SUNDERLAND skipper Lee Cattermole was seething in the wake of a humiliating 3-0 defeat at Barnsley which was all about opponents showing more heart, desire and discipline than his own team.

The Black Cats midfielder has never claimed to be the most skilful or sublime footballer around, but he yields to no one when it comes to physical steel and mental strength.

And he must have been appalled as so many of his team-mates failed to show the necessary resolve to at least make a fight of the second half.

It is an open secret that there are plenty of players at Sunderland who do not want to be there when this transfer window ends, and for them, the gauntlet of abuse they suffered from their own fans at the final whistle will have been shrugged off.

But for someone who cares, like Cattermole, it was deeply wounding and while plenty of players avoided post-match interviews, the captain was prepared to face questioning.

“What can you say about the turn-out, it was incredible,” he said of the 4,000 strong travelling support. “I don’t think what we do will change that - they love the club, love coming to support us and they deserve a lot better than that.”

Sunderland had hoped to reward that support with a second away win to match the 3-1 victory at Norwich, but despite a bright start they fell away alarmingly to leave with a 3-0 defeat at the hands of a Barnsley side which has struggled so far this season.

“It was very frustrating,” said Cattermole. “We probably conceded against the run of play, but then we weren’t strong enough mentally or physically to cope with what Barnsley threw at us after that.

“For the first 20 or 30 minutes, I thought we were the better side. We should have punished them, we should have gone in front but we didn’t have the quality to go and take the lead.”

That failure to finish proved fatal to Sunderland as Barnsley quickly took a two-goal lead after the half-hour.

“It was a lack of quality with the ball and a lack of discipline and attitude without it,” said Cattermole, perfectly summarising Sunderland’s deficiencies.

While the first goal could be considered a misfortune, conceding a second so quickly afterwards just looked careless.

“It was just a bit of weakness,” sighed Cattermole. “I think there were people feeling a little bit sorry for themselves when we went behind, and suddenly it’s like the game’s over having been the better side for the first 20 to 30 minutes.

“You need to keep doing what you’ve been doing and play yourselves back into the game - unfortunately we weren’t able to do that.”

Now, Cattermole is hoping that this might be the low point of Sunderland’s season and the only way is up.

“We’re probably lacking a bit of discipline in this league,” he reflected. “We played quite well on the ball, but came away with nothing and that shows what the league is like - you need to do the basics well and we couldn’t do that.”