HE might have made eight changes to his starting line-up, but Phil Parkinson says his Sunderland side should still have been good enough to see off League Two Mansfield Town.

The Black Cats crashed out of the FA Cup at the first-round stage as George Lapslie’s second-half header condemned them to a 1-0 defeat at the hands of a Mansfield side that were able to celebrate their first win of the season at the 15th time of asking.

Danny Graham twice went close in the opening ten minutes, drilling a shot against the post and heading against the crossbar from inside the six-yard box, but despite enjoying plenty of possession against their lower-league opponents, Sunderland’s players struggled to carve out clear-cut opportunities after falling behind.

Parkinson said: “I’ve picked a team which I felt was capable of winning. There are players that are injured that didn’t figure, and there are one or two we chose not to play because they’d played a lot of football and other players needed the game, but the team should have been strong enough to win.

“Over the course of the game, we put enough quality deliveries into the box to have won the game. The decision-making wasn’t always great and the quality wasn’t always great, but there was enough over the 90 minutes, but our desire and movement to get across people and make something of those moments wasn’t good enough to get through.

“The one cross they’ve put in, the lad has gone in with real desire, got across two of our defenders, and headed it in. I’ve looked at our deliveries, and there is more than enough quality gone into the box to have won the game comfortably.”

The one bright spot from a Sunderland perspective was the debut performance of Callum McFadzean, with the left wing-back getting forward impressively and setting up both of Graham’s early opportunities.

Parkinson said: “It was early for Callum to play. He's only been with us a couple of weeks but with Denver (Hume) and Goochy (Lynden Gooch) being out, we decided to play him.

“I had to protect him by bringing him off towards the end, because we don't want him getting injured going forward. But he showed what he is all about, and put in three of four top class deliveries. 

“He's different to Denver in the way he gets into those areas, but he can be equally effective. I think he'll be a good signing for us.”