Carl Winchester implores Sunderland fans to keep faith with their team, despite Doncaster let-down

Carl Winchester admits Sunderland let down their supporters again at the weekend - but appealed to fans to keep faith in the players as they try to reignite their promotion challenge.

The Black Cats have endured a disastrous ten days, with a 6-0 defeat at Bolton triggering the sacking of head coach Lee Johnson, then the failure to strengthen key areas on deadline day, followed by a 2-1 reverse at the hands of bottom-of-the-table Doncaster Rovers at the Stadium of Light.

The club has no head coach, has slipped to fourth in the table, and the team's confidence looks shot.

But Winchester says Sunderland cannot wallow in self-pity with another game coming up tomorrow, when the Black Cats head to Cheltenham.

"It's frustrating more than anything," Winchester said of the Doncaster result.

"We can’t go 2-0 down, no disrespect, to a team bottom of the league.

"We just need to get together and then focus on tomorrow, it's a massive game tomorrow.

"On Saturday the crowd was unbelievable, 38,000, fair play to them, they’ve worked hard all week to come here and it's up to us to put a performance on.

"It just wasn’t there, and we're sorry that we let everyone down.

"You have seen all season that we can go and hurt teams, it's just now getting them out there to do it and getting their confidence back and getting some belief again.

"I know it's going to be hard to get that belief after that. I understand it's frustrating for everyone but stick with us because you have seen this season we are capable of it.

"I would just like to thank everyone that came out on Saturday because the support was unbelievable."

"That support can 100 percent make a difference, it's a massive club and with the crowd you need to play under that pressure of