Newcastle fans have been debating a move for Garry Rodrigues, after reports from Turkey claimed the Magpies will have to spend €20m (about £18m) to land the Dutchman.
After failing in a bid to sign him last summer, Newcastle look set to reignite their interest in Galatasaray’s Rodrigues this summer, but is he worth the price tag?
According to Turkish outlet Aksam, Newcastle have once again stepped up their pursuit of the pacey winger, but will have to pay the €20m price tag to get a deal done.
The Magpies had a bid for the 27 year-old rejected last summer, reportedly in the region of £6m, but his price has now gone up even more after a wonderful season.
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Rodrigues had the best season of his career so far with Galatasaray, grabbing nine goals and ten assists in 33 league appearances.
Rafael Benitez is desperate for some more attacking flair to help create for a potentially big signing up front, and Rodrigues has the tools to play on either flank.
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Fans have been voting if they think they should pay the asking price, and it’s a pretty even split, with 56 per cent backing a move for the Dutchman.
Tottenham Hotspur star Harry Kane has told Real Madrid that he will join the Spanish club if they meet his list of demands, according to Diario Gol.
What’s the story?
Barely a day goes by when Kane is not linked with a move to the Bernabeu.
The striker’s stunning form, which led him to top the scoring charts in Europe by the end of 2017, is bound to attract attention from other clubs.
Kane has not publicly entertained a move to Madrid, but according to reports in Spain, the 24-year-old is privately considering a switch.
Diario Gol reports that the England international has told club president Florentino Perez that he will only ponder a move if certain conditions are met.
Kane reportedly wants Zinedine Zidane to be sacked as manager, and has also allegedly requested that Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema be axed.
Current Tottenham boss Mauricio Pochettino is believed to be at the top of the striker’s list of replacements for Zidane.
Could these outrageous demands be true?
All stories of this nature should be taken with a pinch of salt, but there is no denying that nowadays footballers have much more of a say than they used to.
The astronomical wages and marketing pull that certain players have gives them much more control.
Many fans adopt the saying that ‘no one player is bigger than the club’, but there have been reported instances of teams dislodging managers.
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If it is true that Kane has made these demands to one of the world’s biggest clubs, then player power has gone way too far.
Give and take is normal for any negotiation, but telling a club to change coaches or drop some of their star players is ludicrous.
Liverpool hero Jamie Carragher believes that Andy Carroll’s £35m valuation had a major impact on his failure at Anfield.
The burly Geordie is set to face his former club for the first time since making a permanent switch to West Ham later today, in a game that is a must win for the Reds in the hunt for the title.
Carroll was regarded as one of English football’s top talents prior to his ill-fated 2011 transfer, when he became a record buy for the Merseyside club.
His £35m price tag appeared to weigh heavy, with the now Hammers idol enduring a tough spell under the guidance of then manager Kenny Dalglish.
In the build up to the game at Upton Park many have been speculating that he may come back to prove himself to his former club, and Carragher – who played alongside the powerful front-man – believes that the pressure of the fee to get him to Liverpool was detrimental to his time at the club:
“If we could have got him for between £12-15m, it would have been good business. The feeling around the club when we were in for him was that maybe he could mature into our Didier Drogba.” He wrote in his column for the Daily Mail.
“Unfortunately, though, Liverpool’s decision to pay £35m was a big mistake and it never did Andy any favours,
“It quickly became apparent he wasn’t the right fit for the club.”
Carragher went on to say that Carroll’s playing style and work ethic also contributed to the botched spell:
“In training, he’d complain if the ball was not flung into the box — and I don’t mean from out wide,
“He wanted the ball to come in to him from close to the halfway line, but at Liverpool that was never going to happen.
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“There were other things. He found the intensity of playing three games every week difficult.
“Before he might have been used to getting himself right for a match on a Saturday, then spending time socially with his mates — as we all did when we were young — but at Liverpool the training and professional demands are relentless.”
