Sunderland boss Steve Bruce now feels the Black Cats are no longer a selling club and can look forward with confidence to the second half of the season. The Wearsider's are currently in sixth place on 30 points after 21 games, and well on course to secure a first finish in the top half since the Peter Reid era a decade ago.
Bruce is determined there will be no repeat of his Wigan tenure when he was forced to sell his star players in the winter transfer window.
Bruce said: "I knew I was losing them, I knew I was losing Palacios and I knew I was losing Heskey and I knew I was losing Valencia, so that was very, very difficult.
"We don't want to lose anybody because we don't have to, and we want to keep trying to build. That's what the aim has got to be."
He said: "It's nice to see us in sixth. It would have been great if we had had 33 points, which we should have had. Then it would have looked even more rosy.
"But to see us in sixth, we would all have settled for that going into the New Year.
"I have got a lot of good young players who we enjoy working with."
