Sunderland boss Gus Poyet has explained sending Connor Wickham away on-loan.
Wickham moved to Sheffield Wednesday last week.
"Connor needs games," he said. "I think he's a player who when we saw him come in, when he was 17, he was impressive.
"You never know, it's very difficult to predict when you have to move clubs, when it is time to make that step forward.
"You can put it on the player or the family of the player, they will say to you [that they want to move] as soon as possible.
"If you depend on the (selling) club's finances, they will say as soon as possible too.
"But the difficulty then is, at the end, he needs to play, wherever that is."
