O’Donovan is prepared for fight to achieve his Premier League dream

8:50am Saturday 17th May 2008

TEN DAYS after hearing that Craig Gordon and Kenwyne Jones are the only certainties to avoid being sold this summer, Roy O'Donovan feels manager Roy Keane's stance has kept the Sunderland squad on their toes.

It is only ten months since O'- Donovan was plucked from Irish League side Cork City and he will be the first to admit that it has taken him time to settle to life in the Premier League.

But the 22-year-old, who turned down an opportunity to move to Dundee United on loan this year, only has aspirations of becoming a success on Wearside.

Keane is understood to have been given the go-ahead to invest around £50m in his squad ahead of the new season, which inevitably raises question marks about players already at the Stadium of Light.

And after O'Donovan made just four starts for Sunderland this season, he could be one of the departures.

"He hasn't said anything negative to me but, of course, everyone is on their toes," said O'- Donovan. "It doesn't matter how long our contracts are here, anyone can go.

"He (Keane) enjoys players having to be on their guard all the time. He'll leave players out and you can see that when they're not in the team they're champing at the bit to get back in. There is a real hunger among all our players.

"It worked during the season, you can't argue with the results we got and the fact we stayed up.

It was never going to be easy but the fact that we achieved safety is great and means we all went away very positive.

"A few players coming in would be nice too."

Having waited for his opportunity to move to the English top-flight, O'Donovan is in no mood to relinquish his status at this stage of his career.

And it is for that reason he rejected the offer to move to Tannadice at the turn of the year, when Keane thought that a stint in the Scottish Premier League would help his development.

"It worked out better in the end for me," he said. "Since I turned that down I became more involved, even if most of the time it was as a substitute. Not everyone gets a chance to play in the Premier League.

"I knew it was a big club before I came in but it has surprised me just how big it is.

"The Irish connection, with the manager, the chairman and all the money that has come in, can be a big factor in our future success.

"It's been well documented what a good job they have done and it can help attract players to have those big names like Niall Quinn and Roy Keane in charge of the club.

"That was why I signed. In Ireland right now Sunderland are as big as Arsenal and Manchester United and it's great to have that behind you."

O'Donovan was not included in Giovanni Trapatonni's first Republic of Ireland squad, which travelled to the Algarve last night.

And while Daryl Murphy and Liam Miller are in, Sunderland's Andy Reid has had to pull out because of a hamstring problem.

Reid met up with the squad in Dublin on Wednesday and trained on Thursday. However, he did not train at Malahide yesterday morning and Trapattoni later revealed he would not be on the plane.

It has also emerged that hip surgery could prevent Sunderland's out-of-favour striker David Connolly moving on this summer.

He had been expected to join QPR.

Meanwhile, Sunderland striker Andrew Cole has rejected a contract offer from Burnley that would have seen him move there permanently.

Cole, out of contract this summer, spent three months on loan with the Clarets and had hoped to stay.

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