Sunderland fell to a shock FA Cup defeat at Port Vale on Sunday

Régis Le Bris says he hopes his Sunderland players have learned a valuable lesson from their shock FA Cup defeat at Port Vale.

The Black Cats missed the opportunity to advance to the quarter final of the competition at Vale Park, beaten 1-0 by the side bottom of League One and ten points adrift of safety at this stage. Le Bris defended his players after they produced a laboured performance in possession in particular, and said his feeling wasn't that they had been complacent or underestimated the opposition. He said instead he felt it was a lesson about the importance of consistency and being able to quickly refocus, after a brilliant backs-to-the-wall win against Leeds United days previous.

"It was mainly about performance," Le Bris said.

"It's fragile - three days before, we won at Leeds. It was an important game and it wasn't easy to win there at Leeds, we deserve full credit for that. Then after that, at the professional level, you have to reset quickly, change your mind, and go like it was your first time in professional football. It's not easy to do that, so you have to learn it.

"I don't think we were complacent," he added.

"I don't think so. It's not my feeling. It's more about the ability to reset. It's not easy, to be fair, but we are at the best level in England, so we have to show it. It wasn't the case today."

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RLB’s verdict on what went wrong for Sunderland at Port Vale

"In this competition, it's more about mindset, fighting spirit, rather than the tactical or technical qualities," Le Bris said.

"Probably, we were not consistent enough [in these areas].

“I think some of the players were at their level, but especially to create the solution today, we were not good enough. The pitch levels everything. It's not an excuse, but it is what it is. The conditions are the conditions. Even with that, I think we should have found a solution, and it wasn't the case. For our player, you always need to experience different situations. Sometimes it's tough, and even negative, because of the result. I hope they will learn from this experience.

“We won the two previous fixtures in the FA Cup, and it wasn't easy, Everton and Oxford,” Le Bris added.

“So we showed that we wanted to [progress], but sometimes you can't. You need to accept how relentless the competition is, so it's about key moments. We still need to learn. I think our team is really young. There are 14 new players in the squad that you can't manage every situation. So I hope it will be a good experience for the future. Sometimes it's negative, but it's even stronger [for you]. So I hope it will help our players.”

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