According to Sky Sports, Southampton are in talks to sign Atletico Madrid striker Luciano Vietto as they look to strengthen their attacking options, but they could face competition from Serie A outfit Sampdoria.
What’s the word, then?
Well, Saints striker Jay Rodriguez joined West Bromwich Albion earlier this month and according to Sky Sports, the south coast outfit look to be targeting Vietto as his replacement.
The 23-year-old has struggled to make an impression with the La Liga giants following a big-money move from Villarreal in 2015 – scoring three goals in 28 appearances for Diego Simeone’s side – and he spent last season on loan with Sevilla.
The Argentine forward is well known to new Southampton manager Mauricio Pellegrino, who came up against the attacker as Alaves boss last term, and he is keen to bring his national compatriot to the Premier League.
How did Vietto do last season?
He impressed during his loan spell with Sevilla, but he found first team football hard to come by towards the end of the campaign, playing just one of their final nine La Liga games.
The 23-year-old scored 10 goals and provided a further five assists in 31 appearances in all competitions, and he spent the majority of the season playing as a centre-forward for the La Liga outfit.
Would he be a good signing for Southampton?
He certainly could be and the club will be particularly impressed with his spell with Villarreal in the 2014/15 campaign, when he scored 20 goals in 48 outings.
Saints generally seem to have a knack of finding gems from abroad and not many would have expected Manolo Gabbiadini to have the instant impact that he did when he joined from Napoli during the January transfer window.
Vietto is another player where perhaps things haven’t worked out for him at a big club, and the south coast outfit can give him a chance to reignite his career with regular football at St Mary’s.
There may be some concerns from supporters that he could be too similar to Sofiane Boufal in style though, while others feel the team lacked height and strength last term – Vietto is 5’8” tall.
What’s the verdict, then?
Well, Southampton have proven time and time again that they know what they’re doing in the transfer market and if the rumours on Vietto are true, they may be about to bag themselves another great player in the making.
It has been a difficult transfer window for Chelsea. While the signings of Alvaro Morata, Tiemoue Bakayoko and Antonio Rudiger all look to be astute additions to the squad, it does appear as though a number of targets have slipped through the clubs fingers.However, according to Le 10 SportÂin France, Antonio Conte is ready to claim a player who has been on Manchestsr United’s radar for some time – Paris Saint Germain full-back Serge Aurier.Despite playing extremely well last season, Chelsea are looking to upgrade, or certainly provide competition for Victor Moses and Marcus Alonso. And with Conte stating that the club are looking for at least four signings before the window closes, the full-back positions are clearly key areas where additions will be made.Serge Aurier has been one of the most consistent defenders in France over the past few years and it now seems as though he will be heading to the Premier League to either Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge.After hearing the news, Chelsea fans took to twitter to express their opinions on the the potential signing of Aurier…
Everton have been one of the most active Premier League teams in the transfer market during a busy summer window.
The Toffees have brought seven senior players into the squad – Jordan Pickford, Davy Klaassen, Michael Keane, Sandro Ramirez, Henry Onyekuru, Wayne Rooney and Cuco Martina – as Ronald Koeman looks for his side to improve on their seventh-place finish last season, as well as progressing to and then competing in the group stages of the Europa League.
The Merseyside outfit are certainly looking strong as things stand now, but their Dutch boss is unlikely to be completely satisfied with the business he has done so far, and there are still areas he needs strengthen before the window slams shut at the end of this month as circumstances continue to change on a daily basis.
While players could still go, Koeman may feel that there are positions that he still needs to add to.
Here are three things Everton still need to sort before the transfer window closes…
Romelu Lukaku replacement
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While they may have brought Wayne Rooney and Sandro Ramirez to the club this summer, Koeman may still be tempted to sign another striker as a direct replacement for Lukaku before the transfer window closes.
The Belgian netted 25 Premier League goals last season and having been so prolific for the club over the course of the last four campaigns, Koeman will be nervous about his team replacing those goals.
Having lost Arouna Kone and with Oumar Niasse likely to go to, the Dutchman doesn’t exactly have a plethora of centre-forward options and with Rooney often playing a deeper role in recent seasons and with Ramirez not proven in the English top flight, Everton could yet move for another striker.
