ALEX NEIL has revealed that a week of training-ground frustration proved the key to Sunderland’s stoppage-time victory over Gillingham at the weekend.

As had been the case in their two previous home games against Fleetwood and Crewe, Sunderland found themselves taking on opponents prepared to station all ten of their outfield players behind the ball as they lined up against the Gills.

The defensive tactics were not a surprise to Neil, who had anticipated such an eventuality and tailored last week’s training sessions to the challenge of breaking down a massed defence.

The Sunderland boss had preached the importance of remaining patient, and his words had clearly been heeded as his side’s perseverance was rewarded with the stoppage-time header from Nathan Broadhead that lifted the Black Cats back into the play-off positions.

“I was telling the lads all week it was going to be hard to break them down,” said Neil. “I wanted to use the sessions to get them used to frustration. I set the other team up in a bank of ten, and said, ‘Right, we need to break them down’.

“What happens in training is that players want to play, score, cut inside and do all the nice things. When you set a bank of ten behind the ball, it’s really frustrating for your forward players. I’ve replicated that pretty much every day this week, and they’ve been extremely frustrated.

“What I’ve then said is, ‘That’s what’s coming, don’t get frustrated because you need to keep committing to the process and eventually you will break it down’. Thankfully, we did. It made that message not untrue. It’s another confirmation in their head that what I’m telling them is not a load of rubbish. So, that’s helpful.”

With his side struggling to break down an obdurate Gillingham defence, it would have been easy for Neil to panic as time ticked away. Instead, he made an astute triple substitution at a pivotal time, claiming his experience in similar situations proved crucial.

“In my opinion, this job is not for an inexperienced manager,” he said. “If you come into something this size, with the expectation it carries, then I think experience is absolutely crucial.

“What I lean on at the moment, when I’m still learning and picking things up, is that I’ve been here before in different scenarios. I’ve been here with different clubs, I’ve been here with different expectations, and I know what it looks like to get out of a league.

“I know what it looks like to create a winning team in a really short space of time. That’s what I’m trying to do at the moment.”