David Moyes: Sunderland challenges as big as I faced at Manchester United

Sunderland are bottom and four points adrift of safety, face mounting injury problems and have very limited room for manoeuvre in the January transfer window.

But the 53-year-old Scot – who spent 11 years at Everton before spells at Manchester United and Real Sociedad – is determined to rise to the challenge of keeping the Black Cats in the Premier League.

“The challenge is as big as anything I have faced,” said Moyes.

“But every club you manage has its own challenges.

“Whether you are at Manchester United and the expectation is you are at the top of the league or at Everton where they are pushing for Europe every year.

“We have our challenges here at Sunderland. They all rank similar but this one for me is really important.

“I want to be a Premier League manager. I want to show that with the team we have got and there has been signs of improvement.

“We will try and galvanise and keep it going.”

Sunderland head into today’s game at home to Watford on the back of defeats to Swansea City and Chelsea.

But over the past six games, Sunderland have won three times and Moyes is keen to get back to winning ways quickly after being impressed with the reaction to defeat at Swansea against Chelsea.

“Against Chelsea, the crowd stuck with us, they thought we were in with a chance right up until the end,” he added.

“I think the fans realise we are starting to get the levels of the players up, there will be limitations at times, whether it be bits of quality.

“The big thing I am looking for is that energy on the pitch. If anybody is not running then I would say it is not any good to me.

“At the moment, that is what we need.

“We have got arguably the best English goalkeeper in Jordan Pickford and the best English goalscorer at the moment in Jermain Defoe.

“So, I don’t want us to be feeling downtrodden in anyway.

“Far from it. We have people that are excelling at this club in their positions.

“We don’t want Jordan to be making saves all the time but he is there if we need him and he will save us points and Jermain will score us goals to win games.

“We need to fit around the other bits to help those two who play a big part for us.”