Zak Vyner has challenged himself and his Bristol City teammates to dust themselves down and return to winning ways when they travel to the Stadium of Light to face Sunderland on Tuesday evening.
The Robins failed to secure back-to-back league wins for the first time this season as they were miles off of the pace against Portsmouth on Saturday afternoon, with John Mousinho’s side barely having to break a sweat for their 3-0 win at Fratton Park.
Colby Bishop’s first-half goal and second-half strikes from Josh Murphy and Callum Lang ensured that all three points would be remaining with Mousinho’s men, much to the frustration of the travelling supporters who had braved Storm Darragh to cheer their side on at Fratton Park.
Although conditions made things more difficult, City were their own worst enemy as they gifted the home side two of their three goals by attempting to play through Pompey’s press, only for Jason Knight to twice have his pocket picked on the edge of his own penalty area. While City did have a few chances to claw their way back into the game the clearest of which fell to Anis Mehmeti and Sinclair Armstrong, Vyner felt the scoreline was a fair reflection of the game on the South Coast.
“We weren’t at the races today at all, too many lost duels, too many bad decisions,” Vyner told City’sclub media after the full-time whistle. “Not good enough at all. We’ve strung some good performances together even when we maybe haven’t got the result so it is a tough one to take.
“Luckily in football, we get to go again on Tuesday to try and put it right but it’s a sore one for us to have to deal with now but it’s only us who can deal with it. We have to look at ourselves and put it right.”
The Robins make the trip to the North East on Tuesday evening as they face Regis Le Bris’ Sunderland side at the Stadium of Light. The Black Cats are yet to lose at home so far this season, but their win over Stoke City on Saturday was their first in seven games with results slowing down slightly after an excellent start to the campaign.
Liam Manning’s side have only lost consecutive games on two occasions this season, the last of which came only a matter of weeks ago when the Reds lost to both Burnley and Watford in the space of four days, but Vyner believes City are capable of bouncing back against Sunderland.
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“We get to go and put it right on Tuesday and make sure that the performance is at a level that we’ve come to terms with this season,” the defender explained post-match. “It’s a quick turnaround, we head up the road and try to put it right on Tuesday.
“We’ll pull and pick this apart and take the good from it and try and put it right in some capacity. It’s hard to think of that now but we’ll have to dust ourselves down and do that.”
After Tuesday night’s showdown with the Black Cats, the Robins welcome QPR to Ashton Gate for the early kick-off on Saturday afternoon with a trip to The Hawthorns to face West Brom the final game on the agenda before Christmas.
Hopefully, Manning’s side will be able to head into the festive period on a more positive note and close the gap to the play-off positions after a difficult few weeks of results following the November international break.