Tony Mowbray has been reunited with key ally Stuart Harvey on Wearside - 18 months after he persuaded him to leave Blackburn Rovers and climb aboard the Sunderland 'juggernaut'. Harvey spent six years at Ewood Park and was latterly head of talent identification there before joining the Black Cats as head of recruitment in April last year.
Mowbray's subsequent appointment as head coach, along with Mark Venus as his assistant, means three pillars of the Blackburn regime are working together again, while another ex-Ewood man, midfielder Corry Evans, is a central figure for Sunderland on the pitch. But Mowbray has revealed that he had to convince Harvey to leave the Championship club and take the opportunity on offer at Sunderland, who were in League One at the time.
Mowbray is a big admirer of the work Harvey does behind the scenes, and his working relationship with the Northern Irishman meant he was quickly brought up to speed on Sunderland's recruitment strategy when he took over from Alex Neil almost a fortnight ago. "When Stuart left Blackburn to come here, he had conversations with me because I think he had reservations and he enjoyed working with myself and Mark [Venus] - he actually lived with us, we were like the three stooges living in an apartment in Blackburn!" smiled Mowbray.
