Sam Allardyce criticises Sunderland players for Spurs mindset

Sunderland conceded three goals in a 20-minute spell at White Hart Lane, as Spurs cruised to a 4-1 defeat which eventually became far more straightforward for the hosts than it had been for the opening hour.

Allardyce was left fuming at Sunderland’s players for going for broke in their bid to get back in the game after Spurs went ahead through Mousa Dembele just before the hour mark.

The Sunderland boss believes that if the Black Cats had kept it tight, rather than immediately throwing men forwards to get an equaliser, then the outcome could have been different.

Allardyce said: “Our lads in their wisdom, decided to go and open themselves right up and decided to go and score two.

“You don’t use those tactics at Premier League level, because all it does is allow the opposition more room to score.

“I’m very disappointed we conceded four, even though the lads are tired and we ran out of legs.

“I’d have expected them to hold on to the position we were in and at 2-1, made life extremely difficult for Tottenham.

“But we didn’t. We opened it up.”

Allardyce’s changes didn’t help Sunderland’s hopes of a positive result either - neither switching to five at the back or with those introduced from the bench, particularly debutant Jan Kirchhoff.

The German had featured for just a couple of minutes at former club Bayern Munich this season, and that rustiness showed as he endured a miserable half-hour outing.

Allardyce added: “He’ll need to get to the pace of this game as quickly as he can.

“We hope he can do that and make a contribution.

“But Saturday was certainly a disappointment for him and for us on the penalty he gave away.”