SUNDERLAND'S push for the Premiership stuttered as Colchester blew the CocaCola Championship promotion race wide open.

Starting the day clear at the top of the table, Roy Keane's Black Cats needed two more wins to guarantee a return to the top flight at the first attempt.

They must have fancied claiming one of them at Layer Road after going into the match unbeaten in 17, but two goals in a frantic late spell gave the Us a deserved win . . . and provided more hope for Derby and Birmingham in second and third.

It seemed to be a case of same old, same old when veteran Dwight Yorke drew Sunderland level nine minutes into the second period . . .

cancelling out Wayne Brown's first-half opener with a clinical header and briefly sparking his side to life.

But with eight minutes left Richard Garcia spun in the box and drilled into the corner, before Jamie Cureton's last-gasp penalty settled it.

All the talk in the build up was of how Keane is on the verge of taking his side to the Premiership in his first managerial job, but Colchester had their own agenda.

They are still battling for a play-off place and looked bright and busy in the opening stages, with Kem Izzet firing in an early sighter that Darren Ward did well to hold.

Jonny Evans and Nyron Nosworthy then combined to clear a dangerous cross into the box but Sunderland were always likely to get a foothold sooner or later and when Daryl Murphy cut inside after quarter of an hour he should have done better than skew his shot at goal.

The Black Cats were being given room to play, and they almost made the most of it after 25 minutes when David Connolly's shot was saved low to his left by Dean Gerken.

But goalkeeper Darren Ward was still being called on far too much for Keane's liking . . . most notably when he clawed Garcia's flicked back-header away from the top corner.

Connolly was the outlet for the visitors, and he twisted and turned in the area 14 minutes before the break only for Brown to get a vital foot in.

But it was at the other end that the Us defender was to make his most telling contribution three minutes into first-half injury time when he arrived unchallenged to head in Kevin Watson's set piece.

Within nine minutes of the restart, however, Sunderland were level as 35-yearold Yorke conjured the leveller . . . showing every inch of his experience to find a yard of space in the box and head in Murphy's cross.

The game was opening up and Nosworthy had to make a great tackle on the hour to deny Hogan Ephraim after he had skipped past Dean Whitehead in the box.

Cue Keane . . . who rose from the bench to berate one of his own players as the Black Cats were given a timely reminder of what was at stake.

His words fell on deaf ears, though.

With eight minutes left the Sunderland defence were caught napping again when Garcia spun away from Evans and hammered the ball low past Ward.

Then when Cureton cut inside Whitehead and was upended in the box in the final minute, the striker dusted himself off to fire home the resulting penalty, and set the promotion race alight.