Sunderland striker discusses why he decided to quit the club.

Lee Howey has now explained why he wanted to leave Sunderland in 1997.

Speaking on the UnderTheCosh Podcast, the boyhood Sunderland fan has admitted that it was ‘too much’ towards the end of his time on Wearside.

Born in Seaham, Lee Howey began his career with Bishop Auckland. He was then snapped up by Terry Butcher in 1993, but it wasn’t until Peter Reid arrived that he began to pick up some first team reaction.

After Howey played a key role in winning promotion to the Premier League, the former defender struggled with life in the top flight and found himself forced out of the starting line-up.

While Howey spent a majority of his career as a centre-half, he was also moved to the opposite end of the pitch at times. The 54-year-old has now admitted that was ‘too much’, but he just wanted to play games.

Lee Howey ‘just wanted to play’

Speaking on the podcast, Howey said: “When I went to Burnley, I made it clear that I wanted to be a centre-half because being a centre-forward was just too much. It was too much.

“But I just wanted to play and that is one of the reasons I left Sunderland because we had getting promoted, I played the last 14 games of the Premier League season and we went down.

“We just never scored enough goals. I think we had the highest points scored in the Premier League at the time and we went down.

“We were playing Sheffield United the first game again live on the Sunday and Andy Melville was back in the team. I was just disappointed. I could understand because Mel was probably a better centre-half than I was.

“I didn’t want to be dropped and I just wanted to play and I knew I was on borrowed time and I just wanted to play as many games before it was all over hence I went to Burnley.

“I was just sat in my house and Reidy (Peter Reid) rang me and said we’ve just accepted a £200k offer from Burnley for you, Waddler (Chris Waddle) wants you