Bardsley: Ricky deserves to be Black Cats boss; Sbragia deserves the Black Cats job.

Byline: Mark Douglas 

PHIL Bardsley believes that Ricky Sbragia "deserves" a crack at managing Sunderland next season.

But the reliable defender knows that the onus is now on the players to prove it by producing a winning performance at Bolton.

In the aftermath of another dismal performance against Everton it has been suggested in some quarters that Sbragia has 'lost' the dressing room - a serious charge to lay at the door of a manager battling to resuscitate a side that looks haunted by the threat of relegation.

Bardsley wholeheartedly rejects those claims, pegging the poor displays on a lack of confidence and re-iterating that the Black Cats dressing room is united by the manager.

However, the only way to prove that beyond all reasonable doubt is to turn in a much-improved performance at the Reebok Stadium on Saturday - something that Bardsley is only too aware of.

"The gaffer has been brilliant, to be fair," he said. "Obviously not all of us are players that he's brought in and that he wants.

"He's had to get on with it with players that he hasn't brought in.

"I think from his point of view he'd like

Turn to Page 57 9 to get us through this season and give it a good go next season with his own players and his own ideas. And I think that he deserves that.

"I think he also deserves a big performance from us on Saturday.

"He's a football man and it hurts him as much as it hurts everyone when we lose - he's a good football man and I hope we can go out there and do it for him on Saturday." One of Sunderland's few consistent performers this season, Bardsley could be absolved of most of the blame for the way that this depressing season has panned out. But the former Manchester United trainee baulks at those suggestions, claiming that the team must be united and accept collective responsibility for the failure to so far consolidate their Premier League status. It is an attitude that has not always prevailed at the Stadium of Light this season. Sbragia has already carried out one cull of players that he felt were undermining his authority, removing El-Hadji Diouf and Pascal Chimbonda from the squad during the January transfer window.

And the feeling persists that he may have to restructure the squad again in the summer if, indeed, he is the man given the task of leading the Black Cats next season. Whoever is in charge after the summer, they will want more like Bardsley in the team. "I don't really know why the results have gone off the boil," he added. "It's easy to point fingers at people and identify individual mistakes but it's just like when you win games: we're all in it together. "You've got to be able to lose together as well. It's a disappointment that it has gone until the end of the season. Of course it is. But we've got three important games coming up, starting at Bolton on Saturday. We need to go positive and try and get some sort of result." Bardsley also sympathises with the fans who have had to put up with some dreadful performances and results in a season meant to herald success and progress. He said: "It's difficult for the supporters, it's been a long season for them. They travel home and away and pay good money to see us.

The lads are trying to do the best they can but confidence of late hasn't been as high as we would want. We're not playing how they want us to play - but that's part of football and it's about how we react." Sheffield United Under-18s ........... 3 Sunderland Under-18s .................. 2 A MATTHEW Fletcher brace wasn't enough to prevent Sunderland going down by the odd goal in five to Sheffield United yesterday. Fletcher put the visitors in front on 26 minutes when he rolled the ball home. The Blades equalised just before the break and when keeper Martin Hunter dropped the ball he was punished for 2-1, before the Yorkshiremen added a third goal. Fletcher reduced the arrears just before the end. SUNDERLAND: Hunter, Marrs, Bagnall, Cornforth, Hourihane, Mitchell (Scott 80), Wilson N, Reed, Fletcher, Wood (Noble L 60), Galer (Elliott 71).