Sunderland boss Martin O'Neill admits he plans talks with Connor Wickham about sending him away on-loan.

The young striker is eager for regular first team football.

O'Neill said: "I need to speak with him. We don't have the squad to send a lot of players out at any time. Some of the younger boys last season, we didn't mind sending them out, we would stagger them so you wouldn't have too many out at any one time.

"We don't have, at this minute, the biggest squad in the world after transfer deadline. However, we do have a number of forwards that I can give some thought to."