Ex-Sunderland talent Sam Greenwood explains how current club Preston North End can beat Black Cats

Former Sunderland starlet Sam Greenwood has insisted that current club Preston North End will look to “take the game” to the Black Cats when the two sides meet on Tuesday evening.

The Lilywhites travel to the Stadium of Light hoping to end a winless streak of five Championship matches, and were left wholly disappointed on Saturday afternoon after sustaining a narrow 1-0 defeat at the hands of promotion-chasing Sheffield United.

For their part, Sunderland survived a scare against relegation-threatened Cardiff City to seal a 2-1 victory on home soil, and another win in midweek would extend their unbeaten run to three consecutive league outings. The Black Cats have already played Preston twice this season, losing a Carabao Cup first round clash at Deepdale in August before playing out a 0-0 stalemate in a subsequent Championship encounter in November.

And those results, combined with a battling performance against Sheffield United, are enough to convince Greenwood that Preston can head into Tuesday’s match with plenty of optimism. Speaking to the club’s official website, he said: “Obviously we’re a bit frustrated in the end [against Sheffield United]. It was a tight game. We know they're a good team and they've got clever players and we knew it was going to be tough, but I thought we created enough to get back in the game.

“Obviously at the start of the game it was tough. We had to dig in deep but as the game goes on we were starting to get more and more chances and we were unlucky not to put one away.”

Focusing his attention on Sunderland, Greenwood continued: “I think it's about taking the game to them. Obviously they're a good team as well, but if you look at earlier in the season when we played them, it was a close game and we definitely could have won that one as well, so it should give us confidence going into that one.”

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What has Sam Greenwood previously said about Sunderland?

Greenwood was part of Sunderland’s academy system until 2018, when he left to join Arsenal. Speaking about what it means to play against his boyhood club last year, he said: “It [playing Sunderland] means a lot to me personally, but I think I've just got to take it as another game. I was there from when I was six until 16. I had unbelievable times there, unbelievable memories, and I’m a big supporter as well. I always watch them week in, week out.”

Greenwood has scored against Sunderland before, during a previous loan stint with Middlesbrough, and has also opened up about what it felt like to find the back of the net against his boyhood side. He said: “It was a mad feeling, to be fair. Just seeing all my mates from school in the crowd who were giving me a bit as well. That’s why I didn't really celebrate because it felt so weird to us. My dad was in the crowd as well and all my family are Sunderland fans, so it was a weird feeling.”

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