Régis Le Bris issues clear Sunderland message after first league defeat and explains what went wrong

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Sunderland saw their unbeaten run come to an end against Plymouth Argyle

Régis Le Bris said his team would learn quickly after their first defeat of the Championship campaign and insists that it has still been a good start to the season.

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Sunderland looked to have rescued a point from a difficult second half when Romaine Mundle scored late in normal time to make it 2-2, but Joe Edwards snatched a late winner to bring the club's unbeaten run to an end. Le Bris said his side were too open in the game and admitted that it was perhaps a sign of opponents working out ways to cope with Sunderland's new philosophy.

He said he was not getting carried away with defeat, just as he had not been carried away at any stage over recent weeks.

"We scored twice away from home, which is not easy," Le Bris said.

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"But even if during the first half, we felt we controlled the game but even then they had something in behind and we weren't in our best shape.

"We conceded twice but then had the strength to come back, which was a good part of the game for us. We concede the third goal which for us, is very disappointing but we are not too down - this is a process and this is a young team who need to learn. This was a new experience. We didn't solve the problems, for example their wingers were able to threaten our defence all the time and we struggled to understand the second balls - we conceded too many counterattacks.

"We have to live many experiences to learn, this team has the potential to learn very quickly. This is a long journey and we will learn quickly. It's a great start for us, really, even after this defeat. We'll have a great review on this game, to understand what went wrong, and we'll find a lot of things we can develop.

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"It's difficult to say at the minute exactly what went wrong but there are I think a couple of things," he added.

"We didn't work together for these last two weeks, and so maybe the references we build during the week are not there. I think also that our opponents are analysis our games, and searching for new solutions. So now, we have to learn quickly."

Le Bris was heartened by the way his side had rallied to apply a lot of pressure on Plymouth in the closing stages, but conceded that they were too open to the counter and allowed the home side to snatch victory.

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"I think you saw the strength in the team, we tried to win but sometimes [it doesn't happen]," Le Bris said.

"We wanted to win and you have this willingness but you need to keep a safe block behind this intention, which wasn't the case."

Sunderland return to action against Middlesbrough at the Stadium of Light next weekend.

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