Steven Fletcher bagged a brace, while Jordi Gomez was also on target as Sunderland climbed out of the Premier League relegation zone with a 3-1 win over Crystal Palace on Monday.
Sunderland were in desperate need of a win after back-to-back defeats and the Wearside club managed to walk away from London with maximum points, despite Wes Brown's second-half own goal.
While the performance was not pretty, manager Poyet said winning was paramount for his misfiring team.
"We needed a win somehow. It was about winning," Poyet told reporters afterwards.
"All managers like performances and we can talk about identity and way of playing but today was about winning.
"So many things against us in the [past] few weeks and last 20 games and we needed to something to win it somehow."
"Today was a game that we knew we needed to suffer for periods, we knew that it would be ugly for a few moments.
"And you need to play ugly, you need to suffer and you need to mark.
"When you have the chance you need to put the ball down and try to play your game and take advantage of what we are trying to do.
"So not just play one way, like we are a passing team and that is it, if you do not pass the ball you lose four nil, so that is the best part of today."
