David Moyes admitted on Friday that Sunderland had gone backwards since Sam Allardyce steered them to Premier League safety last season.
The division’s bottom club are yet to win after eight league matches going into Saturday’s game at fellow underachievers West Ham.
And Moyes was forced to agree with his striker Jermain Defoe’s assessment this week that the club were not a patch on how they finished last season.
Didier Ndong (left) and Steven Pienaar show the strains of a defeat at Stoke last weekend
‘I thought Jermain’s piece was a wee bit taken out of context,’ said Moyes.