Takeover talks are harming matters on the pitch
MANAGERLESS CATS LEFT IN LIMBO
WITH so much rebuilding to do following relegation, Sunderland could not afford so much as a Lost Weekend this summer, never mind a Lost Month.
But the uncertainty generated by takeover talks rumbling on in the background threatens to wreck Sunderland’s preparations for the new season.
Because here we are four weeks to the day since David Moyes resigned and with still no replacement in sight, never mind in post.
The transfer market opened ten days ago and not a single player has been signed - a direct consequence of the managerial vacuum although the £30m sale of prize asset Jordan Pickford has been sanctioned.
And so the remnants of Sunderland’s squad will reassemble on Wearside for pre-season training in only 10 days’ time, short of numbers, short of new blood, and unless things change dramatically short of a manager.
Owner Ellis Short has been looking to sell for years, but he can see the damage that the takeover talks are causing and has set a deadline of the end of the month for any deal to be completed.
It is partly a case of discovering whether the prospective buyers are serious or merely timewasters.
But the deadline is also necessary to end the paralysis that has gripped the club for the last month.
Only when the takeover issue is resolved one way or the other will chief executive Martin Bain be able to move forward with the appointment of a new manager.
Until then, he cannot offer prospective candidates any job security, nor tell them with any certainty the budget they will have to work to, because a change of ownership could change everything.
Effectively, it means that Bain has been chasing his tail for the last four weeks.
What is clear is that Sunderland are highly unlikely to have a new manager in place before July, and he is likely to miss out on seeing the players at their pre-season training camp in Austria.
He will be plunged headfirst into a whirl of pre-season friendlies, while trying to get to know the players, the staff, the set-up, and to try to get disillusioned supporters back onside. He will inherit a threadbare squad in need of a total overhaul, and must identify targets and devise a transfer strategy from a standing start. And he will have just a few short weeks to stamp his authority on the club before the season kicksoff. Sound familiar? It should - it is virtually the same scenario that Moyes walked into last July.
And we know how that turned out.