New Sunderland boss Alex Neil won't forget his first week on Wearside in a hurry

As first weeks in a new job go, this is one that Alex Neil will not forget in a hurry.

Confirmed as Sunderland's head coach late last Friday night having already already taken his first training session, and after being pictured travelling with the team in club tracksuit, meant his welcome was overshadowed by the derision over the delayed announcement.

Then came an uninspiring 1-1 draw against relegation strugglers AFC Wimbledon, after which he gave a frank assessment of the problems with the squad he had inherited - namely the divide between young players who looked jaded after playing too many minutes, and senior men who had played too few.

And then on Tuesday an already fractious fanbase was infuriated when the club revealed the shareholder split between the ownership group, which showed that chairman Kyril Louis-Dreyfus did not own as much of the club as they had been led to believe - and, more pertinently, that Stewart Donald and Charlie Methven together still owned a substantial chunk.

The club has since clarified that Louis-Dreyfus has full control, which took some of the sting out of the situation, but fans will only truly relax once Donald and Methven have sold up and gone.

So it has been some introduction to life on Wearside, and Neil admits he has just tried to keep his head down and focus on the football, saying: "I'll be brutally honest, it hasn't been a distraction for me because I have been extremely busy.

"I'm not a big reader of what is going on outside the football side of things, because trying to fix the football is my main priority.

"However I am aware [of what's happened] because things like that do have an impact and an effect on all facets of the football club.

"I'm aware of the discontent