Mark Robins slams 'rubbish' Sunderland goal and says Coventry City chucked away victory

And he says Sunderland’s equaliser, courtesy of a composed finish by Benji Kimpioka in the 90th minute, was a ‘rubbish’ goal to concede.

Sunderland were second best for much of the content and the Sky Blues could and probably should have been out of sight by half-time, they led 1-0 at the break thanks to a Dom Hyam header past ex-Coventry keeper Lee Burge.

Reflecting on the 1-1 draw, Robins – who Sunderland were keen to speak to before appointing Phil Parkinson – said: “We’ve thrown it away.

“The goal we conceded was rubbish. We should have seen it out.

“When you look at it that we were a goal up right until deep into the second half the game should be over. We had chances to win it and we haven’t taken them.

“That’s our story at the minute. But to come to Sunderland and play the way we have in the first half was good.

“We started to build momentum and pressure, got our goal from a set play, which has been a long time coming to be fair, but you can see that there are elements in the game where we look outstanding and other areas where we are just not ready. Just not there yet.”

Robins added: “The conversation we have just had is based around communication and dealing with things, and the difficult with it is that you have got very inexperienced players playing in a side alongside more experienced players, but the experienced ones have got to take control of the situation, and we didn’t do that.

“We could have dealt with the situation better and we didn’t. We end up not in the right position from the throw in and then we’re all stretching.

“Then we all dropped deeper and panicked and the ball got kicked against their man and they had the presence of mind for the pass and putting it in the position for them to score was a moment of quality.”