Sunderland Are Constipated And Need A Movement
While most supporters at this time of year are more concerned with who is coming into their clubs, Steve Bruce is fretting more about who he can get out of Sunderland.
Although Bruce is still looking to strengthen the squad on the left flank and in both full-back positions once the loan signing of John Mensah has been completed, he is still under orders to slash the wage bill.
Indeed, it is the struggle to get players shifted which is causing the Black Cats boss restless nights. He has already moved on an incredible 22 players in just 14 months in charge, but probably needs to move on another four before the transfer window closes.
Sunderland's wage bill is huge and there are too many players who simply aren't good enough to continue on the club's journey.
The Black Cats are trying to evolve, to progress, and there is bound to be wastage along the way.
The trouble is, it is very expensive wastage. The likes of George McCartney, Teemu Tainio, Anton Ferdinand and David Healy are all on massive wages at the Stadium of Light and, while they no longer figure in the manager's first team plans - at least not as anything but emergency cover - they do not look as though they will be going anywhere quickly.
Bruce needs to get them off the wage bill to persuade Ellis Short to loosen the purse strings in terms of adding players to the squad, but it isn't an easy task.
This isn't Bruce's mess but he has to clean it up. Sometimes that's just the way it is as a manager.
There isn't a lot of money knocking around the Premier League this summer - something Bruce has discovered on Wearside - and anyone interested in signing the above will also have to ask the players to take a wage cut to move.
It would be nice to say every footballer just wants to play regularly, but some do not want to do that if it comes at a financial cost to themselves. Sad, but true I'm afraid.
Worryingly for Sunderland, there hasn't even been many enquiries this summer. Nyron Nosworthy has gone on loan to Sheffield United and Matthew Kilgallon has been linked with a similar sort of move to Middlesbrough. Daryl Murphy has gone to Celtic, but there isn't much else happening.
Initially Bruce was looking to sell, but with three weeks of the transfer window left he may have to be content with loans, just to get a percentage of their wages paid for the season.
Things are bound to get more frantic the closer it gets to deadline day but, at the moment, Sunderland are looking a little constipated!
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Luke Edwards - is Chief Sports Writer of The Journal and uses his blog to give a unique and entertaining insight into events at Newcastle United and Sunderland.
Like you say this is someone elses mess (Roy Previous Regimes!!) and I think it's a sad state of affairs to think of things like this - Roy Keane decided he was going to spend loads of money and give massive wages to players and now he's gone, Steve Bruce is left counting the coppers.
It's about time a wage cap was put on the premier league and football in general - How many people in the world could not survive on £30,000 a week. I'd be happy with that as an annual salary and these guys are on twice that. If the club cut's it's losses and sells them for £1m which is a large financial loss but it saves more than this over the upcoming season.