Halford swapping the Cats for Wolves

Jul 3 2009 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

ANOTHER expensive mistake of the Roy Keane era is to come to an end after Greg Halford agreed to join Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Keane’s time as Sunderland manager featured an unfortunate tendency to accumulate players at great cost, then quickly decide they were not as good as he first thought.

The clear-out is continuing under new boss Steve Bruce, who is anxious to make the size of next season’s squad more manageable.

At the end of Keane’s tenure the Wearsiders’ official website listed 51 senior players – many of whom, like Halford, were on loan.

On Wednesday Michael Chopra joined Cardiff City – who will initially pay only a tenth of the £5m they received from Sunderland two years ago.

Now the versatile Halford is also set to leave at a loss, albeit a smaller one.

The Black Cats paid £3m to take the 24-year-old from Reading two years ago, but his next move is expected to cost Wolves only £2m.

Halford was Keane’s first signing as a Premier League manager, and emblematic of many who followed. He was sent off in his fourth game, a 3-0 League Cup defeat at then-League One Luton Town.

That embarrassment seemed to damage his confidence and reputation for the rest of his brief Black Cats career.

Despite never being a malicious player, he was back in the side less than a week before his next dismissal in a 1-1 defeat to Fulham.

In total, Halford made just nine appearances for the club, all at right-back, before being cold-shouldered.

His last, a 2-0 defeat at Chelsea, saw Keane vent his legendary fury in a half-time rant at the attitude of some of his players. Halford spent the second half of 2007-08 on loan at Championship side Charlton Athletic, before joining Sheffield United for the whole of last term.