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have been rocked by the news that David Silva could well miss their next two games through injury, according to The Daily Mail.
The talented playmaker has been in good form for the Premier League side this season, and is a key man in orchestrating the side’s attacks.
However, the attacking midfielder was replaced after only 12 minutes of Spain’s 1-1 draw with France in Madrid on Tuesday night, and left the field clutching a hamstring.
The initial prognosis is not good as Silva looks set to spend some time on the sidelines in the near future, however this will be confirmed or denied on Thursday morning as the player goes for a scan at the Etihad Stadium club.
If the news from the medical men is not positive, Silva will miss a Premier League clash with west Brom this weekend, as Roberto Mancini’s men look to close the gap on division leaders Chelsea.
However, more importantly, Silva may well be absent for City’s Champions League clash with Ajax on Wednesday, which is a crucial game for the English side.
After losing to Real Madrid and drawing with Borussia Dortmund in their first two games in Europe, the Citizens are desperate for a first victory over the weakest side in the pool when they travel to Amsterdam in midweek.
Some positive news for City however is that Vincent Kompany has felt no ill-effects from 90 minutes of football for Belgium against Scotland on Tuesday, The Guardian report.
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The central defender missed City’s last game through injury, but is now back to health and able to feature this weekend if selected.
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There is nothing quite looking at the ability of the world’s elite footballing nations to leave behind top-class players to dampen the enthusiasm of some England fans ahead of a major tournament.
Spain’s star-studded defensive options mean that Hector Bellerin has been left at home in favour of Real Madrid’s Dani Carvajal and Chelsea’s Cesar Azpilicueta for this summer’s World Cup in Russia as they go in pursuit of a second win in three iterations.
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Carvajal’s injury problems may actually give Bellerin a second bite at the cherry in tournament terms but as it stands, he will be watching the action unfold on BBC and ITV like the rest of us.
So we put the decision to you on whether the Spaniard should have taken the Arsenal flier, 23, to the summer showpiece and it was nearly as tight as you can get.
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As it turned out, 53 per cent of Gunners fans backed the call to leave him at home, as you can see below…
Reported Manchester United target Mesut Ozil impressed in his side’s 2-1 win against Chelsea in their EFL Cup semi-final tie against Chelsea at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday night, and Red Devils fans have urged their club to sign the playmaker now.
The Independent reported on Wednesday that Jose Mourinho is still keen to bring the 29-year-old to Old Trafford despite already signing Alexis Sanchez from the Gunners this month, with the Germany international’s contract with the north London outfit due to expire this summer.
Ozil has shown some improved form in recent weeks following a slow start to the campaign, and he has scored four goals and provided a further six assists in 20 appearances in all competitions for Arsene Wenger’s men this term.
Man United supporters were quick to have their say on his latest display via social media, and while one said “announce Ozil now before he signs a new contract”, another said “our number 10 jersey must be Ozil’s”.
Liverpool are still some way off completing the signing of FC Basel winger Mohamed Salah, according to the Metro.
The Egyptian is supposed to be one of Brendan Rodgers top targets for the January transfer window, after a series of impressive performances in Europe.
Rumours claimed the Reds had agreed a £7million fee with the Swiss champions, however the Liverpool Echo has revealed the two clubs are still some way short of agreeing on the players valuation.
Basel are understood to be demanding closer to £12million for their star man, meaning the two clubs remain some way short of agreeing a deal.
Rodgers will hope a compromise can be met as soon as possible, with the Liverpool manager desperate to complete business early to give the Reds the best possible chance of competing for the top four.
Liverpool climbed back into the top four yesterday at the expense of local rivals Everton, after seeing off Hull City 2-0 at Anfield.
Luis Suarez scored his 20th Premier League goal of the season, although Rodgers was keen to stress afterwards that his side is anything but a one man team.
He said: “Today was very much about the team. Luis will, of course, always get the plaudits because he’s a world-class player.
