Sunderland boss Tony Mowbray delivers verdict on 'important' win against Norwich City

Tony Mowbray hailed an important win for his Sunderland side, and said they were entirely deserving of the three points at the Stadium of Light.

The Black Cats fell behind against the run of play when Hwang Ui-Jo converted Kellen Fisher's cross, but Trai Hume's deflected effort and Dan Neil's clever dink got Mowbray's side ahead at half time.

Jack Clarke then added a late penalty to secure the three points and bring an emphatic end to a poor recent run of results.

Mowbray said his pre-match work had focused on showing his team the positives of their recent performances, and was pleased to see the work they had done on breaking down deep-lying defences paid off.

"I think it was the right result for the way the game went," Mowbray said.

"It felt a little bit here we go again when they scored, I don't think they'd been in our half up until that point and yet we're a goal behind.

"We showed great character to get in front before half time, with some really good, positive front-foot play. It was important for us, I thought it was harsh on us to have lost three games - there were some okay performances in there. You have to take it on the chin when you lose and what was important for us was to keep the confidence up. We showed them a lot of clips of the Leicester game and the rewards of playing on the front foot. We did that well today, suffocated them for long spells and it wasn't really until the last 15 that they asked questions of us, and then in that period we could have scored more goals on the break.

"I'm looking forward to having a week now to prepare for the next game.

"I was pretty confident that the players were still confident. I talk to our analysts a lot and I wanted lots of positive clips from the games we didn't win, to make sure they didn't forget that this is a good team and we're going to win a lot of games. Yes we have to learn from defeats, but we want them to stay positive - watching the wide players eliminating defenders, midfielders flooding the box.

"They still believe that we're a really good side in this league. We know we'll lose some games."

Mowbray said he had no qualms with Norwich City's opener, and said it was a lesson for Pierre Ekwah and his side to learn from.

"I had a chat with Pierre, not an angry one, but just a chat about what happened," Mowbray said.

"He's waiting for the linesman to put his flag up and the full back comes bombing past. He wasn't offside and he got caught. For me, it's fine, it's a lesson.

"I didn't knock too much confidence and belief, I think they felt they were on top and dominating. We did a lot of work on breaking down deep blocks and we did. It would be nice for our strikers to score, but we got it done. We deserved it, our performances have warranted wins and today it definitely did."