Bruce tells Sunderland players: Show some backbone or get out

Steve Bruce has warned Sunderland players to show more “hunger and desire“ to win - or get out of the club.

The new boss has read the riot act to his pampered stars because they have not shown the “mentality“ he reckons is needed to move the club forward.

Bruce is demanding “steel and backbone“ from his squad but was disappointed that they crashed to a 3-1 defeat to Burnley at the weekend. Tonight the Black Cats entertain Birmingham.

In a strongly worded gee-up ahead of this evening, Bruce said: “I need them to show, whether hunger or appetite, is the right word I don’t know. But I need more or they won’t stay at this club.

“The mentality has not been right here for four years.

“But my experience of it is that you have to show resilience, steel and show a bit of backbone to get you through. I told my players yesterday.  I told them I won’t accept it.

“We have been up and down here for four years. It goes beyond that, this is what Sunderland have always tended to do. That’s what we have got to change. We have got to get a level of consistency.

“Burnley was a prime example of where we are. We are either at the top of our game or right at the bottom, there’s no middle ground to make sure we get results. That’s the mentality that we will have to change.

“We can’t just think we will go to a Premier League game and annihilate teams, even though we did that for an hour at Burnley. I was thinking we had a really good team in the first half, but we went from the sublime to the ridiculous in the second half.

“At the moment, this team does not know how to win ugly, it isn’t willing to do the things which need to be done when things aren’t necessarily going your way in a game.

“The big players, big established Premier League players do it week in and week out. That’s why they’re established. You hope my players have got it, otherwise they can’t play at this level.

“The top players stay at the top because they are able to reach a level of consistency at the very top week in and week out.

“Underneath that we still need players who have that mentality, even if they are not in the top four. They have to have that same sort of mentality - because that is what you need in this league.”