Ex-Nottingham Forest defender claims Sunderland tried to halve his wages after offering him a deal
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Mills, 35, retired from the game last year but held talks with the Black Cats in 2018, shortly after Stewart Donald’s takeover.
“I went on a training camp with a Saudi Arabian club to Austria but then Sunderland called me and said they’d like me to fly back and do a medical,” Mills told the Undr The Cosh Podcast.
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Hide Ad"So, I flew back and went up to Sunderland when Jack Ross was manager, I got offered a deal and I was like I’m in Austria in a training camp and they said they would make me an offer.
“I got on a plane and flew back, and the phone goes. ‘Oh yeah, you know the deal. Yeah, it’s not that anymore, it’s 50 per cent of that’. So, I asked why am I in the airport flying home when you told me the deal was this but actually it’s this?’
After off-field problems at Bolton and Forest, Mills sensed there were also issues on Wearside.
“It was when that guy had taken over, it was him but they had someone else in to run the club,” Mills added.
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Hide Ad"So, the owner was saying ‘we’ll pay him that’ but the other guy running the club was saying they can’t afford that, so we’ll pay you this. I’m sitting in Germany thinking here we go, it’s another circus I’m joining.
“I flew home and did the medical and spoke with the manager (Ross) but when I spoke to him, I’m looking at him thinking ‘do you know, what I know that the deal has been halved?’
“So, I’m a bit uncertain as to what’s happened and maybe he’s picked up on that. Because it got to the end of the chat and I said I’ve got my stuff, am I going to a hotel and he asked where I live, so I told him Manchester.
“He said, ‘you’ve got kids, so get yourself off’. I’m thinking what is going on here. I got in the car and said to my agent, ‘that is the weirdest thing ever’ and he said ‘yeah it’s not going to happen now.’