EXCLUSIVE: SPL side Hibernian keen on loan move for forgotten Sunderland winger
Scottish Premiership side Hibernian want Jewison Bennette, with the Costa Rican making it clear he wants to leave Sunderland on loan this month.
Bennette looked a real prospect for Sunderland last season and he impressed at the World Cup as well, but the winger has barely featured in the current campaign.
That has seen him grow increasingly agitated on Wearside, and it had been hoped that the arrival of a coach in Michael Beale who speaks some Spanish would be able to bring a little more out of him.
That hasn’t happened, though, and Bennette has found his opportunities as limited as ever. That has led to some frank conversations during which the 19-year-old told the club he wanted out this month.
Sunderland are not ready to give up on him, though, and a loan move this January to get him playing regular football is seen as the perfect solution for everyone.
Hibernian have emerged as the frontrunners for his signature, with the SPL seen as better for him than a foreign loan as it would continue to settle him in the UK and mean he was required to continue to improve his English.
Speaking in December, the then caretaker Sunderland head-coach Mike Dodds said: "Any of those young players who aren't playing as much as we'd like, I think [a loan] needs to be discussed because we have invested in them and we see them as a long-term project.
“Loans are a way to fix the minutes that they need. The issue isn't the loan, it's finding the right type of loan for whichever player - Jewi or whoever else - and what they need.
“The discussion around Jewi will be not so much does he need a loan, but what type of loan can we get him that is best for his development?
"Whether it be Jewi or any young player, we are fully aware that the best way to develop them is for them to play minutes and that's not lost on us. Domestic loan, overseas loan, style of play.
"We're not going to put Jewi in a team that is going to smash it from back to front. We need to be really selective in terms of where we can get Jewi where someone wants to play him, that plays a similar type of style as Sunderland where he can practice the things that we want him to practice and that we want him to get better at.
"It might be abroad, it might be in this country. Those are things that we need to decide for what is right for this football club."
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