Ross Barkley replacement
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Everton are expecting Barkley to leave before the window slams shut at the end of the month after the 23-year-old turn down an offer to stay at the club.
With just a year remaining on his contract they would rather cash in on him now rather than potentially losing him for nothing in 2018, and Ronald Koeman is actively looking for a replacement for the England international.
While he has brought the impressive Davy Klaassen to the club – who scored 20 goals and provided a further 12 assists in 50 appearances in all competitions for Ajax last season – the Dutchman has never played in the Premier League and Koeman still seems to be determined to get a deal for Swansea City’s Gylfi Sigurdsson over the line, despite finding it difficult to come to an agreement with the Welsh side.
Centre-half cover
Having signed Michael Keane from Burnley and with the likes of Phil Jagielka, Ashley Williams and Ramiro Funes Mori to choose from at centre-back, Koeman may have felt that he had enough cover to get him through the season.
However, the latter suffered a serious knee injury while on international duty with Argentina in March and the club confirmed on their official website last month that he could miss a further six to nine months after undergoing surgery.
Koeman may be forced into the transfer market to bring in a new centre-back now to ensure that he has enough options to cope with competing in both the Premier League and Europa League.
With football fans across the land delighted that international football is again behind us, for a short while at least, we can get back to the real action this weekend.
For Celtic, that means a trip to face Hamilton in the Scottish Premiership, a match that the Hoops will see as a must win after dropping points last time out against St Johnstone. The action comes thick and fast for the Scottish champions over the next few weeks with European and domestic matches every weekend and mid-week in September.
The Hoops have a massive encounter at home to Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday and while focus will most certainly be on securing three points at Hamilton, it’s only natural for both Brendan Rodgers and his side to have one eye on that fixture.
Will that PSG game dictate team selection on Friday night? Will players be rested and youngsters come into the starting XI?
These are the three selection headaches Rodgers must solve before Friday’s trip…
Rotation in defence
With Dedryck Boyata still returning to full fitness and Erik Sviatchenko still ruled out, Brendan Rodgers will most likely have something of a makeshift defence to call upon against Hamilton. The situation is not helped with the fact Hamilton play on an artificial surface, something which has ruled centre-back Jozo Simunovic out of previous matches due to the impact it can have with regards to muscle injuries.
That means we could see a centre-back pairing like Mikael Lustig and Kristoffer Ajer, or even Kieran Tierney moving into the middle as he as done a few times this season. It could also be a chance for Anthony Ralston or Calvin Miller to continue their development in the first team.
For our money, a back four of Ralston, Lustig, Ajer and Tierney seems like the perfect blend of potential and experience for what will likely be a high tempo, hard fought Friday night match under the lights and on television.
Keep Scott Brown for Tuesday?
It wasn’t so long ago that Scott Brown retired from international football with the express purpose of maximising the time left in his club career. Making his return to Gordon Strachan’s Scotland side, Brown has featured heavily for the Tartan army since and started both of their matches last Friday and Monday past against Lithuania and Malta.
With Paris Saint-Germain on the horizon, should Brendan Rodgers leave his captain out of what should be a routine win at New Douglas Park? It’s not like the Hoops don’t have depth in the position with the likes of Callum McGregor, Stuart Armstrong or even Liam Henderson to play alongside Olivier Ntcham.
Celtic will need a full blood, guts and thunder performance from Brown on Tuesday night and keeping him fresh would be a smart ploy in our books. Brown has already played 12 matches in a short space of time this summer for club and country and adding another one to the books on Friday could take something out of his legs before the UEFA Champions League begins.
International impact
Having played on the other side of the world just two days ago, another man who may have to sit out of Friday night’s match is Australian international Tom Rogic. Friday night has come just too soon for the midfield maestro and again, with Paris Saint-Germain ahead next week, the Hoops will want Rogic to be as fit as possible for that one.
Options to replace him behind the striker include Callum McGregor, Stuart Armstrong or, if they’re needed further back, even the likes of Patrick Roberts and Kundai Benyu.
Known primarily as a winger, having Roberts play through the middle could be the option to go for on Friday, with James Forrest in decent form and more than capable of impacting the game from the right flank.
Getting this selection right will be key, especially as Leigh Griffiths is set to miss out and the Hoops may have to turn to the inexperienced Odsonne Edouard to lead the line.
