Dan Ballard reached an important milestone in his Sunderland career on Friday, with the Northern Irish international racking up his 50th appearance for the lads. Ballard has been making some comments on this achievement.
“It’s a proud moment, I’ve enjoyed my time here a lot and the fans have welcomed me from the start. I’ve tried to repay them with my performances on the pitch and I hope they can see that I will always give 100 per cent. It’s nice to hit 50 games and I hope that there will be many more than that. I feel really settled off the pitch too but I really enjoy coming into training everyday and working with the lads and the staff. All the players want to put in performances for the fans because they travel home and away. They are there every week, no matter whether we are in good form or bad form. It's a real driver for me and a lot of the other lads. Of course it is a young squad and we need people to step up being a defender, you want to be a natural leader from the back. You want to help the players in front of you but off the pitch as well. We focus a lot on getting a good chemistry between us in the squad, I think we have built good relationships around the team. I am really happy here and a lot of the other lads are too so I am just really enjoying my football.”
