Phil Smith's tour diary: Inside Sunderland's (sort of) win over Rangers and why Alex Neil is encouraged

Bailey Wright is wandering over to take his place in the dugout when he hears a shout from the visiting supporters.

'Ha'way, get over here sexy!', is the command.

Sunderland’s summer of promotion love isn’t over yet, clearly. Wright can hardly refuse. High fives, selfies and hugs aplenty for the Australian who has had quite simply the summer of his life, a play-off win and a World Cup spot secured.

Wright's popularity on Wearside has soared even further in the wake of his outstanding run through the latter half of the season, and he is serenaded to the tune of KC and the Sunshine Band on multiple occasions through the game.

The sun is out and this is a club on the up. Wright is not the only to feel the love and the positivity carries on right until the end of the night, even when the lights have quite literally all gone out and any chance of returning to the pitch is long gone.

The timing of Estádio Municipal de Albufeira's power cut could not have been much worse. The daylight had been gone a matter of moments, and the players had only just returned to the pitch to start for the second half.

Alex Neil now has some logistical headaches to solve, because he had carefully mapped out the minutes each player would get over these two friendlies and so now he has to go back to the drawing board.

There will have been Sunderland fans here who had flown out just for this game, and so the disappointment at seeing it cut short will have been acute.

It was a frustrating sequence of events for everyone.

There was much for the Black Cats to take comfort from, though.

Sunderland had the better of the game throughout the opening 45 against a strong Rangers side. Alex Pritchard was the standout player on the pitch, linking up well with Elliot Embleton and Patrick Roberts either side of him.

Dan Neil looked refreshed after the summer break and the defensive shape was strong.

Only on a couple of occasions did Rangers threaten. On the first time the impressive Dan Ballard stepped in to challenge Scott Wright, before Luke O'Nien made two excellent covering challenges either side of his goal.

This was another one of those O'Nien performances, on the ball and off it, that makes you wonder how high his ceiling could be as a defensive player striding forward.

Not one Sunderland player looked out of place at what was a good standard.

There is still much to be done in the transfer market but Neil's relaxed demeanour as he discussed that after the game told you there is no panic at this stage.

It will not be an easy season but there is a real platform here, and you left the ground feeling upbeat about what's ahead.

At which point, by the way, every single floodlight roared back into life, bathing the stadium in a brilliant glow.

Typical. Never dull.

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