Poyet ready for Black Cats rescue mission

Gus Poyet is relishing the “great and difficult challenge” of keeping Sunderland in the Premier League after being unveiled as the club’s sixth manager in less than five years.

The 45-year-old Uruguayan is adamant he will not need to compromise the brand of fluent, attacking football for which he made his name in his previous managerial role at Brighton but accepted he will be judged by his ability to secure Sunderland’s top-flight future.

Poyet brushed aside comparisons with his predecessor Paolo Di Canio, whose tumultuous 13-match reign came to an end last month amid mounting criticism of the club’s summer transfer policy under director of football Roberto Di Fanti, with whom Poyet will now work.

And he stressed his desire to ensure a greater role for popular former player Kevin Ball, who inspired improved performances against Liverpool and Manchester United in his interim role and had made no secret of his desire to be given the job on a permanent basis.

Poyet said: “When I started my managerial career just like when I started my playing career, I tried to aim for the best and my aim was to prove I am good enough for the Premier League. Now I have got my chance. It is a great and difficult challenge but I am ready for it.

“When you are in the situation we are in everybody will say it is going to be very difficult. But the big thing is to believe and be convinced, and from what I have already seen I do believe we can be saved now.”

Despite his own reputation for volatility, culminating in his contested dismissal on an unspecified charge of gross misconduct after guiding Brighton to the Championship play-offs last season, Poyet cast an aura of calm and focus in sharp comparison to his predecessor.

He accepted he will need to work closely with long-term club men like Ball if he is to prove wrong those critics who view his appointment as a gamble, and rescue a season which sees the Black Cats stranded at the foot of the table with just one point from their first seven games.

“I have had one job as a manager so far and every time a new manager arrives he wants to stay as long as possible and prove he was the right choice,” he said.

“I’m a positive person and I want to prove myself and I hope at the end of the season I will be sitting here smiling.

“I have already spoken to Kevin and he doesn’t know yet how important he is going to be for me. It is clear you need someone with the qualities Kevin has so I am going to count on him a lot.”