BURNLEY fell to a second straight defeat against a team around them at the bottom of the Premier League table on a miserable afternoon in the north east.

Sean Dyche named an unchanged team for the ninth Premier League game in a row, but his players failed to fire as they fell to a tame reverse to hand Sunderland only their second home league win of he season.

The Black Cats took the lead when Connor Wickham headed home Anthony Reveillere’s excellent cross on-the-run from the right.

It came three minutes after Ashley Barnes had put a header wide from a similar distance from David Jones’ free-kick.

The advantage was doubled just after the half hour. This time the goal came down the left, with Jordi Gomez given time on the ball to find Patrick van Aanholt in acres of space, and his low cut-back was tapped in by Jermain Defoe for his first Burnley goal.

The Clarets improved after the break without ever really threatening to get back in the game and overrun Sunderland.

The main talking point was the substitutions on the hour mark, which saw Sean Dyche replace George Boyd and Danny Ings with Ross Wallace and Lukas Jutkiewicz.

The changed had little effect, and the game drifted towards its conclusion.

It was an afternoon that never got going for Burnley and another disappointing result against a Premier League rival, following the 3-2 defeat against Crystal Palace two weeks ago.