Sunderland will not rush into new deals for out-of-contract stars

Lee Burge, Bailey Wright, Tom Flanagan, Jordan Willis, Arbenit Xhemajli, Lynden Gooch, Aiden McGeady and Aiden O’Brien are all due to become free agents in the summer, and as things stand, none have been offered a new deal beyond the end of the current campaign.

Wright, Flanagan and Gooch in particular have been integral parts of Lee Johnson’s first-team squad in the first half of the season, and there is obviously the potential for uncertainty over their futures to affect their performances in the remainder of the campaign.

Nevertheless, with a January transfer window to negotiate and uncertainty over which league Sunderland will be playing in next season, Black Cats sporting director Kristjaan Speakman insists now would be the wrong time to rush into a series of key decisions about the future.

Instead, while there have been initial talks with the players and their representatives, it has been made clear that contractual issues will be shelved until much later in the season.

“We have several senior players who will be out of contract in June,” said Speakman. “And naturally, there will be some anxiety about that, to a degree.

"They have all contributed to a really high level this season – ultimately, you are looking at high-level professional athletes who know what they are doing and how they go about their business.

“What we have to do is to make the right decision going forward, based on the direction the football club is going.

"At the moment, we haven’t got to the point where we’ve sat down and said, 'Right, okay, this is what we are going to do with this player and that player’.

“Some of it will be based on how the squad moves forward through January into the back end of the season.

"Ultimately, all the players want to get Sunderland promoted – everyone’s purpose and motivation is completely aligned - but naturally you are always going to have a cohort of players who come to the end of the season and will be deciding where it goes.”

Sunderland are hoping to be active in the transfer market this month, with discussions having taken place over a possible loan move for Manchester City attacking-midfielder Patrick Roberts.

Roberts joined French club Troyes on loan in the summer, but has been restricted to just one first-team appearance in the whole of the first half of the season, and both City and the player himself are keen to engineer a return to England. Roberts is due to become a free agent in the summer, and does not want to spend the remainder of the campaign languishing on the bench in France.

The Black Cats’ January business will influence their thinking ahead of the summer, with Johnson keen to avoid being saddled with a large number of contracted players.

Clearly, Sunderland’s fate at the top end of the table will also be a major factor in their summer plans, with the requirements for a season in the Championship markedly different to what would be needed for another campaign in League One.

“Where we’d like to be, if possible, is in a position where we can make decisions as we go through the season rather than as some sort of end line,” continued Speakman. “But it’s always difficult to tell because with every player, the negotiation and conversation can go in a different direction.

“What we’ve done is remain completely open with all the players’ representatives around where our thinking is at, make sure we understand where they are at, and understand about them as people because they have families and they have to look at their careers and what they are going to be doing in their lives.

“Ultimately, though, we have to put Sunderland first and make sure we are making the right decisions for Sunderland.

"I stand by the fact that we have to make the right decision for Sunderland, which means monitoring those players and making the right offer at the right time.

“When you are approaching the January transfer window, what we don’t want to do is to commit to something when we might make a decision and go do something else.”