RODWELL: I’LL BE FIGHTING FIT!

JACK RODWELL plans to use the international break to get fully up to speed in a Sunderland shirt. England international feels he is getting close to doing himself justice after featuring in eight out of Sunderland’s first nine games this season.

“I’m definitely getting there and I should be properly ready by the time the next game comes around,“he told the Echo.

“The first few games, you’re just feeling your way in and getting your fitness – I still am.

“But I am feeling better each game, and, after the international break, hopefully I will be back to 100 per cent.”

The former Everton star was involved in just 16 Premier League matches with City and had less than half- an- hour’s league football with the Blues in the whole of 2014.

And that left Sunderland head coach Gus Poyet looking to work his star buy hard to regain his former sharpness, while avoiding burn- out

Rodwell’s early displays for the Black Cats have been up and down in terms of quality, but he feels that being played so regularly will speed up his quest for consistency and the chance to show Sunderland fans what he’s capable of.

“I got to start three games in a week, with the matches against Burnley, Stoke and Swansea,” he recalled.

“That was tough. I felt a little bit tired in the last game, to be honest, probably due to the effects of the back- to- back games beforehand.