18 superb photos as Sunderland fans take over Trafalgar Square ahead of play-off final - gallery

Sunderland fans are taking over London ahead of the Championship play-off final - with stunning scenes in Trafalgar Square on Friday night.

Sunderland will be backed by more than 35,000 inside Wembley on Saturday - and fans took over Covent Garden and Trafalgar Square on Friday evening in their thousands. The Echo was there to capture the stunning scenes from the capital. Here is our first gallery - with much more to come.

Régis Le Bris has told his Sunderland players to seize the moment and deliver on their pre-season ambition of winning promotion.

Le Bris revealed in his pre-match press conference that he had asked the players their ambition for the campaign ahead in his first meeting when them at the Academy of Light. Le Bris says the resounding answer was to return to the Premier League, despite having finished 16th in the previous campaign.

The Sunderland head coach said he had seen the potential within the group in his analysis before taking the job, and that key would be helping them to find consistency. "The final will be different but at the same time we are exactly where we wanted to be," Le Bris said.

"I asked them in this very room in my first meeting, what is the purpose of the season? And they told me they wanted to get promoted. Here we are. We'll have this opportunity.

"I'd just received the information from them, it was tough at that moment to know whether they could do it. You can create this ambition throughout the season. Their faith was really strong. Because they were 16th last season the step could have been a bit high. But when I watched the games from last season it was really obvious this team could play really good football but lacked consistency. For me it was possible to improve consistency through methodology and work in the season."

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