Elliott Dickman is hopeful Sunderland under-18s can turn their season around when they face Derby County on Saturday.
The young Black Cats have endured a challenging start to the U18 Premier League and remain at the foot of the table, still chasing their first win.
While impressive draws at Manchester United and Everton have boosted morale in the camp, two defeats against Blackburn Rovers and Liverpool have halted their progression.
However, speaking to safc.com Dickman believes spirit in the camp remains high and has urged the youth team to build on the positives gained from last weekend’s trip to Merseyside.
“We’ve done well in the last few weeks in terms of our performances,” he said.
“Our results have been disappointing but I think some of our performances have warranted more from our performances.
“In the main, we have been pleased with what we have done but we are back on our home turf on Saturday and hopefully we can get our first win.
“We should’ve got something from our last game at Liverpool, we played well and we created some good chances but we just couldn’t take them.
“We have taken the optimism from that game into our training so hopefully that momentum can help us on Saturday, although it's never going to be easy.”
He continued: “We have got to make sure we do the basics right and hopefully if we do that and take our chances then we should be fine.”