Sunderland winger Jeremain Lens insists he was pleased to see the club appoint David Moyes as their new manager so quickly after the exit of Sam Allardyce.

The Stadium of Light outfit have endured a chaotic few days since Allardyce quit to replace Roy Hodgson as manager of England.

Allardyce’s future with Sunderland looked in doubt for a number of weeks and there was a real danger it could hamper the club heading into the new campaign.

Sunderland, who are priced at 3.75 to be relegated, confirmed the appointment of Moyes less than 24 hours after the departure of Allardyce and he met the squad for the first time ahead of their friendly with Rotherham on Saturday.

Black Cats owner Ellis Short made clear in his statement that Moyes had been a long-term target and he believes the Scot will be able to get to work quickly.

The former Manchester United boss has just three weeks until the start of the 2016-17 season when Sunderland will travel away to take on Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City.

Lens revealed he met briefly with the new man in charge and expects he will be able to slot straight in as he looks to pass his ideas on to the squad.

“We saw him [Moyes] for a couple of minutes when he came in to say hello [at Rotherham], and it’s good to have a new manager,” Lens said.

“We heard Sam was leaving [on Friday] and everyone was disappointed about that. But we are happy to have a new manager with us and hopefully we can all move on together.

“It’s really good that he has been able to come in so quickly because it’s not too long until the start of the season so we couldn’t afford to be waiting for a couple of weeks.

Hopefully, he can carry on the good work that the previous manager did.”