Cana: John Mensah will be intelligent signing

Aug 20 2009 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

Cana is pleased at how effectively he has combined with Cattermole in the opening week of the season. “I think I am already starting to build up a good relationship with Lee,” he said. “He is my kind of player, he is energetic and always gives 100%.

“We will have to work at our partnership, and we will have to see how other players fit in as the season goes on. But after the first two matches I am fairly happy with how that side of things has gone.”

Despite starting their Stadium of Light campaign with a 3-1 defeat against Chelsea, it has been a largely positive opening to the new season for the Black Cats. And Cana feels it has given him a good introduction to the variety of football in England’s top flight.

“The two games have been totally different because they have been against totally different styles of football,” he said. “The Bolton game was difficult, but I would say it was a typical British game. It was certainly what I was expecting when I came over from France. The Chelsea match was completely different because you are talking about one of the best teams in Europe, maybe the world.

“I thought we matched Chelsea for most of the first half, but we spent a lot of our energy in that time and we weren’t really able to stay with them in the second half.

“After it went to 1-1 it became very difficult. I would say there are good things and bad things we can take from the game.

“There are things we can improve in the future, but we have to remember that small things against very good teams can sometimes look bigger than they are.

“We still have confidence and as long as we continue to give what we have, we will be okay. We have a lot of new players and cannot expect to be 100 percent from the beginning.”

On the Chelsea game, Quinn believes his Black Cats picked the wrong night to face the Londoners. “Chelsea was a real tough night,” he admitted. “We coped admirably for long periods, but we caught them on a night when in 25 years of football I’ve only seen two or three performances from any team like that.

“Everything they did was superb, I take my hat off to them. At one stage I was counting them, I thought they had 13 men on the pitch at one piont, the movement was so good.

“We have to put that behind us next weekend at home, and two wins out of three would be a fantastic start.”

Sunderland hope Cana will feature in that next home game, against Blackburn Rovers. The club are awaiting the results of X-rays on his left hand, damaged in Tuesday’s first half.

“It aches, but if that is all it is, it will disappear in time,” Cana said. “Hopefully, it is nothing more serious than that.”