Everton have been one of the Premier League’s busiest clubs in the transfer market this summer, but Deadline Day has been a rather quiet affair for the Merseyside outfit.
However, Ronald Koeman’s side have recently broken the silence with a swoop for 19-year-old starlet Nikola Vlasic from Hadjuk Split in a deal reports from BBC Sport claim to be worth £10million.
The teenager bagged 13 goals in 120 appearances during his time with Hadjuk, who Everton faced in the Europa League earlier this month, and has already represented the Croatian national team at senior level.
But considering Everton are still lacking that star-studded striker to replace the sheer potency of now-Manchester United front man Romelu Lukaku, Toffees supporters on Twitter aren’t exactly pleased with their club’s latest announcement.
While some have taken issue with the word ‘forward’ – seemingly an attempt to appease Everton fans expecting a striker even though Vlasic is at best an attacking midfielder – others quite simply hoped for more ahead of the 11pm deadline.
Sky Sports pundit Paul Merson has been giving his Premier League predictions ahead of the weekend’s fixtures, and he believes that Newcastle United’s three-match winning streak will come to an end when they face Brighton and Hove Albion at the Amex Stadium on Sunday.
The Magpies bounced back from losses to Tottenham Hotspur and fellow newly-promoted side Huddersfield Town in their opening two top flight games to beat West Ham United, Swansea City and Stoke City in a sequence that saw them score six goals and concede just once.
The likes of Jamaal Lascelles and Matt Ritchie are hitting top form right now and if Joselu hadn’t have been so wasteful in front of goal against the Potters, their 2-1 success would have been even more comfortable.
Even though Rafa Benitez’s men are in fourth position going into the weekend and Brighton are 16th after taking just four points from their opening five fixtures – although they did beat West Bromwich Albion in their previous home game – Merson believes that Chris Hughton’s side will prove to be tough opposition for the in-form Magpies and that they should be happy with a point.
Merson said: “I know it’s only five games but Newcastle have done superbly to get into the top four – not many people saw that coming!
“Their fans will be full of confidence and looking for another win but Brighton make it difficult for opponents at the Amex. Man City were made to work hard and West Brom were dispatched 3-1.
“A draw would be a good result for the visitors, they should take that all day long.”
Newcastle will be looking to win four successive Premier League fixtures for the first time since November 2014, when they won five in a row.
Leeds United have confirmed on their official website that defender Pontus Jansson won’t be linking up with Sweden for their upcoming 2018 World Cup qualifiers after he picked up a shoulder injury in the 3-0 defeat to Sheffield Wednesday on Sunday, and Whites fans are pleased with the news.
The 26-year-old started alongside Matthew Pennington at the heart of the defence against the Owls, but it was another disappointing display for the club as they suffered their third successive Championship defeat on the road, with Jansson leaving the field on a stretcher after colliding with teammate Kalvin Phillips in the second half.
He will now stay in Yorkshire to get treatment on the injury, as he looks to return to action when Thomas Christiansen’s men host Reading at Elland Road on October 14.
Leeds supporters were quick to have their say on the news via social media, and while some believe it is “good news” that he won’t be away with Sweden, others said that “hopefully a rest will do him good” as he hasn’t looked himself in recent weeks.
Club football returns this weekend, much to the joy of Scottish supporters everywhere. The action kicks off early this weekend for fans of Rangers and St Johnstone on Friday night at McDiarmid Park.
With the teams locked on equal points in the Scottish Premiership, it promises to be a cracker with both teams fancying their chances of keeping pace with Aberdeen and Celtic above them.
Rangers fans will go into the match expectant of three points but they might not find that win easy to come by. Tommy Wright’s team are always tough competitors and having finished in the top four of the Scottish top-flight for three years running, are entitled to feel confident themselves.
At the very least it’ll be a tricky and difficult encounter for Pedro Caixinha’s team and here are THREE reasons why…
They’ve scored in all but one of their league matches so far
St Johnstone have been in excellent goalscoring form so far this season. While they haven’t been racking up the goals in individual matches, they have consistently been finding the back of the net and forcing teams to score more than one or two if they want to get a result against them.
The only team that have managed to keep a clean sheet against them in the top-flight has been the impressive Aberdeen. Even champions Celtic couldn’t manage, with Tommy Wright’s side picking up an impressive draw at Celtic Park in the early stages of the season.
