Trai Hume makes honest Sunderland admission about his first season on Wearside after transfer from Linfield FC

Trai Hume admits he didn’t know if he was going to be ready for the Championship when Sunderland were promoted to the second tier.

The 21-year-old full-back joined the Black Cats in January 2022 from Linfield FC but made just three League One appearances in the second half of that campaign.

Hume also had to be patient at the beginning of last season, starting just two of the side’s first 24 league games.

Since then, despite his red card against Ipswich last month, the defender has become Sunderland’s first-choice right-back, while he’s been called up to the last three international squads with Northern Ireland, and signed a new long-term contract on Wearside.

“We have a young group at Sunderland and I feel like playing a lot last season, I have a lot of experience within the group,” said Hume ahead of his country’s Euro 2024 qualifiers against Slovenia and Kazakhstan. “As I keep playing, I gain more experience.

“At the start of the season, the first two games we lost both and I got sent off in the first one (against Ipswich) which wasn’t ideal, but we’ve brought ourselves back, got ourselves higher up the table and hopefully it’s a sign of things to come.

“When we first got promoted from League One to the Championship, I didn’t know if I was going to be ready to play or not. Around Christmas time I got put in, started playing games and I felt good so I’ve tried to establish myself at that level and it’s been good.”

Northern Ireland have just three points after their first four qualifying matches but could bring themselves back into contention with some positive results this month.

“The mood is still very high,” said Hume. “Results haven’t gone our way, but we still feel as a team we can get something out of the group because it’s wide open.

“There’s no one really ahead - it’s all very even. We feel if we got two results here, two wins puts us right back where we want to be.”

Sunderland defender Dan Ballard has also been named in the Northern Ireland squad, yet manager Michael O’Neill has said the centre-back has an injury concern.