Kristjaan Speakman issues update on Jack Clarke transfer interest and underlines Sunderland's strong stance

Kristjaan Speakman has again stressed that Sunderland are in no need to sell players during the January transfer window, and added that they have not had to field any significant bids at this stage.

Speakman said the club had numerous offers on the table to try and strengthen their squad before the window closes next week, and despite significant speculation over the future of Jack Clarke in particular, the sporting director said he did not at this stage expect any major exits.

"I get the news about selling players but our ambition is to retain our best players, develop them, go higher in the league,” Speakman said.

“I don’t see any of those external moves happening. We have not had anything externally to consider.

“I get the nervousness around selling players, I really do, because there are players there we all love, internally and externally. Our ambition is to retain our best players and keep evolving and developing the group. We want to keep performing, try to perform even better, and get to a higher place in the league. From that perspective, I don’t see any of those external movements happening. We haven’t had any discussions on any of those things and we haven’t had anything to really overly consider. So it’s business as usual from our perspective.

“I can never sit here and say that a player is never going to leave because Real Madrid could phone up and say, ‘There’s a lot of zeroes on this figure’. We’ve just got to try to ensure that fans understand that the ownership have the best intentions around building a team that we can keep improving. If the method behind it was to sell, then we would already have sold loads of players. We’ve had loads of opportunity to sell talent, so I’d like people to take comfort in the fact that that hasn’t happened on too many occasions."

Speakman also confirmed that he club were in dialogue with Manchester United over Amad's future, but reiterated Michael Beale's view that he is unlikely to be loaned out by the Premier League side.

“In the transfer window, there’s loads of things that are never going to happen that happen, and there’s loads of things that don’t happen that you think might happen," Speakman said.

"That’s just the market we live in. The situation with Amad is really clear. We’ve got a really positive relationship with the boy and his people, we’ve got a really positive relationship with Manchester United and I think everyone was really delighted on all sides with what happened last season. Do we think he’s a player that could come and improve our team? Yes. Have we inquired about him? Yes. Have we kept in contact? Of course we have.

"If we hadn’t kept in contact about him, my head might be on a stake at the beach. That’s where it’s at. If that picture changes in any shape or form, then we’ll be on it and we’ll understand where it sits. That doesn’t mean that even if he became available we would get him though, because as I’ve said on numerous occasions, I think he’s a tier one player so he’s probably going to be play in one of the top leagues somewhere."