The positive for Rangers is that top goalscorer Michael O’Halloran is unavailable for the match-up given he is on loan from the Light Blues, but even then there are threats in the likes of Stevie MacLean, Liam Craig and Murray Davidson, who have all scored more than once this term.
Every encounter last season was closely fought
Last season saw four very closely contested match-ups between the two sides. Rangers eventually got the better of the Perth side by the end of the season with two victories by a single goal margin.
However the first two fixtures, including one at Friday night’s venue McDiarmid Park, ended in 1-1 draws with neither side managing to cause too much damage to the opposition.
They were physical, stodgy affairs and similar can be expected this weekend. These are the matches in which Pedro Caixinha’s Rangers side have struggled in before, preferring an open, expansive game against teams not afraid to sit back.
Will the Light Blues be up for the battle? They’ll have to be if they want three points.
Pedro Caixinha has given them extra motivation
Soccer Football – Scottish Premiership – Rangers vs Celtic – Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow, Britain – September 23, 2017 Rangers manager Pedro Caixinha REUTERS/Russell Cheyne
This week Pedro Caixinha has been outspoken about his side’s opponents. First he likened them to Scottish Championship side Greenock Morton, not exactly the most kind of comparisons. Then he went further later in the week when he accused the Perth Saints of spying on the Light Blues the last time the two sides met, taking information from someone who leaked the team.
It was explosive stuff and has capture the headlines and back pages in Scotland in the latter half of this week.
It’s all given Tommy Wright’s side extra motivation and it was needlessly caused by Caixinha’s inability to communicate well with a hungry Scottish media.
St Johnstone stalwart Stevie MacLean hit back with his own comments, as did the Saints manager himself, branding the Rangers boss ‘paranoid’, so it’s clear the words have been heard in the home dressing room, which could make Friday night’s trip to Perth more difficult than it needed to be.
Former England manager Sam Allardyce has hinted that he would be interested in becoming the new Everton boss.
Ronald Koeman was sacked as head coach last week after a poor start to the 2017-18 campaign, and David Unsworth is currently in temporary charge of the Toffees.
Allardyce, whose time in charge of England lasted just 67 days, has been without a position since leaving Crystal Palace at the end of the 2016-17 season.
After departing Selhurst Park, the 63-year-old claimed that he had no intention of taking another job in football in the near future.
However, Allardyce has revealed that he would seriously consider the managerial role at Everton if he was approached.
Allardyce told BeIN Sports:
“I’d have to consider that if that phonecall happens. There’s no point speculating at the moment. David Unsworth is in the chair, Joe [Royle] sat upstairs will have an opinion today [after the Leicester defeat] and from the Chelsea game.
“It’s really going to be tough for Everton to get out of that position. Not because the lads are not trying, but as a team collectively they can’t keep a clean sheet and can’t score a goal.
“Those are the two problems, if you resolve one, you’ll end up resolving the other and that will start with the clean sheet.”
Everton have lost each of their last four games in all competitions – including a 2-0 defeat at Leicester City on Sunday afternoon.
A total of eight points from 10 Premier League matches, meanwhile, has left them in 18th position in the table ahead of next weekend’s home game against Watford.
They say that defensive football is boring. That the art of organising a team to be solid and nigh-on impenetrable is against the ideals of football, the idea of which is to out-score the opponent, not out-concede them.
Those people might point to Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United at their most brazen, but they have clearly never watched Atletico Madrid in their pomp.
There may be no more thrilling sight in football than a blazing counter-attack where each player knows his job. To see a team go from defending to attacking in a whirlwind of a moment is exciting, but it’s the ruthlessness of the finish that makes it altogether more predatory. Like a lion downing a gazelle it is both brutal and oddly mesmeric. In order to achieve that, you have to lie in wait first.
At times over the last year and a bit, since Mourinho arrived at United, it’s the gladiatorial thrill of the counter we’ve been missing, apart from the first few games of this season. But when it came to the best of Atletico Madrid under Diego Simeone, that wasn’t the only reason games were enjoyable. There was a joy to watching them defend, too.
Importantly, though, it was a conspiratorial joy.
