Stewart Donald reveals timescale for new Sunderland manager - and a surprise contender for the job

After being officially unveiled as the Black Cats' new owner this afternoon, Donald is hoping to make a quick appointment.

And he revealed that he may have a conversation with Chris Coleman, having stated that he had nothing to do with the Welshman's departure last month.

Donald is keen to appoint quickly to ensure the new boss has time to rebuild the squad over the summer and, with the takeover now formalised, concrete conversations can be had with targets.

When asked about the timescale for appointing a new owner, Donald said: "Very soon I hope."

"We are obviously going to start looking through that process and we would hope seven days maximum, I would think before we have a new manager.

"We have to move quickly, we need the manager to have as much of the summer as possible to assemble the squad he has and assess what he has got.

"I would be very surprised if by the weekend we were not able to tell you who that would be."

Director Charlie Methven, who was sat alongside Donald, added: "You can have notional conversations with people but until you have taken the football club over they are notional conversations.

"Now the situation changes and Stewart will be in a position to have what I would call serious conversations with the candidates."

A number of names have been linked with the post - most recently that of Jack Ross at St Mirren - but Donald threw a surprising name into the frame.

That of Chris Coleman.

When asked whether he would approach the Welshman, Donald was coy and claimed that a conversation may be had - but he did confirm that the decision to sack Coleman lay purely with Ellis Short.

When asked about his departure and what they had to do with it, Donald added: "Nothing at all, that was down to Ellis.

"Ellis' situation regards the business prior to us being involved is down to Ellis. He wanted to make sure the football club was tied up in loads of areas for us.

"It is only up until now that this is when you will see us take charge and the impact we have."