Tony Mowbray has revealed he was plotting a move to bring Dan Neil to Blackburn Rovers if Sunderland missed out on promotion - and is now relishing the chance to work with him on Wearside. Academy graduate Neil was one of the Black Cats' standout players in his breakthrough season last term in League One which caught the attention of other clubs, including Rovers whose then-boss Mowbray was convinced the youngster had the ability to play at Championship level.
But with Sunderland winning promotion, and with Mowbray since installed as the Black Cats' new head coach, the pair are working together in the Championship in any event. And Mowbray says Neil is every bit as talented as he had seen from afar last year, and now sees it as his job to help the 20-year-old improve still further.
"Dan's career is on an upward trajectory, he's a very talented boy," said Mowbray, whose Sunderland side heads to Reading tomorrow. "As Blackburn Rovers manager last year, he was very much on our radar.
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"If Sunderland weren't going to get promoted, we would have been trying take him out of League One. But here I am now working with him every day, and I see the player I watched and thought he was.
"His passing range is very good and he can run all day. He's one of the players we're trying to get to break the box a bit more because I think he's got a goal in him.
"He wants to learn and get better, and he wants to watch his clips after training. He wants to keep improving and, as a coach, there’s nothing better than a footballer that wants to improve and makes demands of your time to go and sit with him and talk through what you thought was good and bad."
Homegrown players often become fan favourites and Neil is no exception, treading a similar path to the likes of Jordan Pickford and Jordan Henderson before him. Mowbray was in a similar situation during his own playing career which started at his hometown club Middlesbrough in the 1980s, and he went on to become a legendary figure on Teesside.
Mowbray says there can also be extra pressures attached to playing for your hometown club, but he believes that Neil has the character to overcome such hurdles. He said: "The footballer has to be good enough.
"It's all very well having a homegrown player in the team, but the homegrown guy can often be the one that takes a lot of the flak if things aren't going well. They almost become an easy target.
"Dan seems to me as if he's got the personality to be able to override that. He's still a young boy, and he does have spells in games where he doesn't influence it as much as he could.
"Because of the talent level he's got, he should be impacting football matches a lot more, for longer. But I think he'll grow into that and understand it.
"You have to give them the confidence. If you talk about artists and soldiers, the soldiers should be winning the ball back and fighting and scrapping, and then the artists are the ones who pick the right pass and know when to dribble and shoot.
"Dan genuinely falls into both categories. You expect him to win second balls and put his foot in and win challenges, but then he can hit 60-yard diagonals where you think, 'Wow, what a pass that is'."
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