When you watched Atletico play – seemingly no matter who they were playing against – they’d never dominate the opposition. Everything was on edge, even until the last minutes. There would be a quality and a class in attack, players like Diego Costa and later Antoine Griezmann would let you know you were watching a top side. But there was something about watching them defend as a team which mesmerised as much as the passing motions of Barcelona in their pomp.
Diego Simeone gets the crowd involved. Everyone is a part. Everything is on edge. Atleti became a big team, La Liga champions in 2014 and Champions League finalists twice in three years, but rarely did they win even the small games by big margins, not like the big teams did. Indeed, that’s not what the crowd were there to see.
In fact, they didn’t arrive to see. They arrived to take part. The Vicente Calderon was filled with people whose job it was to roar the team on because the alternative was to bite their nails. The manager had convinced them that they were part of the war effort, and they had duly resolved to sing for victory.
All you had to do was look at the two banks of four moving in tandem to see the beauty, but a glance at the ball – always at the feet of an opponent – showed that it was all in the balance. One slight mistake from a defender was all it would take before it was gone.
It’s rare for a club to create a sense of community quite like that one, where there is a shared goal between players and fans, especially one which involved such intense concentration in defence. The aim is to entertain the crowd, but not through Pep Guardiola dominance: through the opposite. Fans were complicit in the result, and when you make the defensive performances heroic enough to be thrilling, it’s no longer ‘entertainment’, it’s an immersive experience.
Manchester United will never be Atletico Madrid. United are too big a club. They can never be the underdogs like Simeone’s side can. They don’t have a Real Madrid or a Barcelona to usurp, just noisy neighbours to silence now that Liverpool have long since been knocked off their perch.
The siege mentality that Mourinho creates among his players might well bear fruit in the end, but it’s hard for a fan to buy into that because there is no complicity. They aren’t involved, at least not in the same way. If they aren’t there to be entertained by attacking play, nor are they there to sing for victory, then why exactly are they turning up? And they will turn up, because they support their team, but a reason removes the wall.
This year, Atletico aren’t the same team. Their stadium move hinders and probably weakens them. There were always going to be teething problems and they may well overcome them in the future, maybe even this season, but there is something missing. At the Calderon, though, they were barely penetrable: the fans were complicit in the result and that in turn helped focus the team on the game itself.
That might sound like a strange concept, but it’s an important one which brings together the comparison between Atletico and Manchester United. Because if a style of football which is primarily about defensive organisation and individual attacking flair on the counter is to work in the long-term, then you can’t have your team defending like it’s a mathematical equation or an academic exercise. You can’t line up in two banks of four for the majority of every game. It gets boring for the players.
Football – Chelsea v Atletico Madrid – UEFA Champions League Semi Final Second Leg – Stamford Bridge, London, England – 30/4/14 Chelsea’s manager Jose Mourinho and Atletico Madrid coach Diego Simeone Mandatory Credit: Action Images / Carl Recine Livepic EDITORIAL USE ONLY.
But, if you’re being willed to focus by 45,000 baying fans roaring at every clearance and tackle because they’re complicit in the result, then you’re not focusing on a ‘job’, but you’re defending something much more meaningful than that. And that’s not boring for anyone involved, players of fans.
Jose Mourinho’s problem is that, in the long term, performances like his two at Anfield in his time at United aren’t possible unless you create that same sort of complicity between fans and players. It’s true that you can’t create that in one transitional season, but the worry is that he won’t actually try. And if he doesn’t, he might end up like quite a few performances like he got against Huddersfield, when his players, perhaps lacking motivation because of their rigid and unadventurous style of play, simply failed to turn up in the first half.
But even if he does attempt to string together an overarching philosophy like Simeone did in Spain, one of the reasons why Atletico were such a force in Europe, and why they were, counter-intuitively, such a joy to watch, was because they always felt like the underdogs. Manchester United, on the other hand, are English football’s most successful club and three-time winners of the European Cup. They will never be underdogs, and may never even want to be.
And that’s the sticking point. Mourinho can win the league playing football in such a way. He may even win Champions Leagues. But at a club like Manchester United, will he ever be able to create a situation like Diego Simeone did, where heroic defensive performances are thrilling, not drab 0-0s against the club’s biggest and bitterest rivals?
If not, he might have to learn to out-score even the biggest teams, not just out-concede them.