Tony Mowbray is taking Sunderland's back-to-back defeats at Rotherham and Coventry in his stride, insisting such results are part and parcel of life in the Championship. The Black Cats suffered two successive defeats for only the second time this season, losing 2-1 at relegation strugglers Rotherham a week ago and then at the weekend by the same scoreline against the Sky Blues.
Those results saw Sunderland drop out of the play-off spots to ninth in the table at the weekend, slowing the momentum they had built up in the preceding weeks. But, while Mowbray was left frustrated by those results and wants his side to get back on course when Stoke City visit Wearside this weekend, he is looking at the big picture which still sees Sunderland enjoying an excellent season on their return to the Championship.
"We will probably go up and down over the next 12 games," said Mowbray. "We can potentially lose two or three games, and we can potentially win two or three games.
READ MORE: Sunderland's lack of strikers has not translated into lack of goals as all expectations exceeded
"We could drop towards mid-table and think 'oh no', but win two on the bounce and you are back in the top six. That's the league we are in.
"The real positive is that we are not scrambling around at the bottom, worrying that if we lose we drop into the bottom three. We have found a level of consistency that has allowed us to pick up points and we have to try and continue that over the remainder of the season and see where it takes us.
"Without the pressure of 'we must win', in my mind the pressure is there to play well and impose ourselves on the opposition. We can play well and still find a team on a hot day and their strikers take the few chances they get and we lose, or we can go and play a little bit below-par and still score three goals as we did at QPR the other week.
"It's football. It's the nature of the game that the result dictates everything. You were either great or you were terrible, but generally the reality is that you were somewhere in between."
Those back-to-back defeats meant that Sunderland have picked up just a single point from their last three games, but they are still part of the pack chasing a play-off place with just a dozen games to go.
READ NEXT:
- Sunderland make decision over relocation of away fans at the Stadium of Light
- Sunderland to reopen Premier Concourse for season ticket sales after five-year hiatus
- Callum Doyle reflects on 'big' Sunderland loan spell after Coventry's win over Black Cats
- Sunderland's 1973 Road to Wembley relived: Roker Park's greatest night as Man City defeated
- Dan Neil admits Sunderland must add cutting edge to their neat approach play after Coventry loss
