Other irons in the fire?

By Graeme Anderson
Published on Saturday 19 January 2013 09:00

SUNDERLAND boss Martin O’Neill is pursuing interest in other strikers as well as Swansea City front-man Danny Graham.

The Black Cats made a firm bid for the £5m-rated 27-year-old this week, who Swansea have suggested they will only allow to leave if their bid to sign Stoke City’s former Sunderland striker Kenwyne Jones succeeds.

But with other clubs, notably QPR, Norwich and Reading interested in signing the Gateshead-born striker, O’Neill is not confining his search for new striking talent purely to the Liberty Stadium.

He said: “I don’t want to talk about individuals at other clubs – that’s not my remit.

“But what I would say is that at this stage we do have several irons in the fire when it comes to reinforcing ourselves up front.

“We are looking at a variety of players, not just the one.”

Sunderland’s desire to cast their net wide is understandable. They cannot rely on getting Graham – though they must be in pole position given the fact they have made a bid which should be acceptable to Swansea, and the noises coming out of the player’s camp is that he favours a move back to the North East.

But the Sunderland manager – who knows he needs to bring in new attackers with the club having allowed Ji Dong-won to go out on loan, Bosman-signing Louis Saha to leave if he can find a new club, and Fraizer Campbell looking set to move to Cardiff City – knows he cannot afford to put all his eggs in one basket.

He said: “It has been a busy time for us with a lot of games, as well as the window, but it will settle down a bit next week with no game to play and maybe then we can force one or two things along.”

By then, Campbell could be on his way – the player having travelled down to Cardiff in midweek for talks.

But Sunderland are not necessarily ready to part immediately with a player who might have to wait for a move while the Black Cats look to bring in a replacement.

O’Neill said: “Players are leaving and need to be replaced in the squad.

“By the same token we don’t want to leave ourselves short at the end of the transfer window.

“We recalled Ahmed Elmohamady from Hull City this week for that reason – because we need more bodies.

“And we have to think twice about letting anyone go at the moment if we can’t get replacements in.”


Could all this Danny 'I hate Sunderland' Graham stuff just be a smokescreen for something better and far more acceptable to all fans? Fingers crossed.

 

No, he's just keeping his options open as we only have a month & most of that has passed.

 

Hope it is a smoke screen mate don't want him at all.

 

I'm just hoping that he does have a better option than Graham up his sleeve but I fear that this article itself is more of a notice to Swansea that if they dont play ball we will move on (when in fact DG is Mon's No.1 target all along).


As you know I have massive, almost insurmountable problems with Grahams signing but we need new faces and as you say, there are only 12 more days to get them in. To wake up on Feb 1st with DG as our new striker will be a worry for me but to wake up with no more additions will be an even bigger worry for me altogether.

I just hope this whole transfer window doesn't blow up in Martins face,a s he is treading a fine line here imo.

 

My only problem with him is he won't improve us mate so why buy him? Sort the defence out this time around then worry about the front line. MON only plays one striker ever we have Fletcher and Whickham for that role for the remaining 16 odd games and, at a push (a big one admittedly) Sess who knows he may be better as a lone striker than playing behind the main forward.
For me anyway defence is the priority then CM as Catts is turning into a poor mans Micheal Owen lately.

 

i dont thik thats fair catts really wants to play and i think owen just wants an easy life with a big payday to finance his love of racehorses.

 

I'd love this lad Sissoko and an audacious bid for Haangerland as well.

If we cant get better than Graham this window then maybe hang onto Campbell until the summer. For the sake of losing £600k its hardly worth it.

 

Didn't MON pull a similar trick during the fletcher saga ie use the press to indicate you have other options? Next thing you know Wolves became more receptive to the deal.

May be a bit of kiddology going on here.

 

Gary hooper??

 

he's just testing Swansea and trying to force them.