Lynden Gooch: In action for Sunderland at Liverpool, was injured for the U23 side

Gooch, a regular in the Premier League squad and late sub at Liverpool on Saturday, was included in this PL2 match against Tottenham in order to get some game time.

However, he injured his left ankle midway through the half when he seemed to land awkwardly.

After lengthy treatment, he was carried off in the 27th minute with boss David Moyes looking on concerned.

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The USA international's departure blighted an entertaining contest on a bitterly-cold night at Eppleton CW where Adnan Januzaj was on target with the first-teamer playing the first 54 minutes.

Sunderland U23, being watched by the club's new chief football officer, Simon Wilson, were chasing five wins on the spin.

Andy Welsh's side have strung together some good form across four competitions and it looked like continuing after leading 2-0, only for struggling Spurs to level with goals just before and after the break.

Sunderland took an 11th-minute lead with Gooch involved.

George Honeyman, Josh Robson and Gooch combined nicely on the right and after Josh Maja won the header in the middle, HONEYMAN lashed the ball past keeper Pau Lopez.

Spurs saw plenty of the ball, but goal threats were rare with Mika saving well with his feet from Shilow Tracey and Joe Pritchard firing just over.

Sunderland doubled their lead in the 39th minute thanks to the red-hot pace and cool finishing of JANUZAJ.

The on-loan Man United midfielder got on the end of Maja's clearance, galloping 50 yards into the box and keeping two pursuers at bay before slotting a neat left-foot shot past Lopez.

Spurs did pull back a goal in stoppage time with TRACEY beating Mika from the left of the box.

And they were level nine minutes after the re-start, TRACEY at it again, blasting home.

Spurs had the better of the second half though the Cats had a chance on the hour when Maja headed straight at Lopez while Ethan Robson went just wide from the edge of the box 10 minutes from time.

But a draw ended up being a fair result.

FULL-TIME:

SUNDERLAND 2