Here's what Tony Mowbray had to say, ahead of hosting Wayne Rooney's Birmingham City at the SoL...
LOOKING FORWARD TO FAN DISPLAY?
“You’re talking about stuff I don’t really know about there but I’m assuming people are holding placards up and creating some sort of message or colour are they? Good. The supporters really are the main thing, for me at this football club, anyone who says ‘what’s it like at Sunderland’, it’s an amazing club and what makes it is the people, the fans, the supporters, it’s quite an incredible football club, they deserve to be playing in the Premier League and that’s part of the journey that we are on to try and see If we can get this club back to where it belongs. I say belongs, you have to do it on the grass on the football pitch but undoubtedly the supporters who can’t effect what goes on on the football pitch other than support the players, it’s quite an amazing club. It doesn’t surprise me if the supporters are doing something special because they’re special every day and we work hard every day to try and give them a team that they can be proud of and we’re doing our best.”
ROONEY
“Well we’ve been watching the matches of course, he seems to have made plenty of changes in every game, I think he’s searching still for his best formula, I only say that because I see the personnel changes in the games, generally three or four each game and he’s looking at his squad I think at the moment.”
NEEDS TIME
“I think you have to judge Wayne over a longer period than four matches, of course you can have a manager bounce sort of thing for a team when a new guy comes in and results swing positively and yet he came in on the back of two wins from John Eustace and now what is it, four defeats or three defeats and one draw or four defeats and a draw I’m not sure but my focus is on us really, I managed against Wayne before when Blackburn had played Derby, he’s a nice guy I like Wayne Rooney, he’s really humble and a nice guy to talk to about football, so I look forward to seeing him on the weekend, he knows that we’ll be trying our best to win and I know Birmingham will be coming desperate to try and get a result before the international break so we look forward to the challenge of the game and hopefully with the backing of our supporters we can find a way to get three more points.”
