Going back to Sunderland as manager would be super: Kev

Club legend Kevin Phillips has revealed he would ‘love’ to manage Sunderland one day.

The former striker is a hero on Wearside, having struck up a hugely successful strike partnership with Niall Quinn under Peter Reid.

Phillips holds aspirations of moving into management one day, most recently he was part of Gary Rowett’s coaching team at Stoke City.

Phillips says he would likely follow Rowett to a new job but admits the thought of taking charge at the Stadium of Light one day does appeal.

That won’t be anytime soon though, with Jack Ross doing an impressive job of helping revive fortunes on Wearside.

Phillips told TalkSport: “At some point, I’d love to go back to Sunderland and manage them.

“I was up there on Friday night watching the game and I’ve not been up for a good time.

“That stadium, when that place is rocking it’s a hell of a place to play football.

“It’s a great place to play football but it’s a bad place to play football if it’s not going well and vice-versa as a manager, they’ve had some tough times but ultimately I’d love to have that job at some point.

“Whether that will ever happen I don’t know.”

He added: “In terms of management, you can’t be picky. I take my hat off to people like Sol Campbell, Paul Scholes because you can’t be choosy and at the end of the day if something was to be presented to me tomorrow at a lower level then you’d have to look at it.

“Not many ex-players get chucked in, I know Frank Lampard went in at Derby and is doing a great job but that’s kind of a one off. “Youdon’tgetchuckedinto a big job, you’ve probably got to startalittlebitlower.”