Sunderland boss Mike Dodds issues strong verdict on Watford defeat as poor form continues

Mike Dodds insisted that his Sunderland side didn’t deserve be on the losing side as their dismal run continued with a 1-0 defeat to Watford at Vicarage Road.

Much of the first half played out with little excitement but the Black Cats did have the best two chances just before the break through Chris Rigg and Trai Hume. Jack Clarke then missed a couple of good openings shortly after the interval, with the visitors punished when substitute Ryan Andrews finished a counter attack midway through the second half.

In truth Sunderland created little in the closing stages as they looked to get back on level terms, though Patrick Roberts missed a good chance when substitute Luis Hemir found him in the box. The interim Sunderland head coach insisted that he couldn’t be too critical of his players despite their poor form continuing, but added that it was a lesson in how ruthless they need to be at second-tier level.

"I'm really upset for the group and I'm really upset for the fans, whether it be those that travelled down or those in the North East,” Dodds said.

“That's a game that we shouldn't be losing, and we shouldn't even be drawing. Even some of their staff and players said the same as I was coming off the pitch there. They said they'd got away with one. It's a real bitter pill to swallow but I've just said to the players - that's football. They've got to realise that they've got to take their chances, it could have been a three or four-nil game. And then it's a really poor goal from our perspective to give away, they play through midfield far too easily - we haven't laid a glove on them and they've breached our backline. What I would also say is that is one moment in 90 minutes where I felt out of possession we didn't do what we should do. But it's the Championship, they're big moments and you can't take your foot off the gas.

"They're my two big disappointments, I think we've had four or five big chances - not half chances,” he added.

“Jack has had a couple of chances we've one at the ned with pat and Hemir, Riggy has a chance where he could do better. Trai had a good chance where the keeper comes out and smothers it, there's four or five there off the top of my head. i can't be over critical of the group, I was critical last week and after the Blackburn game and rightly so, but if I take the emotion out of the result and I'm looking purely at the performance - if we play that game ten times over then we're going to win it nine times."

Dodds said improving the team’s output in the final third is going to have improve: “You can’t get away from the facts. We’re not conceding many goals other than the Blackburn game and Southampton - though I can live with that one because we knew that was going to be a basketball game. But we’re not scoring, so I’m not going to sit here and try to spin positives. What I will say is that at least today we’ve created big chances, and they are big chances rather than half ones. So that would be a positive from today because that’s something I could have said after the Millwall game.”