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With Connor Wickham only having one year left on his existing contract, there has been a lot of speculation that the striker could depart the Stadium of Light before the transfer window closes but Gus Poyet is not only confident that Wickham will still be a Sunderland player come Tueday but that he will also sign a new contract;
I said in the situation where Connor is, either he signed a new contract or the club needs to sell and that was simple.
However, I didn't say we had offered him a contract, no we didn't, so nobody needs to accept an offer they haven't been offered. I didn't say anything about an offer.
That was the normal situation with any player except he's under 23 which in this case brings compensation to the table.
If Connor keeps playing and keeps scoring goals I'm sure he would like to stay here because he feels important, except if a top, top club comes in for him like any other player.
I'm confident when this transfer window finishes he will sign. I want Connor to stay here
The 21-year-old scored his first goal of the season in the Capital One Cup tie at Birmingham in midweek and getting the player tied down to a new deal will be a big boost for the club after they finally started seeing a return on their investment during the great escape.
Meanwhile, Celtic's chief executive Peter Lawwell has been discussing the possibility of the Scottish champions signing Steven Fletcher during an interview.
Speaking about the difficulties of signing expensive players, Lawwell used Fletcher as an example and admitted his club would be interested in the Scottish international if a deal was possible;
Let's take Steven Fletcher who would cost £6m to £7m and is on £37,000 a week and is 27. That is a huge investment.
You would go for Fletcher if there was a deal to be done for him on loan or such like.
Lawwell did admit that signing players on large salaries, like Fletcher, could cause dressing room problems;
We have had knock-backs from much lesser players than that level. If they want to come and play here there is then the difficulty of their salary. You sign them and then the consequence of that is an unhappy dressing room with unhappy players.
Although it's unlikely we would sell Fletcher during the time remaining in this window, the striker has struggled to get involved in Sunderland's two Premier League games so far, with it appearing that he is unsuited to either the role he is being asked to play or Poyet's style of football and if something doesn't change for the player soon, it would be no surprise to see the 27-year-old depart sooner rather than later.
Stay tuned to Roker Report throughout the summer as we keep you up to date with all the transfer news and rumours. Also, feel free to keep in touch with our dedicated Transfer Centre, which you can do by CLICKING HERE.
