DAVID MOYES always knew he was facing a tough challenge to turn Sunderland around and his first five weeks in the job have only supported his initial view.

But the experienced manager, after spells with Preston, Everton, Manchester United and Real Sociedad before turning up on Wearside, is convinced he knows exactly what is required – he just needs time to do it.

He recorded a first competitive victory in the midweek EFL Cup victory over Shrewsbury Town, but heads to Southampton this afternoon looking to improve on a Premier League record of two games, two defeats.

A lengthy injury list, which has seen goalkeeper Vito Mannone join other key players on the treatment table, has certainly not helped, nor has the length of time it has taken for a decent number of new signings to arrive following Sam Allardyce’s departure to lead England.

Those, though, are the short-term issues he is looking to address before, hopefully, he can attack the factors which he feels will lead to brighter times.

But Moyes, who had been waiting for the right job before taking on the challenge, is still enjoying the task of reviving the fortunes at the Stadium of Light.

He said: “This is a test, this is a test. But I came back for a bit of excitement, I wanted excitement. That was my thing. I wanted to be excited by the job. I'm excited by the job.

“I'm looking at it and saying 'I can see why, I can understand totally why things have not always gone right here, in the short term'.

“I can see it, and I'm trying in a way to put bits of that right. I'm never, ever going to get it right in the short term but we're trying to get the foundations.”

Moyes has, arguably, encountered more problems than any of his most recent predecessors during the first few weeks of his reign; particularly as the timing of Allardyce’s departure was at the height of pre-season.

The 53-year-old remains confident of being able to succeed at Sunderland, but is warning that it will take time.

He said: “It never looks like it until it grows, and when it does you can say 'Remember when we started doing this and this?' It never looks like it at the start.

“I'm hoping it will be soon, I'm hoping in six months or one year you might say 'I can see it, there may have been a few tears along the journey but I can see why that started'. That's my hope, it really is.

“But I need a bit of help to get that going, we need a couple of results to go our way to get us up and running.

"I see everything as far as the club, Southampton might not be a bad model to look at, but has that not been implemented eight, nine ten years ago, so you could say come on, I can't come here with the plan and say this is how we're going to go, because in truth this is firefighting.

“I have to try to put small bushfires out first. Once I get the small bushfires out then I don't need to deal with the big fires so I've got to make sure that I can get a grip and keep putting fires out and see if I can continue to build if I can.”

The arrival of Javier Manquillo this week on a season-long loan from Atletico Madrid has taken the number of new additions to six under his watch, but he needs a lot more if he is to stand a chance of steering the club clear of relegation.

Moyes has no regrets, even after the setback of being told goalkeeper Mannone will be out for at least three months with torn elbow ligaments.

The Sunderland boss said: “I felt midweek we were as bare as we could nearly get, and I hope that if we can get Fabio Borini back, John O'Shea, Lee Cattermole, we could have a stronger base to start from.

“At the moment we don't have that because of the injuries. I don't really like talking about injuries but it is a fact that we would have been a bit stronger.

“We've had to throw in Paddy McNair and Donald Love, boys, at the moment. What has come out of it is Lynden Gooch, he's probably the one you'd say, well, maybe nobody would have put him in. He was on loan at Doncaster. He's come in and actually looked as if he can play at this level. So you would say right away, there's a real positive.

“But undoubtedly, we are patching up just now and I do hope that by next Wednesday I'm able to say 'Doesn't this look a bit more rosy?' It won't be rosy until we get some injuries back as well, because I just couldn't bring in enough to cover the damage that's been done.”