Tony Mowbray: 'I'm not going to build Dan Neil up just so he can be sold to a Premier League club'

Dan Neil will, of course, be attracting the attention of Premier League scouts, but Tony Mowbray wants to keep him under the radar.

Tony Mowbray says he would prefer to keep the talents of Sunderland youngster Dan Neil under wraps for as long as possible.

Neil produced what was arguably his best ever performance for Sunderland in the 2-0 win over Middlesbrough, and he has been steadily improving all season.

However, he joked he was reluctant to talk about Neil too much for obvious reasons.

"Listen I'm not going to sit here and build Dan Neil up so you lot can go and get him sold to a Premier League club," Mowbray told the press after the win over Middlesbrough.

"I was very aware of him at Blackburn Rovers, he was on our radar as the best player in League One in our opinion.

"Now that I'm here and working with him I'm going to keep him quiet, just let him do what he does and keep developing."

Neil recently revealed he was forced to make significant improvements to his defensive game to force his way back into the Sunderland side.

Former boss Alex Neil told him he wasn’t good enough without the ball to get into his team, but he went away over the summer, improved, and was in the starting line-up for the first game of the Championship season against Coventry.

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"He's a wonderful kid, he looks you in the eye and asks you questions," Mowbray said.

"When you shout and moan at him for not doing this or that, he doesn't throw a strop, he comes to see the clips so that he can understand what you mean. He's a very, very talented young guy who wants to get better.

“He's got all the attributes to be a top midfielder player. [Middlesbrough boss] Michael Carrick will follow me in soon and he isn't too far away from being that type of midfielder - who is elegant with that bit of quality.

"He's growing into becoming a good footballer, but please don't go making big headlines, we want to keep him quiet."

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