MARTIN O'NEILL will draw on his experiences from a difficult first season at Aston Villa as he attempts to turn Sunderland's foundering fortunes around.

The Black Cats host Villa at the Stadium of Light this afternoon hoping to claim only their second Premier League victory of the season.

Tuesday night's humiliating Capital One Cup defeat to Middlesbrough has ratcheted up the pressure ahead of today's encounter, with the boos that rang out at the final whistle underlining the mounting frustration at Sunderland's inability to break down a succession of opponents.

O'Neill's side have the worst scoring record of any team in the Football League, but it is hardly the first time the Northern Irishman has had to overcome adversity in his long and successful managerial career.

While his four-year spell at Villa Park eventually proved successful, with Villa recording three successive top-seven finishes, the early days of his reign were extremely testing.

His Villa side embarked on a run of one win in 13 matches during his first season in the Midlands – Sunderland's current run is one win in 16 in the league if the end of last season is taken into account – but having turned things around once, the Black Cats boss is confident he can do so again.

“That period at Aston Villa was tough,” said O'Neill. “Funnily enough, people were saying the same things – that we were getting a few too many draws at the time. Those draws eventually turned into defeats over the Christmas period, which I remember well.

“It was a difficult first year there. We finished 11th and weren't really able to introduce changes that season. We signed Ashley Young and John Carew in the January, but didn't really make that many changes at all for a while. It took a bit of time, but we got there. It was a very fine side in place at the end, but it takes a bit of time to do that.”

O'Neill will expect to be granted a similar length of time at Sunderland, and for all that the club are languishing in 14th position, it should not be forgotten that they have only suffered one league defeat this season.

It is their lack of success in front of goal that is the key factor behind the mounting anxiety though, with Tuesday's failure to score against Middlesbrough making it one goal from the last four matches in all competitions.

Steven Fletcher remains the only Sunderland player to have scored in the Premier League this season, a concerning statistic O'Neill has attempted to address on the training ground this week.

“You have to work on things during the course of the week, which we're doing,” he said. “That's very important, and of course a bit of reassurance helps. But you really have to work at it.

“What needs to change? Maybe it's a case of players gambling a bit more and taking risks. If you lose the ball once or twice, you have to have the confidence to go again. That's a major thing.

“Great players in the game might have lost the ball once or twice and been shouted at by their team-mates and the crowd, but they still had the ability to go again.”

At the start of the season, it was anticipated that Adam Johnson, James McClean and Stephane Sessegnon would combine to provide the creativity that was lacking on a number of occasions last term.

Instead, the trio have failed to produce anything approaching their best form. Johnson has appeared nervous and hesitant, receiving ironic cheers as he left the field on Tuesday, McClean has shed much of the confidence which enabled him to rampage through opposition defences last season and Sessegnon has been off key in every game he has played.

The result has been a chronic lack of spark, but O'Neill remains reluctant to make wholesale changes to his team, instead preferring to place his trust in his key players' ability to turn their own form around.

“I don't think it was misplaced optimism (at the start of the season),” he said. “I think we all felt Adam would be a great player, and he will be. We're only eight games into the league and while I do accept that every result is important, it's the overall picture that counts.

“Sessegnon is a very good player – the Player of the Year last season – and James realises himself now that really good opposition players are coming in to close him down. He has to work out ways to counter that, and I have to help him.

“We're capable of pulling it round, and those players (Johnson, McClean and Sessegnon) will come good, I've absolutely no doubt about that.”