SAM ALLARDYCE admits Sunderland cannot afford to lose at Norwich City next weekend if they want to retain any hope of avoiding relegation.

The Black Cats remain four points adrift of 17th-placed Norwich, with six games remaining, after Jamie Vardy’s second-half double condemned them to a 2-0 defeat at the hands of league leaders Leicester City this afternoon.

Leicester took another giant stride towards claiming the title as they claimed their fifth successive victory without conceding a goal, but despite matching their opponents for long periods of a closely-fought encounter, Sunderland were left to reflect on a sixth successive game without a victory.

They still have a game in hand on the Canaries, who lost 1-0 at Crystal Palace on Saturday, and continue to produce performances that suggest an improvement in results is possible. However, they are running out of time, and Allardyce accepts their fate will be as good as decided if they lose in Saturday’s lunch-time encounter.

“The key thing now is that we cannot afford to lose at Norwich,” said the Sunderland boss. “Don’t lose. They’d be seven points clear of us if we lose, so that can’t happen. It wouldn’t be mathematically certain with five games to go, but it would be heaping too much pressure on us.

“We’ll try to win, but the most important thing is that we have to make sure we don’t lose because we’ll still have a game in hand.

“The flickers of hope are there. Hopefully, we can achieve the performances, and the opportunities to win, that we saw against West Brom, Newcastle and Southampton in the last six games. That’s the hope that’s still there for us.”

Sunderland looked to be on course for at least a point when they successfully negotiated the opening hour of today’s game, but as has been the case on a number of occasions this season, mistakes at both ends of the field proved costly.

First, the Black Cats’ back four switched off as Danny Drinkwater played a long ball over the top, enabling Vardy to outpace Younes Kaboul to score. Then, when Sunderland were presented with a glorious opportunity for an equaliser with eight minutes left, Jack Rodwell failed to find the target when well placed in the penalty area.

“Your focus against a team that is top of the league is always very important,” said Allardyce. “We’ve allowed ourselves one slip, which we should have mastered. Everybody knows Leicester play lots of balls over your defence to try to get Vardy in. We slipped up once, allowed Vardy in and he scored.

“That was disappointing. I’d have preferred them to score any other way apart from that because that’s his main threat. We’d coped with it okay up until then, but that’s no good if you let him in once. They’re top of the league because Vardy and (Riyad) Mahrez are two of the top goalscorers. You couldn’t afford to give him a chance like that, and he certainly punished us.

“Then the turning point was Jack Rodwell’s miss, which is becoming one of our problems now. We’re not converting chances, so here we are. We’ve lost the game, even though we tried our very best playing against the team at the top of the league.”

Leicester have now claimed 19 of the last 21 points available to them, and there are no signs of Claudio Ranieri’s side slipping up as the tension continues to increase.

Their next two games pit them against West Ham and Swansea, and Allardyce fully expects them to finish the season as champions. He does, however, feel they are able to play a brand of football that he himself was criticised for supposedly championing while he was manager at West Ham.

“I think Leicester are unique in the fact that they don’t have to be pretty,” he said. “They don’t have to play a certain way. The way they’re playing is so good, their fans love it.

“Whereas fans at some bigger clubs might moan about it and complain about them playing ‘not the right type of football’, it’s terrific for them.

“Each and every player is playing better, and with more consistency, than they’ve ever done in their life before. I think that’s the beauty of it – it’s not just three or four, it’s all of them. They don’t seem to put a foot wrong and good luck to them, that’s what confidence gives you.

“When you’ve got two leading goalscorers, that’s why they are where they are. And then they’ve found a way of not conceding goals as well. They’ve got both combinations spot on, and that’s why they’re riding high at the top of the league.”