A CONCERNED Steve Bruce last night admitted Sunderland’s next two matches will “define their season” after first-half goals from Tim Cahill and Landon Donovan condemned the Black Cats to a 2-0 defeat at Everton.

On a night that saw Sunderland’s supporters join in a home chant of “Rafa, sign him up” aimed at unsettled striker Kenwyne Jones, the Wearsiders slipped to their ninth away defeat of the campaign as their defensive frailties reared their head once again.

The loss, which extended the club’s winless run to nine Premier League matches, left Sunderland just three points clear of the relegation zone ahead of back-to-back home games against Stoke and Wigan.

Win those, and the Black Cats can start to breathe more easily after a dreadful couple of months. Lose one or both, though, and the rest of the season will almost certainly revolve around a frantic battle against the drop.

“The next two back-to-back home games will define our season,” admitted Bruce, who lost Kieran Richardson and Lee Cattermole to first-half injuries. “We’ve had a wonderful start and a horrible couple of months.

“We must go on and get a couple of results in these two games. If we do, and we’re capable of that, then we can start to move forwards. But we also need to start getting a settled team. I’m convinced we’ll get there.”

If they are to turn their form around, they are going to have to improve on the dreadful defending that contributed to last night’s defeat.

Nyron Nosworthy missed his header as Cahill opened the scoring in the seventh minute, and Donovan was given far too much space in which to engineer a 20-yard drive that beat Craig Gordon.

Bruce bemoaned his side’s defending in the wake of last weekend’s FA Cup fourthround defeat at Portsmouth, but despite the introduction of Matt Kilgallon, John Mensah and Nosworthy, it was hard to discern an improvement at Goodison Park.

“I seem to be like a struck record at the minute,” said Bruce. “The goals we gave away were far too easy, and they didn’t have to do much to score them. Two long balls up the pitch have caught us, we haven’t been able to defend them well enough.

“That has been our Achilles heel of late – we just can’t defend properly. But in the first half-an-hour we were nowhere near the standard we need to be in the Premier League.”

Bruce remains keen to make defensive additions before the transfer window closes on Monday, but the Black Cats boss has struggled to make any inroads in the last few days.

Guy Demel, Habib Beye and Rod Fanni remain on his radar, but thanks to a combination of excessive wage demands and difficult negotiations with the players’ clubs, the trio all look like falling through the net.

The Jones situation is also proving difficult to put to bed.

The striker started on the bench yesterday, and while his performance as a substitute was an improvement on his disinterested display at Fratton Park, the sound of Sunderland supporters mocking him in the closing stages will surely have troubled both Bruce and the player.

“The quicker we get Kenwyne turned around the better,”

said Bruce. “All of this nonsense which has happened has disrupted him a bit.

But we hope it’s gone and he can get on with being Sunderland’s centre-forward.”

Cattermole will be assessed this morning, after sustaining yet more hamstring damage.

“It’s the other hamstring,”

said Bruce.“It’s unfortunate, but it seems to happen when he’s been out for a long time.”