SUNDERLAND could find themselves stuck with £3.6m French misfit Lilian Laslandes - despite placing him on the transfer list earlier this week.

For although the striker's agent, Phillipe Flavier, has been searching for a new club for the past six months there have been no takers - and he indicated that the 30-year-old would be happy to return to Wearside after the summer break.

Laslandes, capped seven times by France, turned out to be Sunderland manager Peter Reid's worst ever buy.

Seen as an eventual replacement for Republic of Ireland veteran Niall Quinn, Laslandes proved a complete disaster and managed only five Premiership starts before being farmed out on loan to struggling German outfit Cologne, who were later relegated and dropped all interest in the Frenchman.

Now Laslandes seems set to rejoin Sunderland, where he still has three seasons to run on a lucrative contract worth nearly £1m a year.

His agent admitted: "I have been working on finding a new club for Lilian for some time, but at the moment there have been no offers."

Flavier, however, remains optimistic that he will find a new opening for Laslandes, probably in France, but he does not yet know what kind of transfer fee Sunderland will want for the player, even though they are desperate to get him off their books.

He said: "He does not regret moving to Sunderland, even though things have not worked out. He is disappointed that it did not go well for him in the early days, but that is football.

"He was not unhappy at Sunderland and has a contract, which he would honour if another club is not found, but it does not look like he will continue there."

Flavier added: "But I am confident he will find a new club this summer. The French transfer market has now opened and I will be working on opportunities there."

Sunderland will expect to recoup some of their losses, but will be happy to wash their hands of a player who became a walking embarrassment for Reid, ranking alongside the hapless Milton Nunez (£1.6m) and Carsten Fredgaard (£1.8m) as his worst transfer blunders.

Flavier said: "We have a good relationship with Sunderland and I have to speak to them to find out exactly what they want. Lilian is an experienced player and he knows he will play well at the highest level somewhere."

* Sunderland striker Kevin Kyle received a verbal rocket from coach Berti Vogts after scoring his first goal for Scotland on a friendly tour of the Far East.

Kyle pushed the referee during the 4-0 win over a Hong Kong Select X1 and while the match official took no action the 20-year-old was reprimanded afterwards by Vogts, who said: "He's very young but he must learn and understand that kind of thing should never happen."

Kyle admitted: "I was so frustrated because I was getting my jersey pulled all the time and I pushed the referee by mistake.

"The manager had a go at me after the match and told me to calm down - I know it was a stupid thing to do. But I'm just so desperate to play for Scotland - it's something I used to dream about. Now I've been in the team and I've scored. It's the best thing that's happened to me; maybe the best thing I've done in my life."

* Teenage Sunderland striker Chris Brown has been called up by England for an Under-18 international tournament in Portugal next month.

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