Random Starlet Watch Because it seems that you can't be a young English midfielder in the lower leagues without being linked with Spurs we've been linked with Sheffield Wednesday midfielder Sean Clare, who impressed on loan at Gillingham as a right winger and occasional right back before being recalled in January and going straight into Wednesday's team where he's played their last couple of games as a defensive midfielder. I give it until Friday before one of the hacks joins the dots and sees a player who has played defensive midfield, centre midfield and right back and decides this obviously means he's replacing Eric Dier...
I give it three weeks before Poch starts responding to hacks' leading questions about player departures by asking them if they know anything about the rumours that Los Ladrones are looking to bring in De Bruyne. Going back to Sean Clare for a moment, he won't be playing in this evening's Swansea/Wednesday match as he's cup-tied.
hbic perennial Max Meyer is allegedly available on a freebie this summer. His form at Schalke has allegedly dropped of late, but is he still a CM playmaker prospect ??
I think he started the season playing poorly in an advanced role and then picked up when played deeper. Fighting it out with Bentaleb and Stambouli for his starting place, at the moment. Linked with the Goons and the Scouse.
There's been plenty of comment over the past eighteen months about Meyer having a bad attitude and a massive ego as well as being disruptive in the dressing room, so the odds are that Poch wouldn't want anything to do with him. There's a reason I said that, if we were going to sign a Schalke midfielder, Goretzka was the only one worth signing and that's because he's the exact opposite of Meyer: he works for the team, isn't a complete knobhead on and off the pitch, and clearly has the qualities our midfield needs - but it was obvious last summer that he was being loaded onto the Bayern conveyor belt so there was no chance of that happening.
Random Contract Rumours Tom Comatose is suggesting that Son is set to be offered an improved deal, which can be best summed up with the following gif please log in to view this image There's also the suggestion that Keanan Bennetts and Japhet Tanganga will be the next youngsters to be offered new deals, so cue at least seven people on Twitter creating that it isn't Reo Griffiths...
Telling you, he's Asia's answer to David Beckham. Bloke's a ****ing rockstar out there. I read a few months back - then saw a pic of it - that a South Korean sports channel which shows live games always has his face at the top left of the screen where the scoreline goes, it's there instead of "TOT" or "SPU". Pretty sure the article also said there's usually a 20 min or so pre-match documentary on him.
Good for him. Probably good for us, too. He seems very humble, grounded and balanced. Always plays with a smile on his face and the other players seem to really like him. Would be easy for him to go all Ronaldo, but he never moans, even when he's not in our starting XI or is used when others aren't. Hopefully his goals against Rochdale will put him on a bit of a run, especially now there's competition for his position in Lamela and Moura.
I have got so much time for this lad - for all the reasons you set out. In common parlance, there’s ‘no **** about him’! Just gets on with it, with a smile on a face as if he appreciates every minute of his career. In that regard he is well matched at Spurs as of all the top clubs, we probably have the lowest ‘ego culture’ amongst the players. His performance on Weds was brilliant - not only the goal, but the pure enthusiasm and skill he brought to that first half when others were struggling.
Centre Back Watch Because we're obviously selling Alderweireld this summer, this means we're going to start being linked to various centre backs. So here's the first batch... Issa Diop (Toulouse, 21yo, France U21 (so Senegal then...), contract until 2020) Built like un ****house en briques yet more than capable with the ball at his feet, Diop sounds an awful lot like the Ligue 1 version of Davinson Sanchez. Jonathan Tah (Bayer Leverkusen, 22yo, Germany, contract until 2023) Let's start with the obvious stickler here: he signed a contract extension last week, which somehow the hacks forgot to check. Putting that aside, it's fair to say that you can describe Tah in much the same way as Diop (i.e. ein Ziegelstein-Scheißhaus who's good with the ball at his feet), but in addition he has a reputation of being calm and composed at the back like Verts. Juan Foyth (Tottenham Hotspur, 20, Argentina U20, contract until 2022) The hacks seem to have forgotten about him, which is strange given he played on Wednesday... Cameron Carter-Vickers (Tottenham Hotspur, 20, Trumpistan, contract until 2020) The hacks also seem to have forgotten about him, although this is less strange as half of them don't know what the Championship is. Sessegnon Watch The Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed bin Sultan bin Zayed bin Khalifa Al Nahyan Team have been linked with him. Right now I suspect Levy is sending a screencap of Patrick Roberts' career trajectory since he followed the Craven Cottage > Craven Spending path (or if he really wants to be make the point clear, he'll also add the likes of Jack Rodwell and Scott Sinclair)
Seri Watch Our good friends at HITC, who still won't understand that we won't be signing Max Meyer, are reporting that the Mousers are in pole position to sign Jean Michael Seri for £35m because it's easier to walk into their midfield than ours Somebody told them that Naby Keita'll be joining them in the summer, right? Something known as "common sense" tells me that Norbert'll use a Henderson/Keita pivot next season, while the questions about Dembele's long-term viability and Wanyama's contribution this season certainly implies there's a spot in ours for the taking... What makes this even funnier is the Transfer Tavern are running a clickbait saying Man Utd and Liverpool should battle one another to sign Wanyama for next season.
Centre Back Watch II With the papers reverting to type and running headlines that Toby will be headed to Man Utd and/or Barcelona, once again revealing that their dartboard has a maximum of four targets on it, we're back to being linked with random centre backs from around Western Europe, so... Benjamin Pavard (Stuttgart, 21yo, France, contract until 2021) The hacks really like linking us with Bundesliga centre backs don't they? Last week it was Jonathan Tah, and we've been linked with Salif Sane and Jannik Vestergaard in the past couple of months. They also don't like looking up when they signed contracts, given he signed an extension back in December so the odds of Levying are practically nil (although nature finds a way...) That being said, Pavard does fit what Poch expects from his centre backs as he's a ball-playing centre back who can read the play and bring the ball forward in much the same way that Verts and Toby can (and Foyth is learning to do), he's capable of also playing defensive midfield or right back, plus with Stuttgart playing a back three he's already familiar with playing in that formation as well as dealing with the bundesliga's expectations of a high press.
