Tony Mowbray makes an honest admission in verdict on what went wrong for Sunderland tonight

Mowbray made three changes to his side as he tries to guard against fatigue, but he also shifted to a 4-4-2 formation that saw Alex Pritchard play out wide and Jack Clarke move through the middle.

He felt that Sunderland were vulnerable to Rotherham’s high-pressing approach and didn’t want to give them any encouragement, but in the end his side lacked their usual fluency and improved in a more familiar system later in the game.

Joe Gelhardt almost set up a grandstand finish by scoring his first Sunderland goal, but in the end Rotherham’s two-goal advantage was too much to overcome.

“We’re left disappointed,” Mowbray said.

"I think you’ve got to give them some credit for the intensity they play at, but we knew that.

“I changed the shape today to try to play slightly differently against their pressure, but I think ultimately, as you saw, we’re better at doing what we normally do.

“I think when we made the changes and brought some more established players onto the pitch, we got better. Maybe because we were 2-0 down, we got better too, but we weren’t at the level we would normally play at, and that’s credit to them.

“You roll it all up, and that’s what you get. I wouldn’t sit here and say it was one thing or the other – we just didn’t perform at the normal level.

“I think a lot of that is down to the intensity they play at. It’s difficult to play against. I’ve likened it to playing against Millwall, you know you are playing against a team who play against the ball very well.

“We changed formation to play, and there’s a logic why you change formation. It’s a team that press really high, so why would you play around your own box when they press so well? You don’t do it, you leave more targets forward.

“There’s a logic to why we changed formation, because of the way they play, but we still should have been better tonight.”