Sunderland begin preparations for January transfer window as Kristjaan Speakman sets out plan
Sunderland are already beginning to turn their attentions to the January transfer window
Kristjaan Speakman says Sunderland are already turning their attentions to the January transfer window and will be able to strengthen the squad where necessary.
The club’s sporting director said that the significant sale of Jack Clarke to Ipswich Town would not necessarily mean to more spending in the winter window, but said they would look to be active and that the hierarchy had demonstrated their willingness to invest.
“We’ll turn our attention to January, we’ll track the progress of our players and we’ll track the progress of the players we like out there in the market,” Speakman said.
“Then when we get to January, we will make the same set of decisions against the same requirements, which is that we want to keep improving the team.
“We’ve invested in every single window. We were making the acquisition of Milan before there was even a bid on the table for Clarke so these things are not intrinsically linked apart from the fact that, when you look at the big picture, we obviously want to make sure we’re in a good place. We will continue to keep looking to invest. I don’t think there’s a need to spend money just because there’s a perception that you have money. We can improve through succession planning, and we can also improve the team through external recruitment. We don’t know where we’ll be in January. We’ll do our usual set of reviews, our player audits running up to that period, and then we’ll see where we think the need is. Where we think the need is, is where we’ll try to action that in the marketplace. That might involve spending money, or it might involve acquiring a highly-talented player like Alan Browne on a free transfer. That’s the balance of our work.”
Speakman has already said that the club are happy with the squad they have for the next few months, thus ruling out any free agent additions in the interim.
“We always look at that market because you always have to look for opportunities, but ultimately we have a group that is doing really, really well at the minute,” he said.
“So first and foremost we want to focus on, look at and work with the players we have in the building rather than those that we don't. Overall, myself and Regis are both committed on trying to have a size of squad where it is competitive and everyone can feel they can get on the pitch.
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"You don't want it to balloon beyond that point. Within that, you'll always have players who can play two or three positions. So we feel have enough of those within the squad or within our U21s to come in and fulfil that if we need. Our strategy is always in two halves, the block of 21 games to the January window and we feel we've got the right balance to get us to then.”