AS if losing to Birmingham City wasn't bad enough at the weekend - Sunderland are also facing the loss of one of their key performers for the next two games.

To compound the Black Cats' disappointment at St Andrew's, Dan Ballard picked up a tenth booking of the season for a second-half tackle on Birmingham forward Tyler Roberts.

The centre-half will now have to sit out the forthcoming matches against Swansea and Norwich.

"It's obviously frustrating," said Ballard. "I know I've been on the threshold for a while now so I've had to be a little bit more cautious.

"The way I play I tend to pick up more bookings than others. I didn't feel it was a booking today, but there have been many like that this season.

"It's frustrating having to miss games. I never go to hurt players or whatever so it is frustrating but they are the rules so I'll miss the next two unfortunately.

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"When you play most games, most players will sort of get up to that tally. It does feel, I don't know if harsh is the right word, but it's extremely frustrating."

Saturday's defeat leaves Sunderland in tenth position in the table, four points off the play-off positions, and means they have now won just one of their last 12 away games.

"We did have a really good first half, which again makes it frustrating," said Ballard. "We knew at half-time we needed to do the same thing but they changed, they pressed us a lot higher and I think we struggled to keep the ball and struggled to change to go a little bit more long ball and keep the pressure off us.

"Of course they are chasing the game so can throw a lot more at it and we never caught them on the break to finish the game."