Phil Parkinson responds to criticism of his Sunderland team selection and playing style

Phil Parkinson admits he must find a better balance in his Sunderland side as their woes in front of goal continued.
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The Black Cats produced little in a woeful 1-0 defeat to Gillingham last weekend, with Parkinson facing heavy criticism for his team selection that saw Sunderland move to five defenders at the back.

Chris Maguire came on only as a late substitute, while Duncan Watmore and Aiden McGeady played no part.

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Parkinson admits he needs to find better solutions but insists the return of Charlie Wyke and Lynden Gooch will also be key.

Gillingham score a late goal against Phil Parkinson's Sunderland sideGillingham score a late goal against Phil Parkinson's Sunderland side
Gillingham score a late goal against Phil Parkinson's Sunderland side

“We went with the set up that we thought would give us the best balance to get the win, we weren’t able to do that," he said.

“Did we threaten enough? No.

“There’s always a solution and we’ve got to find that from the group of players we’ve got. I’m determined to do that, obviously there’s the opportunity in January to help the existing players, but equally there’s more to come from the lads we’ve got.

“We haven’t threatened enough, I think it’s personnel as well as me striving to get the right balance in the team to allow us to do that.”

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Sunderland have been noticeably more direct in recent games, with the service to the forward line particularly poor.

Parkinson insists that was not part of his gameplan at Gillingham and says his players must be ‘braver’ in possession.

“We set out to play because we knew that if we didn’t pass the ball we’d get drawn into the way the want to play, and they are better at that than us,” he said.

“At times they put us under pressure and with the tightness of the pitch, we didn’t show enough quality often enough.

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“If you’ve got Will and Marc up there you’ve got to find the quality into feet in and around the box, so it certainly wasn’t a directive from us. We’d worked on needing to brave on the ball and play, but it was a difficult game, Gillingham make it hard for you.

“It ended up being very scrappy like a lot of games down there are, and we had to do better to avoid that.”