STEVE Bruce is hopeful of adding a striker to his squad before the transfer window closes on Wednesday.

And the Sunderland manager has admitted that his side have lacked “that killer thing” of a regular goalscorer since Darren Bent joined Aston Villa

The Black Cats, who have scored just once in four games this season, have been linked with a number of forwards, including Craig Bellamy and Peter Crouch.

Bruce (pictured left) – also after a left-winger – confirmed he has “one or two things in the fire”, and hopes “something will come to fruition” by mid-week to hand his faltering side the “spark” it needs. “It’s been a tough week because we lost a derby game and now all of a sudden we’ve got the divine right to come here and turn Swansea over,” Bruce said.

“We should have done in my opinion, like we should have done at Brighton. We created enough chances in the game, we just have to find that killer thing which is scoring a goal.

“If I’m being honest we’ve lacked that really since we lost Bent to Villa. However, we have to make sure we don’t let it derail us and hopefully we might bring someone in who can give us a spark and get off and running.

“We’re looking to see if we can do something and we hope something will come to fruition.

We’ve got one or two things in the fire, let’s see what develops.