Another day, another round-up of transfer speculation featuring the usual gaggle of money-saturated big-name continental heavyweight clubs chasing the usual gaggle of big-name continental heavyweight players. Barcelona? Tick. Chelsea? Tick. Manchester City? Tick. Manchester United? Tick. Bayern Munich? Tick. Paris Saint-Germain? Tick. Real Madrid? Tick. Crewe Alexandra? Tickety-tick tick tick. Yawn.
To Spain, then, where Barcelona’s West Ham loanee Alex Song is wanted by Chelsea and Manchester City, whose interest in the midfielder has been piqued by the Cameroonian’s homegrown status. Having joined Arsenal as a 17-year-old and therefore played three years of football in the UK before his 21st birthday, Song is – in football terms at least – as British as stiff upper lips, the monarchy and binge-drinking. He can play a bit too, which is obviously another point in his favour.
In other Camp Nou news, despite insisting that they’d quite like to keep their unsettled and not-in-the-team striker Pedro, Barcelona are understood to be willing to let him go for as little as £7m, because he has only one year left on his contract. Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham are forming an orderly queue.
Meanwhile in Madrid, nobody seems to know where on earth Gareth Bale will be playing his football next season, but that hasn’t stopped everyone speculating wildly. The latest “intel” leaking from the Bernabéu is that he’s staying put, having been reassured that he’s part of the club’s plans for next season.
According to the Spanish sports daily Marca, Cristiano Ronaldo is in a bit of a funk over the club’s inability to win trophies despite his brilliance and Paris Saint-Germain are monitoring his latest bout of petulance accordingly. Elsewhere in the Spanish capital, Atlético’s Mario Mandzukic could be packing his bags and heading for Monaco, who are rumoured to have tabled an eye-watering bid of £25m plus the former Atlético hero Radamel Falcao for the Croatian striker.
Not content with bolstering their ranks of homegrown players with the aforementioned Mr Song, Manchester City want the Liverpool winger Raheem Sterling (£50m), the West Bromwich Albion striker Saido Berahino (£20m) and the moon on a stick. This imminent influx of talent will obviously force a clearout led by Yaya Touré, who now looks a stonewall certainty to sign for Internazionale. “We are at the stage where we hope we can complete it,” said Inter’s vice-president Javier Zanetti. “Yaya would give us that leap in quality.” The Nerazzurri are also hopeful of bringing Thiago Motta back to San Siro from PSG.
Speaking of the French champions, the Rumour Mill almost choked on its morning croissant and café au lait while perusing its copy of Le Parisien, where we discovered PSG have withdrawn their chapeau from the ring signposted
“Clubs Interested In Signing Paul Pogba”. The Juventus midfielder’s excessive wage demands are understood to have been the source of much harrumphing at PSG Towers and he will now sign for Barcelona instead.
Closer to home, the Manchester Evening News reports that Pep Guardiola will “assess the managerial situation at Manchester United before making a decision about City”, once his Bayern Munich contract expires at the end of next season. Nicolás Otamendi’s looks likely to pitch up in Manchester a lot sooner, with the Argentinian newspaper Olé reporting that the Valencia central defender has agreed terms with United, although the club have yet to agree a fee with his current employers.
At Stamford Bridge, Chelsea have unveiled a fiendish plan that would force Arsenal to include Theo Walcott or Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain in any deal that would enable Petr Cech to go the other way. Further north, the Aston Villa striker Christian Benteke could end up joining the ranks of transfer targets Brendan Rodgers wasn’t interested in anyway, now it has emerged the Premier League champions are plotting to hunker down alongside Liverpool in the starting blocks for the race to secure the Belgian goal-getter’s signature.
And finally, as promised, to Crewe. The Sentinel reports that Crewe Alexandra are hopeful that Ryan Colcough will sign a new deal. The Railwaymen’s 20-year-old winger has had a torrid 16 months blighted by injuries and assorted off-field brushes with the law, but was instrumental in keeping his side in League One at the end of this season.
