After a relatively successful first season on Wearside for Steve Bruce, the manager was hoping to recruit some reinforcements in the off season. Defence appeared to be his prime target area which is no surprise given some of the heavy beatings his team faced during the 2009/10 Premier League season.
In addition to this, injury crisis that tended to be a common theme in Steve Bruce’s tenure at multiple clubs hit Sunderland in the centre of defence during the previous season where it got so bad that captain Lorik Cana had to fill in at centre half for a period leading up to Christmas.
Whilst news outlets were reporting that the club were continuing to work on engineering a loan deal similar to the one that brought the Ghana international John Mensah to the Stadium of Light the previous season though Bruce told the media that this was a protracted deal due to the fact that Lyon were eager to sell the player whilst Sunderland only wanted a loan given his physical issues.
> _“Defence is the priority. If you look at the squad from the end of last season, Mensah and (Alan) Hutton aren’t with us any more._
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> _“We are trying to make something happen on Mensah, but it is difficult._
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> _“If we could get something similar to last season agreed with Lyon, we’d take him back, but I think they want to sell him and I couldn’t say to the board, with his physical problems, that it’s a deal that offers value for money._
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> _“The money Lyon are quoting for him, it’s too much._
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> _Everybody who watched Sunderland last year knows we were far better when he played._
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> _“He’s had a great World Cup with Ghana, but he couldn’t train from what I’ve heard._
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> _We’re still in talks and we will look to do a deal if we can._
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Bruce also spoke to the media about other deals that the club were trying to do which included Schalke defender Heiko Westermann and also Sol Campbell. Given his name in the Premier League, the potential transfer of Campbell was one that was sparking interest amongst fans.
Campbell - who was now 35 by this time - had just left Portsmouth and was eying up another contract elsewhere with the Premier League obviously being his preferable choice. Whilst Bruce admitted the talks were ‘positive’, he didn’t appear to think that a deal was close to happening.
> _“I also had a brief chat with Sol. I’ve known him a long time. It was a catch up to see what his ideas were and to see what he is looking to do. It was positive stuff.”_
Clearly, Bruce was keen to bring in reinforcements but it didn’t appear anything was particularly close at this stage. Along with the aforementioned names, a deal for Westermaan didn’t seem likely due to an injury that the defender suffered.
A month later, Bruce finally got one of his men in the door in the shape of Mensah who eventually rejoined on a loan deal after what was an extremely protracted process. Injuries would also continue to be an issue for the Ghanian where he was generally playing second fiddle to Titus Bramble and Michael Turner.
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