McCarthy relieved after Wolves ´wringer´

Mick McCarthy is still getting used to seeing his Wolves team do it the hard way after they came from behind to beat Sunderland 2-1.

Home side Wolves were trailing to Kieran Richardson’s goal in the 51st minute of Sunday’s match at Molineux, when Sebastian Larsson missed a penalty that would have made it 2-0 to the visitors on 72 minutes.

Wolves promptly equalised through Steven Fletcher less than 60 seconds after the penalty miss, and Scot Fletcher then netted the winner with 10 minutes remaining.

The victory ends a run of two defeats in succession for Wolves, and takes them up to 15th on the English Premier League table.

“I’m shattered after that,” McCarthy said.

“You go through the wringer sitting on the sidelines sometimes, and that was one today. I’m delighted and thrilled with the result of course.”

“Because we conceded a goal it was backs against the walls.”

“We were desperately trying to get back into it and I can only admire my players for the way they go about it every week.”

“They were catching us on the break a couple of times, but there’s no point in sitting back and taking 1-0 defeats is there?”

“The lads kept going. Everybody’s delighted, it’s a great result for us.”

Following the sacking of Steve Bruce on Wednesday, Sunderland were led by his former assistant Eric Black, with incoming manager Martin O’Neill watching from the stands.

“It’s been a disappointing afternoon,” Black said.

“If the penalty had gone in, you’d like to think we’d have gone on and won the game.”

“I thought that was the pivotal moment in the whole of the game. I don’t want to blame the person who took it because I think Seb Larsson has been outstanding this season.”

“But the confidence and energy drained a little bit when it didn’t go in and the rest of the game became hard for us.”

“They scored 40 seconds later and that didn’t even give us a chance to galvanise ourselves. That’s what happens in football. There are crucial turning points and that was the one today.”