Sunderland striker Darren Bent had no sympathy for Liverpool following his freak winning goal.
Striker unapologetic over beach ball goal
Sunderland striker Darren Bent had no sympathy for Liverpool following his freak winning goal in his side's 1-0 victory at the Stadium of Light.
Bent grabbed the only goal of the game after just six minutes in fortutious circumstances.
The striker saw his shot deflected off a beach ball, which had been thrown onto the pitch by the visiting fans, to totally deceive Pepe Reina.
Reina was furious with the award of the goal as under the laws of the game it should be disallowed with a drop ball given, but the officials appeared not to notice the change of direction the ball took after it hit the beach ball.
Bent was not bothered by the comical goal and revealed he was not even aware the beach ball was in the Liverpool penalty area.
"The shot off the post in the second half probably evened it up for me using the beach ball as an offensive weapon!" joked Bent.
"I didn't know it was there, to be honest. I swivelled and hit the ball, saw it was going in and the deflection just took it over Reina's leg."
Bent could have a hat-trick and admits he was surprised how open Liverpool's normally reliable defence was.
"The team played really, really well today and 1-0 probably flattered Liverpool from their perspective because it should have been three or four," added Bent.
"When I heard seven minutes of injury time at the end, I thought 'oh no', but the boys dug in and we were telling each other 'believe, believe - we can do this'.
"We've got a really good team spirit down here and hopefully that can continue.
"Usually Liverpool aren't as open but today they were, which is why we had four or five good chances. They are usually a tight unit but we won't grumble."