“Nine out of 10 players would not have played today. He had a real bad knock on the top of his foot from the Chelsea game. I know, having managed and worked with players, that most players wouldn’t have played with what he had today.
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“He had strapping on it and he put himself out there for the team yet again. That’s why he gets the goals that he does, because he’s so determined.
“But it was very much a team effort today. It was a great header from Daniel Agger from the corner and that set us off.”
Sir Alex Ferguson didn’t mind straying into self-parody last weekend after he bemoaned the lack of added that his Manchester United side were given to mount a comeback in their defeat to Tottenham at Old Trafford, and while there may be more than a faint whiff of hypocrisy in the air about his comments, does he have a point that the job shouldn’t be the referee’s to handle anymore?
The job of a referee or match official in today’s game is tantamount to some sort of vindictive self-harming spree; it’s a thankless task and more often than not, while their incompetence may irk and irritate, they’re not doing it on purpose and they don’t really have an agenda, despite the often flawed arguments of those fans that clearly do have one.
Controlling 22 players on a pitch at such a frantic pace while simultaneously trying to add up the correct allotted time is a tricky proposition and could even be seen as an extra burdening pressure on the referee, so should we not be doing more to help them and in the process lighten their load, allowing them to focus on the rigmarole of actually making the sort of decisions that do matter?
After all, the referee’s job is to make decisions, no matter how arbitrary they may seem and it’s not as if added time at the moment is in any way scientific. Whenever an official holds up the sign with five minutes or four on it, it can often be met with groans by the home supporters or the away fans if the result is or is not going their way, but isn’t it just about what we’ve come to expect? Even in games with little of note to report, token minutes of injury-time are inevitably added on and it’s just become the accepted norm of how things are done.
Ferguson told reporters after the Tottenham defeat: “They gave us four minutes [injury time], that’s an insult to the game. It denies you a proper chance to win a football match. There were six substitutions, the trainer came on, so that’s four minutes right away and the goalkeeper must have wasted about two or three minutes and they took their time at every goal kick. That’s obvious to everyone today and it’s a flaw in the game that the referee is responsible for time keeping. It’s ridiculous that it’s 2012 and the referee still has control of that.”
Setting aside the ridiculous notion that Manchester United received either unfavourable treatment from the official on home turf or that Chris Foy’s performance was down to incompetence or a loose grasp of the rules, which Ferguson is clearly insinuating here, what other alternatives are there really out there at the moment?
The main one would be to adopt a ‘real time’ approach to matches, sort of like they do in the NFL or NBA, where the clock is stopped every time the ball is not in play. Sky Sports used to provide the somewhat useful, often pointless ‘ball in play’ statistic at any given point during one their matches for whenever you clicked on the red button and this system, in its most basic principle, would operate in a broadly similar way.
The average amount of time that the ball is in play during a Premier League match can range from 50-65 minutes, which is hardly the most level of playing fields and fairest of systems around the more you think about it. On any given weekend, Manchester City could play West Ham and have only 50 minutes to win the game, while Manchester United could play Swansea and have 65 minutes to get a result. While these fixtures will of course balance themselves out over the course of a campaign, again, like is the case with added time, it’s far from scientific.
The argument put forward in favour of this system being introduced is that it will greatly reduced time-wasting, gamesmanship and the ability for managers to criticise match officials. Of course, for those of you that watch the NBA and NFL more than me, you’ll have a keener insight into this, but there are always ways for teams to push the rules in seeking to gain an advantage and time-wasting is still common-place in both these sports, as is play-acting with suspected ‘injuries’.
The solution that Ferguson puts forward of a sort of independent time-keeper is again flawed, for what is the referee but an an independent time-keeper and upholder of the rules of the game? It’s a bureaucratic move that simply wouldn’t work and would just shift the blame to a man up in a studio with his finger on a button or stopwatch rather than the man out on the pitch. The blame is not removed, simply the person it’s aimed at.
