Inspirational skipper Stuart McCall believes familiarity with Sunderland will boost Bradford City's hopes of a first home victory of the season.

The Bantams will tomorrow be buoyed by last weekend's 1-0 victory at Derby which lifted them out of the bottom three.

The Wearsiders have enjoyed a fine start to life in the top flight and arrive in Bradford tomorrow riding high in fourth place.

McCall said: "It is great that we have won two away games already but it is in our home games where we need to start picking up the points. We have to look at tomorrow' game as one to get maximum points from.

"We know it will be difficult though because they are really flying. I think it might help that we know all about Sunderland because we had two big battles with them last season.

"We played very well up at Sunderland to get a 0-0 draw at a time when our form was just coming round after a disappointing start to last season.

"I think people started to take note of us then. And then even down here we were unfortunate to lose 1-0 because we started the game really well and should have scored.

"You look at their side and apart from Stefan Schwarz and Steve Bould, it is more or less the same team that came up.

"We know them very well so there should certainly be no fear on our parts. Sometimes when you face the big names you do play differently, no matter how hard you try not to. Kevin Phillips is doing well but we know what we are up against."

McCall has been as proud as anyone in Bradford to see City in the Premiership and is delighted to be playing regularly after recovering from hernia and Achilles operations during the summer.

The former Scottish international returned to the City line-up two weeks ahead of schedule in the 2-0 defeat at Arsenal in late August.

McCall has boosted the City midfield with some typically industrious displays and he was an important steadying hand to ensure his side held on to their precious one-goal advantage at Pride Park last weekend.

He said: "Last week was a big result for us because we have got over the psychological barrier of being in the bottom three. At the moment, we know we can improve on our quality.

"By that I mean everything - whether it be our passing, control or movement. The important thing is we know we will get better but our confidence can take a dent when results do not go well so it was good to get a win.

"We went down there with another positive team. You can't get much more positive than the players we had at Derby, particularly the front four with Peter Beagrie and Robbie Blake on each flank."

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