AARON Connolly is at a crossroads in his career.

When will the next chance be the last? When will he realise his potential and back up the excitement that greeted his emergence at Brighton in 2019? Or, more to the point, will he?

If Connolly is anything like the striker who burst onto the Premier League scene five years ago next week then Sunderland could have pulled off a masterstroke.

But there's a reason the 24-year-old was a free agent. Recent years have been a story of misdemeanours off the pitch and struggles on it. And yet there's been flashes, flashes of the player who dazzled for Brighton and scored twice against Tottenham on his Premier League debut and quickly became a senior Republic of Ireland international.

It's a challenge, but what if Sunderland can get the best out of Connolly?

"Aaron's capable of anything he wants in his career if he stays on track," said Liam Rosenior at Hull last season.

"He's not 100 per cent fit, which is scary. He's a leader in the dressing room."

Hull were Connolly's last club, a loan move made permanent in the summer of 2023 but a stint that would only last 12 months.

"He knocks on my door every single day," laughed Rosenior, who didn't mind the striker's quirks.

"That's what I like. He's horrible. He's a horrible little one, the lads will tell you that, but I love him because he's himself.

"He moans about everything. He moans about having to go in the pool at the hotel when we're trying to recover, he moans about food, but you need different characters. I don't want a group of nice guys."

Connolly's time at Hull followed a couple of underwhelming loan spells after the striker had failed to build on his brilliant Brighton breakthrough.

There was a spell of making the headlines for the wrong reasons, including a covid breach during lockdown.

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By the time he joined Middlesbrough in January 2022, Connolly was already having to rebuild. That spell on Teesside didn't go to plan - with just two goals in 21 appearances.

And his next temporary move to Italy to join Venezia came with an honest admission.

“It has not gone as well in the last two, three years maybe as I thought it would have gone," he said.

"I started off well. I made some wrong choices off the pitch, on the pitch, and it’s little details like that. If you don’t get all that spot on it’s downhill, really from there.

“I got a lot of things wrong. If I could do it differently, I would. That’s why this move to Italy was vital, just to get away from kind of the circle I was in back in England.

“I needed a fresh start.”

It was a fresh start that didn't go to plan, but Connolly still tried to put his struggle in Italy to good use.

“It’s a massive point in my career," he said after joining Hull.

"Being 19 feels like a long time ago when I was playing in the Premier League regularly.

“That’s down to me and that’s stuff I’ve not been professional enough about.

“That mindset has completely flipped and if I can take anything positive from that Italy move, it’s that side of the game off the pitch, I had to get used to a different environment and just work.

“There was a lot of running in Italy but I’m starting to enjoy that bit of it as well, the professional side."

And, despite him not lasting long at Hull, there were signs of a revival. He scored five Championship goals before the end of September last season and played his way back into the Republic of Ireland squad.

"Everyone knows it hasn't been a straightforward journey for Aaron" said Stephen Kenny, the national team's boss at the time.

He lost that momentum, however, didn't start a single league game for Hull from mid-January onwards last season and made only four appearances.

Which brings us to the present day and Connolly's next opportunity. Sunderland will see the short-term deal for the striker as low risk and potential high reward. Has the penny dropped for Connolly? If he flops on Wearside, it's hard to see another big move presenting itself, regardless of the talent within. Perhaps that will sharpen the mind of the striker. That will be Sunderland's hope.