Perhaps the only way the League Cup win could have gone better would have been to get the Argentine a goal from open play and quite how he missed having gone around Sunderland goalkeeper Vito Mannone remains a mystery.
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The Black Cats suffered another defeat, this time a 3-0 reversal at Manchester United, on Saturday even though there were signs of improvement before the opening goal arrived deep in stoppage-time at the end of the first half.
Advocaat has religiously stuck to his favoured 4-3-3 system throughout this season, yet Sunderland have shipped an alarming 23 goals in nine games in all competitions and put a paltry two points on the board in seven league matches.
But they need to start finding ways to win games and quick, and their next game is against the away day specialists West Ham United when they meet at the Stadium of Light next weekend. It just killed us.
“We can’t keep saying we have a lot of games to go”, said Advocaat.
“We do back him, not that he needs it. He is a very experienced manager”.
“We were good for that first half – controlled, blocking things”, added the on-loan Ruben Kazan midfielder. “Plus, [Fabio] Borini as a striker had problems keeping the ball, that’s why I brought on [Steven] Fletcher”, he told reporters.
“We need to show some courage rather than just losing so easily like we did on Saturday”, M’Vila said, quoted by the Chronicle.
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M’Vila admitted that “killed” Sunderland, with Wayne Rooney’s goal 40 seconds after the restart, allowing United to coast through to the finale, albeit Ola Toivonen and Patrick van Aanholt spurned second-half chances. Too easy. The third goal the same.
