Bradford City are hoping to sign Sunderland's right-sided midfield player Nicky Summerbee in a £1.5 million deal.

The fee has been agreed with their North East Premiership rivals and now City are waiting to meet the player and his agent.

Chairman Geoffrey Richmond said: "We are awaiting a phone call from his agent to arrange when he and the player are coming to see us."

The 28-year-old former England under-21 international joined Sunderland from Manchester City in November 1997 in a £1 million part exchange deal which involved Craig Russell moving to Maine Road. Since then Summerbee has made 93 league appearances for Sunderland.

Manager Peter Reid tried to sign Arsenal's Ray Parlour as a replacement for Summerbee, but his £5 million bid was turned down.

Summerbee, who began his career at Swindon, missed only one Premiership match for Sunderland last season until the end of February, but he then had a dispute with Reid and played only five more matches although he did start in the last three games of the campaign.

City have been trying to sign a right sided midfield player as cover and competition for Jamie Lawrence and this week Sheffield Wednesday's Swedish international Niclas Alexandersson turned them down to join Everton with Coventry City and Aston Villa also competing for his signature.

Richmond said: "We have set a criteria for signing players in that we will be signing only players of proven Premiership experience.

"Our first three signings, Peter Atherton, Ian Nolan and David Hopkin come into that category in that each player has got considerable Premiership experience behind him.

"Although the club would like to be signing young players with potential the priority of the club is to consolidate our position in the Premiership.

"For the moment we are looking to sign players who could make an immediate impact in the team because our priority is to retain out status and improve on last season's league position and points total."

Tickets for the club trip to Holland for Saturday's Intertoto Cup quarter final, second leg against RKC Waalwijk will remain on sale until close of business today.

City have sold nearly 800 tickets for the trip and eight coaches have been booked. The coaches leave Midland Road at 3am on Saturday, not 4am as previously announced."