Bailey Wright: ‘We can have a right good go and try to achieve something special’

Bailey Wright says Sunderland feel they have the talent to ‘have a right good go and try to achieve something special’ this season.

Sunderland are just three points short of the play-offs, which represents serious progress considering they only got out of League One last season.

Wright though says while it’s important to keep that perspective, the Sunderland squad also fancy themselves to achieve this season too.

"I think the momentum from last season and wanting to finish as high up the table as possible has continued for us this season," said Wright. "For sure it is a stronger division but we back ourselves.

"We are still inexperienced as a squad, I guess you could say, but with inexperience comes a lot of excitement. I think we've got a lot of potential in the squad and in the team to keep on developing and progressing, which is massively important.

"We're past the halfway mark of the season and we are in a good position. By no means are we comfortable or happy with what we have achieved, but we know what we are capable of.

"I think the highest we have sat this season was fourth - albeit not for long! But the division is still very tight and with a couple of wins you can be up there, while a couple of losses can see you slip, so we're not going to get carried away.

"In football you have to separate out internal noise and external noise, but both matter. The internal noise is what we do day-to-day, what we see the opposition is, and what we believe we can do.

"That has carried on from last season to this season. You can feel the togetherness in the group and that counts for a hell of a lot.

"Ability and quality helps, but togetherness and spirit also helped get us through last season and it will be the same this season. As long as we keep on improving in all aspects of our game, I think we can really have a right go this season.

"We've always said that when this place gets going, it's a very tough place to come and we've shown that this season. But there's no job done, we've still got nearly half the season to go and hopefully we can go and do something special."

Sunderland didn’t have the best time last time out against Swansea, with them well-beaten 3-1 at the Stadium of Light.

That was really just down to an early red card to Luke O’Nien though, so Wright isn’t looking to closely at it.

"Saturday wasn't ideal, but there are going to be bumps in the road,” he said.

"We have to remember where we were 12 months ago compared to where we are now. That said, we don't want to keep looking back on where we have been and what we have done, we want to keep on pushing forward and reach the next target and the next goal.

"There are a lot of things to look forward to. It's going to be a really tough second half of the season but I'm looking forward to it."

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