Roy Keane feels that too many of his Sunderland players believe they are already safe and have taken their foot off the gas as a result.The Black Cats boss thought that his side lacked their usual passion in the 2-1 Premier League home defeat to Manchester City on Saturday, after a run of three consecutive victories.
The Black Cats are seven points clear of the drop zone with four games remaining, but their manager insists that there is still work to be done if they are guarantee their top flight status for next season.
"If I'd said it once during the week, I'd said if five million times: that we've still got a lot of hard work to do," Keane told the Sunderland Echo.
"We've maybe slackened off two or three per cent and its cost us.
"I could have predicted it in the morning. I felt it in my bones.
"People need to start listening to the right people. They need to listen to me, rather than the nonsense they read in the papers.
"Sunderland safe? I've never read so much rubbish."
With an eagerly anticipated Tyne-Wear derby at local rivals Newcastle to come on Sunday, Keane has reassured the club's supporters that he intends to resolve the problem ahead of the trip to St James' Park.
"You can talk all you want in the dressing room, but I do believe that one or two people took their eyes off the ball. People ask me what I'm going to do about it?" he said.
"I say, we will sort it out this week.
"My players were just waiting for things to happen rather than making it happen.
"Football can be cruel, but if you give away the ball sloppily you are going to get punished.
"We've been sloppy before but we got away with it against West Ham and Fulham.
"People get bogged down by the results, but I'm always looking at the bigger picture.
"Maybe we should have had an open top bus after three wins in a row! But I do believe it is possible to win four games in a row.
"I didn't enjoy watching it (the match against City) and I'm sure the supporters didn't either. City have some good players, but we gave them a helping hand.
"The beauty of football though is there's always another game. You try not to over-analyse defeats or victories but the bottom line is we need to do a lot better than that."
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