Soccer:Ricky Sbragia admits the closing weeks of his time in charge of Sunderland were a "nightmare". Sbragia stepped down as Sunderland manager yesterday after his team narrowly escaped relegation from the Barclays Premier League.

The Scot succeeded Roy Keane at the Stadium of Light in December but, despite winning two of his first three games, was unable to engineer a major upturn in form.

Sbragia said: “When I took the job, the brief was to keep us in the Premier League.

“Early doors it was fantastic, we played well and looked as if possibly we could have got a bit further. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.

“The last six or seven weeks have been an absolute nightmare for me but it’s all come good at the last.

“The players have been fantastic from day one, I’ve always said that. The staff have been excellent, the admin side really positive.

“We always believed we could stay up, even in the bad times, and obviously it’s come true for me on the last day.”

Sunderland will be the north-east’s only representatives in the top flight next season after both Newcastle and Middlesbrough were relegated along with West Brom.

Sunderland chairman Niall Quinn promised to take his time to find a big-name manager to replace Sbragia.

He said: “It needs a big man to take on a mantle, to take the pressure, to take the interest, to take the strain of getting a big club like this to go forward and to change the mentality.

“Big people change mentalities. I will do everything I can to deliver a big name.

“We haven’t sat down to even think about managers or lists of managers.

“But what I would say - and Ricky knows it too - we do need a big name here, but we need somebody, I believe, who will change the mentality of the dressing room.

“The person I believe can do that will be top of the list.

“But that’s for another day. I haven’t even set a timescale for starting to talk about it, and that’s the truth.”

Martin Jol, Frank Rijkaard, Steve Bruce and Steve McClaren are among those to have been linked with the job in recent weeks as it emerged that Sbragia’s reign was likely to come to an end.