Fairly widely reported over the past twenty-four hours, with Sunderland manager Steve Bruce commenting:
"We've asked the question of City and we now just have to wait and see what they say. But the timetable is not up to us on when we get an answer, it's up to them.
"With these new 25-man squad rules, clubs don't have to name their confirmed squads until the end of August, so if they wanted to, City could delay any decisions on their squad until then."
Whilst Shay Given's return from injury has seen him feature in pre-season, this has perhaps allowed the club some scope to contemplate a further loan for Hart - something that had been ruled out when Given went down injured at the end of last season.
The concern would be though in that agreeing to loan Hart at this stage would be a big gamble given the lack of football Given has had, and it is by no means certain either as to which 'keeper Mancini will go with to open this season with both splitting time in pre-season so far.
Hart's comments earlier this week did however suggest he would be receptive to another loan move as opposed to spending a season on the bench, and the club do have Stuart Taylor in the squad after re-signing him recently.
As Bruce alluded to though, with the squads not having to be named until the end of August, this could allow the club to monitor Given's fitness over the earlier part of the season to assess whether he is deemed fit enough to allow Hart to be farmed out again.