• Signing of centre-half a candidate for steal of the season
• ‘Hull needed the money’ says Sunderland manager Bruce
Michael Turner’s £4m switch from Hull City to Sunderland looks a candidate for transfer market steal of the season but Steve Bruce has explained that Ellis Short’s willingness to pay straight cash up front clinched what appeared to be an extraordinarily cheap deal.
The centre-half is already being tipped for England honours and although when Turner’s fee was initially purported to be £12m a few eyebrows were raised that sum still sounded just about plausible.
However, Adam Pearson, the new Hull chairman, this week revealed that the east Yorkshire club received £2.8m with the remainder being shared between Turner’s previous clubs, Charlton Athletic and Brentford, as sell-on fees.
As August drew to a close Hull’s precarious finances clearly helped persuade Paul Duffen, Pearson’s predecessor, to accept such a modest figure from Short, Sunderland’s owner, for the Humberside club’s player of the season.
“I think we made the payment in one go which obviously helped,” Bruce said. “The situation there [at Hull] helped the owner to get him for that sort of price. Hull needed the money and it was the right time to act.
“We were delighted to get Michael for the price we got him though, he’s a very good player for that fee. We are just delighted with the deal and, as you know, Brentford and Charlton have made a few quid out of it which is good.”
Not that this was an opportunistic act on the part of Sunderland’s manager who, instead, spent three months haggling over Turner with his Hull counterpart. “I rang Phil Brown about Michael at the start of the summer,” Bruce said. “The figure he was quoting me then was ridiculous but eventually we got our man.”
Bruce’s pursuit of Tottenham Hotspur’s Darren Bent proved similarly protracted but also had a successful, if somewhat more expensive, outcome. On Saturday the £10m striker returns to White Hart Lane as Sunderland’s leading scorer and his new manager could not be more delighted with his progress.
“I made a phone call to Harry [Redknapp] about Darren within 24 hours of me getting this job and, yes, I got encouragement, we knew the transfer was always on,” Bruce said. “I wanted a centre-forward who can score a goal but Darren is also good in the air, quick, works hard and is probably a better footballer than I thought he was. And he is young and desperate to do well.”
Should Bent fulfil Bruce’s predictions and establish himself in the England side the deal could end up costing Sunderland another £5m. “At the time I’d never paid £10m for a player so it was a colossal sum for me,” the former Wigan manager said. “But the deal actually adds up to £15m and, make no mistake, we’ll get there because it all relates to goals, England appearances and this, that and the other.”
Bruce clearly believes it has been money well spent. “Darren’s got a fantastic attitude,” he said. “He’s our record signing, but he attends more charity functions and does more stuff for kids than any other player.
“And there was never a hint of ‘I don’t want to come to Sunderland’ with him. We’re not in Outer Mongolia, but for some people it’s an issue. You would think we were on Planet Zeus up here, but it was never an issue for Darren.”
Even so Sunderland’s manager was privately thrilled Bent and Redknapp never hit it off. “I’m not sure if there was a personality clash with Harry,” he said. “But we all have them, I’m just glad they didn’t get on.”
SunderlandHull CityPremier LeagueLouise Taylorguardian.co.uk
