Alex Neil insists he 'can't knock on the door any more' than he has already to press the case for Sunderland to bring in reinforcements this month as a matter of urgency. The Black Cats have brought in seven signings already - including two players who were on loan with the Wearsiders last season - but after a summer exodus of men deemed surplus to requirements, Neil's squad remains light on numbers and with little or no cover in some key positions.
Neil has largely taken a patient approach up to now but, with a couple of injuries - including to new addition Dan Ballard, who is expected to be out for around eight weeks with a fractured foot - reducing his options, and with the transfer deadline just over a fortnight away, it is clear he needs new recruits sooner rather than later. Prior to the injury to Ballard, Neil had said that he wanted 'four or five' more signings before the window closes.
And, asked this morning whether he has been knocking on owner Kyril Louis-Dreyfus' door, Neil said: "I can't knock on the door any more. There's probably no door any more - I've probably bust it down!
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"We need to get reinforcements in. We're aware of that.
"It's been an ongoing discussion, it's not as though anything has suddenly significantly shifted - except that we have lost a key player [Ballard] for a length of time, which makes our job doubly difficult because now we are light in an area where we had strength.
"We need a bit of help. We need to get players in.
"At the moment we have key positions where, if we get injuries, we're light and in some positions we have arguably got nobody to take their place."
Sunderland fans can see the areas in which the squad is short of cover, with a lack of backup for strikers Ross Stewart and Ellis Simms and the lack of cover for Dennis Cirkin at left-back, oft-cited issues. And Neil shares their concerns, adding: "All the frailties that people see, and they say 'we need to strengthen there, or we need to strengthen there', I can assure you I've seen it long before anyone because I see it every day.
"I know exactly where we are, I know exactly what we need to do, but it's not easy getting it done."
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