Gus Poyet insists he has no issues with being Sunderland's head coach rather than manager.

The 46-year-old Uruguayan appeared to question the depth of the squad with which he was left after sporting director Lee Congerton completed the Black Cats' summer recruitment drive in the wake of last Saturday's 8-0 humiliation at Saints.

However, Poyet is adamant he is happy to accept responsibility for the things he does control at the club and leave others to deal with theirs.

He said: "It depends what you want, really, and then you need to adapt. Me, I adapted to life in France, to life in Spain, life in England - I try to adapt to a different way of seeing it.

"Who knows? Maybe in another country, an 8-0 means that you lose your job. In England, no - at the moment.

"You need to adapt and me, I have got no issues. Now, when you adapt, then you have got your responsibilities and the rest of the people have got theirs.

"I am not going to adapt to what is good for someone and then be responsible for the other ones. It's natural, I take it naturally. I have got no issues.

"It's not like I want to be happier, I just want to know what is my role and I do it to the best of my ability, so then I accept responsibility for my role. It's simple."

In the immediate aftermath of the debacle at St Mary's, a shell-shocked Poyet was perhaps more forthright.

He said: "I'm a head coach. I don't make the squad, that's not my job."

The former Brighton boss was less exercised as he carried out his pre-match press conference ahead of Saturday's visit of Arsenal to Wearside this afternoon, but nevertheless keen to stress once again the demarcation of duties.

He said: "I pick the team, I make the decisions, I make the changes and I assume responsibility. The rest is not my department.

"If we make money at the club or we don't make money at the club, it's not my department. If we travel by bus or travel by plane, it's not my decision, it's the club which spends the money.

"I accept mine [responsibilities]; the rest, I am not going to take."

Poyet's main concern has been his lack of defenders - he had only four fit last weekend with Sebastian Coates and Billy Jones set to be missing for several more weeks yet.

The club moved to address that when they handed 34-year-old former Napoli full-back Anthony Reveillere a contract until the end of the season today, although they were still awaiting his international clearance.

In the meantime, the head coach had swiftly turned his attention to the Gunners after holding a grisly post-mortem on Tuesday, but resisted the temptation to drag his players in last Sunday.

He said: "People said to me, 'Are you training on Sunday?' and I said, 'No, I don't want to see them', and that's the truth, so we didn't train on Sunday.

"Now there are probably a few fans who think they deserved to train on Sunday and not have a day off, but I am sorry, it was my decision and I didn't want to see them on Sunday."

Sunderland's south coast nightmare came days before a series of Champions League thumpings in midweek - Bayern Munich won 7-1 at Roma, while Shakhtar Donetsk beat BATE Borisov 7-0 and Chelsea put six without reply past Maribor - which, far from easing Poyet's pain, simply served to increase his consternation.

He said: "I have never experienced it myself as a football player in 17 years, so I don't know how it feels.

"Every year, there is a 7-0, an 8-0, a 9-1, whatever. It shouldn't happen. It's not normal and different budgets don't matter because this was Southampton, it was not Real Madrid.”