Chris Coleman has urged his players to ‘earn the right’ once again on Saturday when Birmingham City come to town.
Sunderland welcome Steve Cotterill’s side to the Stadium of Light this weekend, with securing back-to-back victories high on the agenda.
A point at league leaders Wolverhampton Wanderers gave Coleman hope going into last Saturday’s home fixture against Fulham, and the Lads didn’t disappoint as Josh Maja marked his league debut with an unforgettable match winning goal.
And while Maja’s goal helped lift the Black Cats out of the Sky Bet Championship bottom three, Coleman has insisted the lads are far from where they should be as we head into the festive fixtures.
Speaking to safc.com, the Welshman shared his delight at the feel-good factor resonating from Saturday’s win, but called for his players to not get carried away and play with a "desperation."
“I look at it and think it is three points and that is all we got,” he said.
“I take loads of positives out of the performance; the attitude of the players and the fans were brilliants – they stuck by us.
“But it is gone, it is behind us, so we have got to look to Birmingham. We have got to focus on the next challenge and we need to take care of that.
“We are still in a situation we need to be far from and to be away from it is going to take a lot of hard work and more weekend’s like the one we have just had.
“It was great, fantastic and I am delighted for everybody because everyone deserves it, but we have got to go and earn it again in this game coming up at the weekend.”
“There is only one game we have failed to score in and that was Wolverhampton but again we got a great point,” he continued.
“We were down 10 men and then we were down to 10 men in the match against Reading.
“All in all when I look at it after five games so far, I am pleased with what I have seen.
“Is there room for improvement? Of course. But I think the players have worked hard and we need to continue to work hard and we need to have a little bit of a desperation about us.
“We can’t ever think we are in a comfort zone because we have won one game. It doesn’t matter what you have done it is all about what you are going to do in the future.
“We need to have a little bit of fear, a little bit of healthy fear to make sure going into the next game we do everything we can to get to the maximum and that’s what the attitude has to be.”