I doubt that's true, to be honest. He's been out injured and is recovering quite slowly, but it's a dodgy position for a lot of clubs. He's homegrown, Premier League experienced, from Oop North and clearly fancies a move. City are currently playing Fabian Delph at left-back. Wouldn't surprise me at all to see them chuck some money at him. Quite a bit of that applies to Shaw too, funnily enough, plus his contract is running down. He was Pochettino's pet at Southampton, so he might want to go back in for him again, despite his failure at Utd. Bit of a risk, though. Not sure it would be a great move.
There's talk of GKN going out on loan in January, mainly as he's being dropped from the European squad to make way for Lamela. I'd say that confirms Cornet coming in...
I knew that he was out of contract in January, but I couldn't really work out why. The Ukrainian league is July to May and it's very rare for a player to have a contract expire in the middle of the season. Strange.
Latest from the rumour mill... Apparently we have cooled our interest in Barkley and would prefer for him to use the remainder of the season to regain full fitness before moving on a free come June. Allardyce has been speaking a lot recently about lacking creativity so it might be the case that he doesn't want to lose arguably his most creative asset next month. Also a few whispers on the vine that Poch feels let down by Kieran Trippier's failure to seize the opportunity presented by Walker's departure. Apparently there was a minor falling out after his appalling display against City, which I guess explains why Aurier wasn't rotated for the Soton game. There is even talk that we'd be willing to sell. Personally think its total BS but in fairness the lad does need to pull his finger out and finish the season strongly.
Probably doesn't help his case that we've got Walker-Peters waiting in the wings, having yet to put a foot wrong or make any public moans. A lot of teams have dealt with Trippier this season by man-marking him, which seems utterly bizarre for a right-back. He doesn't attempt to beat a man and we haven't exploited the space left by this unusual ploy, so there's plenty of blame to go around. Hopefully he'll step it up a bit and force his way back into contention. If not, then we've got another option, thankfully.
I know he was dire against City but I really don't buy this whole "Tripps has been poor" stuff. Davies has been excellent which may overshadow Tripps but I'm more than happy to have him as part of this squad. If 7 assists from 17 games in all comps is "poor form" then I'd love to see him firing on all cylinders. Papers are just yet again trying to **** us over and cause unrest.
So would a lot of us. If the one season wonder can, then why are many of the squad not doing so ?? "Papers are just yet again trying to **** us over and cause unrest." Probably so.
I'm also fine with him being part of the squad - I got this from a guy on twitter who is usually bang on the money about things. Called Llorente before the papers so much as farted in his general direction. The question seems to be whether or not Tripps will be happy with being 'part of the squad'. All of his talk in the summer suggests not - he sees himself as the 1st choice RB. Fair enough to him. But imho that will only be at a mi-table side tops. Far too limited and one-dimensional to do the business for a top 4 club. And yes, as good as he is at crossing, let's be honest here - if you were to draw up a list of criteria by which a defender should be judged, 'number of assists' would be pretty low down on the list. The modern defender needs positional awareness, pace, strength and ability to play out from the back. Tripps is sorely lacking in all of those departments.
Fullbacks haven't been great defenders for a while. Many lack positional awareness these days as they're more focused on being further up the pitch, hence why DMs are becoming more and more important and also why teams are adopting a three at the back style. City aside, his defensive game has vastly improved this season and while he may not have pace he makes up for it with technique and vision. No doubting that once Aurier becomes most accustomed he'll likely make the spot his own but having Tripps here fighting for that role is a massive asset.
Ajax Watch CalcioMercato are linking us with their Brazilian winger David Neres, who's been drawing all manner of comparisons with Neymar which don;t at all look lazy or like he has a pushy agent. Of course, this has led to the most xG of xG arguments, the radar... please log in to view this image If these things make sense to anyone, I'd like to hear what the bloody hell any of it means.
Apparently Everton are close to signing Cenk Tosun for 25m. The player was quite emotional when he was subbed off during last nights game, and apparently was waving goodbye to the fans.
Rumours that the Chavs are going to bid for Barkley! Let's not have another William scenario, please Daniel - he's not worth the effort, even if 100% fit. And in other news Los Ladrones are in for Ryan Sessegnon!! Now, all probably ****-talk, but that lad is worth fighting for.
If Wanyama's back this month I think the only position that really needs strengthening in this window is the right wing. Much as I love how much Sissoko seems to be trying and improving, he's always going to be a liability. Get Barkley in and we can cover to Dembele's role as well, if he doesn't find some level of form. There are some other issues that aren't so important to fix right now. Like another defensive option. Someone like Kouyate would be perfect as he's essentially Dier, except he's happy to play where ever you want him to. He's top quality aswell imo, should be playing for a top 6 side. Doubt he'd be available this window as West Ham are in a relegation scrap but he's one to keep an eye on, just incase he does become available. Realistically we're probably not going to do much but if we can get Barkley, or someone similar, plus a youngster or two with next season in mind, that'd be a really good window. I like the look of the young winger/forward at Sheffield United, he might be a good option.
Reports from Portugal report we had a £31m bid for Bordeaux forward Malcom rejected. Just a reminder that, recently, Malcom made Bordeaux's Twitter do this Mainly because he was busy doing this By mere coincidence, Malcom's being touted around half of Europe, so it wouldn't surprise me if the Portuguese press is making up a bid to try and get the usual suspects to pony up.
