Chris Waddle fires incredible '£300m' transfer warning to Sunderland and Leeds United

Former Sunderland midfielder Chris Waddle has claimed that the club will struggle to stay in the Premier League by adhering to their current transfer blueprint - claiming that they may need to spend as much as £300 million to ensure survival.

The Black Cats secured a long-awaited return to the top flight via the Championship play-off final last month, and have already wrapped up a club record permanent agreement for January loanee Enzo Le Fée.

But ex-England international Waddle, who spent a stint on Wearside in 1997, is of the opinion that Sunderland will need to continue splashing the cash if they are to avoid an immediate return to the second tier.

What has Chris Waddle said about Sunderland’s transfer strategy this summer?

When asked about the recent sale of academy graduate Tommy Watson to Brighton and Hove Albion, Waddle told OnlineCas, as quoted by SussexWorld: “I think it’s a shame but this is what Sunderland do. They get young players, then sell them on for a profit. They balance their books, make money, but it’s not the approach that will keep them in the Premier League.

"If you go up and want to stay up, you can’t buy six players from the Championship and hope it’s good enough. They need to be looking to South America and Europe and buy from their top divisions, so you know they can handle top-level football. Instead, teams who are promoted often buy from relegated teams, or buy the best players from the Championship, and it just doesn’t work."

He added: "Leeds, Burnley, Sunderland, they have to buy quality players who can cope with the Premier League, or they’re going down straight away. That’s because the gap between the divisions is now so extreme you need to spend £300 million on transfers and contracts to stand a chance."

What else has been said about Sunderland’s summer transfer plans?

Outlining Sunderland’s plans for the summer transfer window during an interview last week, sporting director Kristjaan Speakman said: "We're always trying to get the balance right between being prepared for whichever league you might be in and we've tried to do that.

"Naturally as a play-off winning team you're behind where other clubs might be, but we're fast-tracking that and catching up. We're looking to improve and build a team that is capable of staying in the Premier League, I think the objective is fairly clear.

“Everyone will point to the statistics as to how difficult it is to stay in the Premier League and we're fully aware of that, we're not naive. Our strategy in getting to the Premier League and the solutions we needed, to the ones we need to stay there, will be different. That's work we're doing at the minute but ultimately, we're going to stick to our values. We need to have a team that the community and city is proud of, we've build that in the current team and we have to have that in the Premier League.

"When we came to the club we had a multi-year strategy about how we'd able to get back to the Premier League, and it's about continuing that way of thinking. We're going to make decisions that are in the best interests of the club to try and retain our position in the Premier League, while also making decisions that don't negatively impact the club in the long term. I think we've seen before at Sunderland that if you don't consider those factors, how negative that can be in the long term. I don't think it's necessarily anything different in terms of our principles, but there are clearly key decisions coming up around making sure we have a squad capable of achieving our objective of staying up."

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