Sunderland manager Gus Poyet says his side are back from the dead after they beat Chelsea 2-1 at Stamford Bridge in the Premier League on Saturday to revive their chances of survival.
Sunderland, who are bottom of the table with 29 points from 34 matches, have enjoyed a fine week, drawing 2-2 against title chasing Manchester City on Wednesday, before downing Chelsea.
"If we don't stay up now it will be a shame because on Wednesday afternoon we were dead," Poyet, whose side trail 17th placed Norwich City by three points with four games remaining told reporters.
"Then we got a point against Man City when it should have been three and we got three (points) here today. That is a great relief and a great opportunity to stay up."
Sunderland made life difficult for Chelsea throughout the match.
They fell behind to an early Samuel Eto'o goal, but were undeterred and fought back superbly as Connor Wickham followed up his midweek double against Manchester City to equalise, before Fabio Borini scored the winner from the penalty spot.
"We needed to fight, we needed to defend, we needed to stayin the game," former Chelsea midfielder Poyet continued.
"We needed to make it difficult for them. We needed to takeour chances, or two.
"Overall, I think coming here at the bottom of the Premier League, playing the way we played, I think is quite decent."
With eight minutes remaining former Chelsea striker Borini, who is on loan from table-topping Liverpool, showed no signs of nerves as he calmly stroked the ball past goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer to inflict Jose Mourinho's first home Premier League defeat in 78 games as Chelsea manager.
"Everybody is going to be talking about Fabio now because he is a Liverpool player," Poyet said.
"He is going to have a few texts from a few friends at Liverpool for sure. But I can assure you he only played for Sunderland today, he didn't play for anyone else."
Poyet, who has been in charge of Sunderland since October,believes that beating Chelsea epitomises their season as they seem to perform better against the sides near the top of the table.
Sunderland play fellow strugglers Cardiff City at the Stadium of Light next Sunday, and Poyet is aware that his side will go into the game as favourites after pulling off a shock result against second-placed Chelsea.
"Every time we play against the top teams we perform and play in a better way than we play at the teams at the bottom," he added.
"How are we going to convince everyone in England we are the smallest team against Cardiff? Tell me because everyone will expect us to beat them. But with a result like today we can expect anything from us now."
Comments
0 comment