It’s took him years to build his reputation and finally earn the right to say he’s a Championship manager. That’s with his boyhood club and the club he lives and breathes.
He’d run the risk of being seen as nothing more than a really good lower league manager if he chose to drop down there again, no matter how big the club was.
He’d be League One’s Neil Warnock, good at getting clubs up, but once they’re up not good enough to cut it at the higher level.
No, for all his mouthing off about the boardroom he’ll not leave to go to Sunderland. He’s ambitious sure enough and could be tempted by a club coming down to the Championship with money to spend.
But if he gets reasonable backing, it won’t have to be mega millions, he won’t be tempted to leave the Lane for anyone at Championship level or below.
He knows the potential at the Lane more than most managers and he knows what a huge club it could be.
His managerial ambitions can all be served at the Lane if he’s given half a chance and the same can’t be said at perhaps wealthier clubs who might temporarily have the money to out muscle other bigger clubs such as ourselves because of some rich benefactor.
But it invariably at clubs like that it all goes pear shaped sooner or later. He’ll wait and see how it pans out over the summer. He’ll still get his chance to move on if he’s unhappy and he’s no fool, that’s why he’ll not be going anywhere just yet, least of all Sunderland.