Steve Bruce was happy to focus on the positives despite Sunderland's penalty shoot-out defeat to Aston Villa on Tuesday night - with the performance of young midfielder Jordan Henderson giving him the greatest satisfaction.

Henderson, 19, was the best outfield player on the pitch after turning in a composed display which deserved better than to end in tears.

The local boy was one of three Sunderland players to see efforts saved by Villa's Brad Guzan in a penalty shoot-out at the end of 120 goalless minutes in their Carling Cup fourth-round clash.

Bruce said: "The kid is broken-hearted after missing the penalty as you would expect. He's only 19 and I didn't think he deserved that on his performance, he was excellent."

Henderson peppered Guzan's goal throughout the contest after a number of surging runs from midfield with his best effort coming just before half-time, a fierce volley which Guzan did well to parry.

Bruce added: "He has been in my thoughts all season, he has been involved in every game we have played.

"He has run himself into a standstill tonight and I would love to see the distance he has covered.

"I think we have a very, very good player on our hands. He is very disappointed but he will learn from it."

Sunderland had the better chances over the 120 minutes but failed to beat Guzan, who was inspired.

The American kept his side in it with an 83rd-minute penalty save from Kenwyne Jones before performing further heroics in the shoot-out.

Bruce lamented his side's profligacy in front of goal with Jones and Kieran Richardson, who missed a one-on-one with Guzan in the closing minutes of extra-time, particularly wasteful.

But he was pleased with the general level of performance.

"I think everyone knew that when it went to penalties we had no chance of winning, not with the chances we missed," he said.

"It wasn't our night as our overall performance was excellent against a very good Aston Villa side.

"In my opinion we deserved to go through but when you play against a side like Villa you are only going to create four or five chances and unfortunately we weren't able to take one."

For Villa, the night was all about Guzan, who was described as "immense" by boss Martin O'Neill.

"You just got the feeling it would have to be something really special to beat him," said O'Neill.

"He looked really confident and capable. I can pay him no higher compliment than saying I was almost expecting him to save them."

O'Neill was not getting carried away with Villa's progress into the last eight, however, adding: "It was a great win for us and we are in the quarter-finals but we must not look past the draw at the weekend.

"The players are tired and we must now focus on a big game for us against Everton on Saturday but this will certainly help their confidence."