Sunderland FC

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Sbragia rues defensive lapses

05 Feb 2009 - 08:09:02

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Ricky Sbragia blamed defensive lapses for Sunderland's FA Cup defeat at the hands of Blackburn Rovers.

The Wearsiders lost Wednesday's fourth round replay 2-1 after extra-time at Ewood Park with the Black Cats boss unhappy with the defending for Rovers' first-half equaliser and late decisive strike.

Sunderland had taken the lead in the seventh minute courtesy of a David Healy opener.

"I thought their equaliser was a soft goal, it took a deflection off Anton (Ferdinand)," he told the club's official website.

"I thought the longer the game went on, the more likely we looked to win it as we started playing a bit better.

"We didn't want extra-time but we looked the better team in it and created one or two chances. When it went into extra-time I had a sneaky feeing we would win it.

"But we didn't put away our chances and then we switched off. We shouldn't have given a free-kick away and then we switched off when it was taken.

"We really need to be able to see games out, we're not doing it. At 1-0, we should take control of the game and dictate it better but Blackburn came back.

"On too many occasions we've gone one up and not seen the game out and it's disappointing.

"It was disappointing to go out but we have and now we look forward to a big game against Stoke on Saturday."