Manager Brendan Rodgers says Liverpool have to make less mistakes if they are to achieve their objectives this season.
The Reds resume their English Premier League campaign with a visit to the Stadium of Light on Saturday and the Liverpool boss expects a tough game against Gus Poyet's men.
"In any game of football, no matter how dominant you are, there's always a period of pressure that you will come under," Rodgers said on Thursday.
"I think for us, the single biggest thing has been mistakes. It's not so much structurally, we have a tendency at times to make mistakes and that ultimately has cost us.
"I think that's something that we work hard on and we look to eradicate from the game. From the Crystal Palace game, we needed to change. We needed to get back our model of work and from that, we've slowly got back to a decent level again.
"There's still a lot of work to do. But part of that is ensuring that we don't give away silly goals. That's something that every coach or manager will tell you is continuous.
"They're [Sunderland are] very difficult to break down, they get a lot of numbers behind the ball. They close the space up and you have to work really hard and well to try to find the gaps to get in.
"It will be slightly different at home. They will be the home team and they will want to go on the offensive a little bit more.
"But they have good players and they have shown over the course of the season so far with a lot of draws that they are hard to break down, but that's our job to go there and look to put in a performance that gets the three points."
The Reds will be desperate to make the top four so as to qualify for the Champions League and if not, to make it via the Europa League.
And Rodgers is looking forward to the challenges ahead.
"I'm looking forward to the challenge in the second half of this season," the manager added.
"It's still going to be tough. We respect that. But we've got great spirit at the moment.
"The football and idea is returning to our game. We'll make every push in every competition that we are in to bring success here.
"I'm looking forward to it. Players are developing, players are improving and we can see how seven points [away from fourth] may seem a lot, but it certainly can be whittled away.
"You just have to consistently win games and perform well and that's our idea."
