A 10th away loss of the campaign – 2-0 at Tottenam on Saturday – places even greater importance on the Stadium of Light clash with Birmingham a week tomorrow.

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All but two of the Black Cats' 20 points have been gleaned at home this campaign and, although losing at White Hart Lane did not worsen their league position too much with most of the other relegation candidates also failing, Murphy accepted the away form is an increasing problem.

"You could say we should have got a point with the chances we had at Spurs, but when we give away terrible goals like we did then it is always going to be an uphill struggle," said Murphy, Sunderland's man-of-the-match at White Hart Lane.

"We started poorly down there and conceded a silly early goal. We had two chances to clear the ball, didn't and they ended up scoring from the cross. There is always pressure on to get results at home. Our home form is decent enough but we really need to start picking up points away from home.

"We have to learn how to get these results quickly and our next game is now absolutely massive."

Birmingham lost to Chelsea at the weekend and, like Sunderland, have this coming weekend off after falling out of the FA Cup at the first hurdle.

That the Black Cats were still in with a shout against Spurs at half-time was something of a miracle after Aaron Lennon's second-minute goal threatened to set up a hammering.

"They had a lot of chances in the first half, and we had to dig deep," said Murphy. "Craig Gordon kept us in it with a few saves, one of them a blinder, and we came out in the second-half knowing we were still in the game.

"We're getting so close to better results away from home and created some good chances. It is a little bit of inexperience on our side that we're not finding a way to finish these games.

"We do look at the positives and the chances we created and hopefully in the next game we can take those chances."