Former Sunderland coach Robbie Stockdale has revealed he will always be thankful towards John O'Shea for the way he handled himself during his brief stint as caretaker manager.
Stockdale joined Sunderland as a youth team coach in the summer of 2012, before becoming Sunderland u21s manager in 2014.
When Sam Allardyce became the Black Cats manager in October 2015, Stockdale was promoted to first-team coach after the first of three spells as Sunderland's caretaker manager.
He would remain part of the club's coaching staff until the end of the 2017/18 campaign after Sunderland suffered a second successive relegation and Stewart Donald had completed his takeover of the club.
Stockdale experienced some huge highs and some desperate lows during his time at the club but his toughest week would prove to be his last at Sunderland.
After relegation to League One was confirmed and Donald acquired the club from previous owner Ellis Short, manager Chris Coleman and his assistant, Kit Symons, were sacked.
It left Stockdale to assume caretaker manager duties for the third time as he looked to galvanise a depleted, demotivated Sunderland squad ahead of their final match of the season.
Champions Wolves were the visitors at the Stadium of Light and Stockdale led the side knowing he was likely going to follow Coleman and Symons out of the exit door.
Players were refusing to play but O'Shea, who would be playing his last game for the club, was one of the senior players who made things easier in tough circumstances.
Sunderland recorded an unlikely 3-0 win and Stockdale has now expressed his gratitude to the likes of O'Shea when reflecting on his Black Cats exit.
“At the time, everything was changing," Stockdale told BBC Radio Tees Sport Boro Podcast.
“There was no chief executive in charge because he was leaving, and the new owners weren't in, so it was like a rudderless ship.
“It was a really tough week, and that was probably one of the hardest weeks I've had.
“I was pretty much sure I was going to get sacked at the end of the Wolves game, but I got the coaching staff around me who were still there and promoted Elliott Dickman and Cliff Byrne from the under-21s, and got good people around me.
“We were training with 14 players, that's all we had fit, and you're just hoping we get through the game and it disappears.
“I had some not so great players and attitudes who were refusing to play, but I had nowhere to go with that as there was no-one above me.
"But I had some really top ones as well - John O'Shea, it was going to be his last game for the club - and people like that who did things properly. I'll always be thankful for that, because it made my week a lot easier.”
Stockdale, 40, is currently out of work having spent 10 months as Hibernian's assistant manager in 2019.
