Football stories were obviously in short supply for the Sunday paper correspondents as Sunderland captain Michael Gray of all people was linked with a move to St James’ Park.
Leaving aside the fact that his performances in the last two seasons have indicated that the former England man’s best years are behind him, you’d struggle to find a player more committed to the Mackem cause (Clive Mendonca apart!). That is surely the biggest reason why we would never want to sign him and that he’d never want to sign for us.
Fortunately one report on Monday claims ‘club insiders’ have laughed off the reports.
There was some more barrel-scraping going on in Fleet Street with a claim that we’d offered a contract to former Barcelona and Holland defender Frank de Boer. Presumably Sir Bobby’s recent comments about being happy with the quality of central defenders at the club were forgotten as soon as they were reported.
And Monday has seen the Carl Cort for Freddie Kanoute swap deal revived by the rumour peddlers, although it appears to be little more than an attempt by the Frenchman’s agent to hurry through his move to Spurs.