Bent eager to repay Black Cats' faith

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The Black Cats shelled out a club-record £10million fee, which could yet rise to £16.5million over the four years of the contract Bent has signed with the Wearsiders after manager Bruce confirmed it was the price that had been the stumbling block, almost wrecking a deal that took a fortnight to come to fruition.

And Bent is grateful to Bruce and chairman Quinn for not giving up on the pursuit as he told Sky Sports News: "A lot goes on behind the scenes - Steve Bruce and Niall Quinn, all behind the scenes really tried to make this deal work on numerous occasions."

He added: "I knew we were close once or twice and then it got knocked back again. It's disappointing but you've got to pick yourself up.

"They stuck with it and showed real belief in me and I'm just glad they've got me here finally."

The 25-year-old former Charlton frontman was leading scorer for the White Hart Lane club last season with 17 despite failing to hold down a regular place.

With Robbie Keane, Jermain Defoe, and Roman Pavlyuchenko already among Spurs' ranks, the writing was on the wall when Harry Redknapp further bolstered his striking options with the signing of Peter Crouch last month.

But Bent wants to look forward rather than back.

"My time at Tottenham's over. I'm a Sunderland player now," he said. "What I want to do now is focus on the future now at Sunderland football club. Hopefully I'll have a better experience here than I did there.

"The amount of messages I've received from Sunderland fans, wishing me to come up here was obviously key in me wanting to come here. Now I'm here I'm just delighted to be here and want to kick on."