Jack Ross: Sunderland need to keep clean sheets | OneFootball

Last season, Sunderland lost a League One-low five matches but drew a whopping 19 games, falling six points short of automatic promotion before losing to Charlton in the play-off final.

In spite of their dominance, the Black Cats only managed to earn a clean sheet 13 times.

It was more of the same on Tuesday as Sunderland dropped valuable points once again, drawing Rotherham 1-1 after Marc McNulty’s first-minute strike was cancelled out by Jake Hastie.

Speaking after the match, manager Jack Ross placed an emphasis on his side’s need to keep clean sheets.

“We’re disappointed not to get the win,” said Ross. “We had a period of superiority, scored, and had other opportunities to go further ahead.

“But I’m loath to be too critical of the front players because they’ve delivered this season and done well for a while now.

“The harsh reality for us is that we need to keep clean sheets. We’re ten games into the season now in league and cup, and we haven’t kept a clean sheet.

“That buck and responsibility always stops with me. It’s my fault today – we need to continue to work hard at it to make sure we begin to do it (keep clean sheets) because if we do that, we turn what has been a decent ten games into a really good ten games following on from now.

“It was a difficult game against a good side, but on reflection, we’re disappointed with the chances we had and then the failure to keep a clean sheet because that’s turned three points into one.”