Tony Mowbray has revealed just how limited Sunderland's options were going into their New Year's Day game at Blackpool after a sickness bug spread through the camp. The Black Cats came from behind to earn a 1-1 draw at Bloomfield Road as they ended the Christmas period with seven points from a possible nine.
Sunderland had stayed in the North-West between Thursday night's win at Wigan and the visit to Blackpool, using the facilities at Manchester United's Carrington training base to prepare. But Mowbray had a major problem ahead of the Blackpool game, with several players suffering from illness while others including Danny Batth, Lynden Gooch, Dennis Cirkin, Niall Huggins, Aji Alese, Alex Pritchard, and long-term casualty Elliot Embleton, were all ruled out through injury.
Luke O'Nien played despite not feeling 100 percent due to illness, while Corry Evans was named on the bench but with no realistic chance of playing because he had also fallen victim to the bug. "We've had a lot of illness in the camp and maybe that was partly why we started slowly," said Mowbray.
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"Our first day of training after Wigan I think there were only six who trained, and then 11 or 12 the next day. A few of the lads who played have been in their beds the last couple of days with illness.
"We've also got eight or nine injured who would have been strong contenders to start the game. The numbers were getting really short, Luke O'Nien wasn't expected to play until the morning of the game when he said that he didn't feel as bad and that he could give it a go.
"Corry Evans sat on the bench but he wasn't really available. It's great credit to the team that we put out today that they're leaving really, really disappointed that they didn't win.
"We had some big footballers not available and yet they still showed we can give teams more than a good football match."
Mowbray included 15-year-old academy product Chris Rigg amongst the subs to fill out the teamsheet, but said if circumstances had been different he may have given the midfielder his debut. He said: "I never want to put a bench out at such a big football club as this with only five or six players on it - it smacks of small club, really.
"I think we should always be thinking of encouraging young players, enticing them to see that they are not that far away from our first team, so it was good to bring young Riggy up and put him on the bench. If we'd been 4-0 up there was every chance he might have got on the pitch, but it was a tight game and it wasn't really the day for him to come on."
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