There’s no groundswell of popular support for a widespread rule change as there is with goal-line technology and FIFA are under no sort of pressure to change the current system, no matter how flawed it is. It would take a game of huge importance and a miscalculation of massive proportions for them to even consider acting on it, such is their inability to lead the game, seemingly content to play catch-up on issues such as this instead.
To my knowledge at least, I oppose any change to the current system, despite its flaws, for the precisely same reason that I’m not for goal-line technology being introduced into the game. What makes sport what it is, it’s very essence, is human error. Take away the human part of the game and it suddenly becomes a much more joyless, soulless form of entertainment much more reminiscent to the American sports which I simply can’t get my head or heart into.
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Tradition in itself is not a strong enough reason to keep something around, particularly if it causes needless friction and controversy, much like with the current handshake ritual before games as we’ve seen recently. Nevertheless, at the same time, unless it’s a major problem having an impact on countless results, which I can at least accept goal-line technology would be a step towards eradicating, then it’s perfectly understandable that there’s no pressure to change the current rules as aside from a minute here or there, it’s really just an excuse for a manager to vent at a poor result.
Take away the human element from the game and the healthy debate that comes with it, and it takes us down a slippery slope. While accuracy is of course important, that’s not the reason why we all lose ourselves and ritually immerse ourselves in the game every weekend. Yes it can be hugely frustrating when things don’t go your way, as I’m sure that’s all Ferguson was feeling in his post-match interview after the Tottenham loss, but we shouldn’t trivialise a trivial issue too much. If that sounds somewhat naive and hopelessly romantic, then I’ve been outed, but I simply can’t see what the game has to gain from making a substantial change to the way its currently run over this matter.
As reported by The Mirror, Arsenal are interested in signing Freiburg defender Caglar Soyuncu this summer.
What’s the story?
The Gunners’ defensive line is arguably where most of the club’s transfer work needs to be done when the window opens, with any incoming manager having to stem the tide of goals they concede on a regular basis.
One player that could arrive at the Emirates Stadium is Freiburg centre-back Caglar Soyuncu.
That’s according to The Mirror, who say the club have already opened talks with the German side about signing him, as part of a three-signing strategy to replace Shkodran Mustafi and the injured Laurent Koscielny.
Soyuncu is rated at £10.8m by Transfermarkt.
Who is he?
Still just 21 years of age, Soyuncu moved to the Bundesliga last season and has already made over 50 appearances for Freiburg, emerging as one of the most talented young centre-backs in the division.
At 6ft 2in, he has a strong physical presence and the ball-playing ability that would allow how to fit into the way Arsenal play under Arsene Wenger.
Arsenal investing in a younger defender makes sense but they would really need Soyuncu to settle in immediately given their need for first-team centre-backs.
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The Gunners conceded more goals than any other side in the top seven of the English Premier League this season.
Many signings have arrived and failed to make an impact so signing a 21-year-old instead of an established, elite defender will be seen as a risk, but it’s one that could pay dividends given the potential the Turkish international has.
Everton confirmed on Wednesday night that Theo Walcott has signed for the club, making a move from Arsenal where he’s spent the last ten years of his career.
Walcott makes the move to Merseyside for a reported £20m on a three-and-a-half-year deal that further illustrates Everton’s desire to add talent that can make them a consistent force in the top half of the English Premier League table.
The England international made 399 appearances for the Gunners, scoring 108 goals and assisting 78 more from a variety of attacking positions.
Despite that significant contribution, he was often criticised for a lack of consistency in an Arsenal shirt and in recent years increasingly moved to the fringes of Arsene Wenger’s squad. This season he’s seen just 63 minutes of top flight action.
Fans are pleased to see him make the move, with most recognising that he served the club decently over the last decade. Some have been more critical, believing he never really reached his potential and was a massive disappointment.
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Arsenal supporters took to Twitter to share their thoughts on his move…