Sunderland sporting director Kristjaan Speakman has insisted that the club will be looking to finish as high as possible in the Championship next season following their promotion from League One.
The Black Cats sealed a return to the second-tier last weekend by defeating Wycombe Wanderers in the play-off final.
Goals from Elliot Embleton and Ross Stewart secured a 2-0 victory for Sunderland at Wembley Stadium.
The Black Cats have since decided to make some alterations to their playing squad.
As confirmed by the club's official website yesterday, Aiden McGeady, Arbenit Xhemajli, Jordan Willis and Lee Burge will all be leaving the Stadium of Light when their deals expire next month.
In order to have best the chance of achieving a relative amount of success in the second-tier next season, Sunderland will need to engage in some transfer activity in the coming months as they are also set to wave goodbye to loanees Callum Doyle, Jack Clarke, Nathan Broadhead and Thorben Hoffmann.
Making reference to the 2022/23 campaign, Speakman has revealed that the club will not set a limit on their ambitions for this particular term.
Speaking to Chronicle Live, Speakman said: "We're not going to try and put a halt on any ambition, say that we're going to try and finish 20th, 15th or 12th or whatever.
"We want to finish as high as we possibly can and will give everything to do that, but we've also got to be respectful of the fact that it is a new league and we are taking a new team into it.
"We've got to get the blend right in our squad to give us the best chance.
"What we're not going to do is deviate from the strategy."
The Verdict
When you consider that the Championship is famed for its competitiveness, it can be notoriously hard to predict who will emerge as front-runners in this particular division.
A whole host of clubs will be keen to follow in the footsteps of Fulham and AFC Bournemouth who both managed to secure promotion to the top-flight earlier this year.
The scale of Sunderland's success next season could potentially depend on whether they are able to nail their recruitment.
Having previously worked as a manager at this level for Norwich City and Preston North End, Alex Neil will be confident in his ability to assemble a squad which is capable of thriving in the second-tier.