Phil Parkinson convinced canny Portsmouth forced Sunderland to fall into their own trap

And that approach inflicted the Black Cats’ maiden League One defeat of the season on Saturday.

Retaining the 4-4-2 system and the same starting XI which lined up at Gillingham on Tuesday night, the Blues set about defeating their hosts.

The outcome was a 3-1 Pompey victory – their fourth consecutive away such – in the Stadium of Light rain.

And Parkinson admitted Kenny Jackett’s match-winning gameplan crucially deflected Sunderland’s playing style onto them.

He told the Sunderland Echo: ‘We've discussed many times since I came here, through pre-season as well and into this season, that teams are going to come and press us early in games.

‘We need to play in the right areas of the pitch, and just too many times we didn't make the right choice of pass.

‘Portsmouth, to be fair to them, were strong, physical and closed us down. That's exactly how we've been playing and they reversed that onto us.

‘We didn't respond as well to that as I would have liked until half time, after which we were a lot better.

‘We just didn’t start the game well enough,

‘Portsmouth didn’t surprise us in the way they played, they pressed us, they were physical, we had too many square passes, and we gave the ball away too cheaply.

‘We got punished for that, with too many players who weren’t at it in terms of decision making, playing the right ball at the right time.’

John Marquis scored twice and Marcus Harness grabbed the other against the Black Cats, who earlier levelled through Charlie Wyke.

They also had Luke O’Nien sent off for two bookable offences late on, after impeding Ryan Williams to concede a penalty.

Parkinson added: ‘It was a good response after the break, we had a really good period in the game but we needed a goal in that period and we didn’t get one.

‘There were then a couple of injuries that just disrupted the game a little. We looked the most likely at that time, but they were a dangerous team on the counter.’