Sunderland fan blog: Stoke City win revealed key character within Alex Neil's squad

Saturday’s 1-0 victory over Stoke City proved to be more of the latter than the former, as the Black Cats showed fight, spirit, and determination to overcome the struggling Potteries.

There was no doubt it was a scrappy affair between two sides that, at times, didn’t seem to have enough to break each other down.

For Sunderland though, this was another three points in the bag.

Although, for all the Championship is dictated upon the quality – in comparison to the tough and ragged League One, finding ways to win ugly (and, early) helps massively for Alex Neil’s side early doors.

Within the assessment of this latest win, it’s necessary to look at how Stoke pinned Sunderland in for large parts of the first half. Sunderland were leggy, tired, and struggling for ideas, as the Potteries sought rather empty avenues for attack.

For all the Black Cats created very little, did the hosts create much of any note?

Probably not, but they’d edged the first half display with their pressure and tempo, in an opening 45 where new addition, Liam Delap, seemed to cause Luke O’Nien problem after problem.

So, when Jack Clarke managed to wriggle away from his marker with the half-time whistle on the horizon, the real moment of quality came.

The former-Stoke loanee picked out a sublime floated ball over the nervy defensive line for Ross Stewart, whose finish was rather helped on its way by a struggling Josef Bursik.

At times, it felt like Sunderland had to dig deeper than they previously had so far in this campaign, they picked up six yellow cards over the whole of the 90 minutes, which tells a story itself.

Within Neil’s post-match comments, there stands out one overwhelming message: “You can’t win games playing nice football all the time.”

This latest Championship triumph for Sunderland was more about the three points than anything, but if anything, it showed the Black Cats have a new sense of spirit on their return to the second tier.