Sunderland boss Tony Mowbray delivers this verdict on what went wrong for his side in second-half collapse

Mowbray's Sunderland took a two-goal lead into the interval despite the absence of Patrick Roberts, with Amad and Dan Neil establishing a well-deserved advantage.

Burnley got back into the game through a set-piece goal, an area which Mowbray has previously admitted is a major issue in the absence of so many of his most physical players.

Mowbray then felt his side went away from the game plan that had served them so well through the opening stages.

"The first half was about the intensity from us, the intensity to stop a good team from playing and to ask questions of them in turn," Mowbray said.

"They play a very high line, try to impose their style on you, and we decided that we didn't want to the team that plays 5-4-1 against them and allow them to have 70% possession. We had a go, played on the front foot and got the rewards of that.

"The second half - it was probably hard to maintain that intensity level, they showed their quality. Getting that first goal when they did gives them a lot of energy and drive.

"They could probably smell it and vice versa we were probably in protect mode rather than doing what we'd been doing, being aggressive, push our full backs on and play a high line, play balls in behind them and push them back.

"They have some real quality, the third goal, he steps inside and bends it in the far corner, the second maybe a cross but is similar.. the first one is a set play and we've been through, I can't turn 5ft 7 midfielders into 6ft 3 players who can deal with their big defenders. We've got Corry Evans marking the defender who heads it back, he's 5ft 8, it's where we are at the moment. It's very difficult for us to make that first contact. We talk about players like Ross Stewart, he’s a goalscorer for us but he’s 6ft 3 who helps us immensely on set plays, Ellis Simms is the same. Dan Ballard, Aji Alese… it’s difficult for us. We’re trying to mark zonally across the six-yard box, we’ve probably only got Danny Batth who is above 6ft. I’m only saying what you can all see.

"In my opinion, we needed to narrow their back four, play a lot of diagonal balls in behind to turn them round, get our full backs high to push them back. That's what he did so well in the first half, why we stopped in the second half... it's probably going into protection mode in the mind.

"It's difficult to keep the intensity up and all the analysis suggested that they'd be best team we play, we disrupted them really well in the first half but we couldn't maintain it."

Sunderland return to action away at Luton Town next Saturday.