The Blues let a 1-0 lead slip against the Black Cats, with an injury-time winner from Chemsdine Talbi ensuring Regis Le Bris’s side left Stamford Bridge with all three points in a game that the stats showed we deserved something from.

Enzo Maresca’s Blues had made the perfect start, scoring inside the opening five minutes through Alejandro Garnacho – his first for the club – before the visitors hit back later in the first half courtesry of Wilson Isidor.

Cucurella was on media duties shortly after the final whistle and the Spaniard accepted that the result was a tough one to take, but called on the Blues to learn from this defeat and ‘manage’ games better going forward

‘It’s a really tough one to take,’ Cucurella stated after the game. ‘We are all very disappointed, of course.

‘We need to improve with these matches. I think we need to learn to manage the game better. We scored early, dominated at that stage but then we let the opponents back into it and I think we need to learn to kill games off when we are on top.

‘We scored the first goal, and I think we should have scored a second one when we had the chance. We need to learn to be better against teams that come with a gameplan such as Sunderland, where they stay very narrow and compact.

‘The good thing is that it is still early into the season. We have many games where we can improve and we have plenty of time to do this, and secure more points.’

The Blues dominated in terms of possession and shots at goal, but ultimately had nothing to show for our efforts following Sunderland’s late winner.

Cucurella felt that both goals – a long thrown that wasn’t dealt with and a fine finish on the counter – were avoidable and believes we need to learn to manage situations better.

The left-back also highlighted the fact that we have another game around the corner, a Carabao Cup clash away at Wolves, with the focus on returning to winning ways quickly.

‘The goals we conceded, we know we can manage these situations better,’ Cucurella explained. ‘We know that a lot of teams are trying to use long throws more and we need to manage them better.

‘We worked on them yesterday because we knew Sunderland will look to use long throws and be direct from set-pieces. I think maybe we relaxed a little bit, and they punished us. It’s no excuse, we need to learn from this and make sure this situation doesn’t happen again.

‘Then with the second goal, again, I think we need to manage things better. It’s true that we always look to win, especially at home, but we’ve been caught out on the counter-attack and been punished. It’s small mistakes but ones we need to learn from.

‘The good thing with football is that you can always put things right quickly. We have another game on Wednesday and it’s an opportunity for us to get back with a win.’