Christian Eriksen had another impressive season for Tottenham Hotspur during the 2017-18 campaign – scoring 14 times and registering 13 assists in 47 appearances in all competitions.
The Denmark international netted twice in the Champions League for the London club, whilst 10 of his strikes came in the Premier League, where Spurs secured another top-four finish despite some difficult form in the final weeks of the campaign.
Eriksen is still just 26 years of age, and Tottenham will do well to keep him for the long run when considering the talent that the attacker can call upon.
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Eriksen will actually be out of contract at the end of the 2019-2020 campaign, and a number of clubs – including Spanish champions Barcelona – are believed to be closely monitoring proceedings.
It appears that a selection of Tottenham fans are quite concerned when it comes to the Dane’s future, and have called on their club to address his contract as soon as possible.
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A selection of the Twitter reaction from the Spurs supporters can be seen below:
Anthony Martial is not expected to be involved in Manchester United’s Premier League clash with Southampton at Old Trafford on Saturday afternoon.
The Frenchman, who is valued at £31.5m by transfermarkt.co.uk, missed United’s Boxing Day clash with Burnley – which finished 2-2 – but was pictured in training on Thursday ahead of the clash with Southampton.
United boss Jose Mourinho, however, claimed that none of his injured players from the last match would return this weekend.
As a result, Chris Smalling and Antonio Valencia will again be absent, whilst Marouane Fellaini, Michael Carrick and Eric Bailly will remain on the sidelines for the Red Devils.
United will enter this weekend’s match off the back of successive draws in the Premier League, which has seen them drop 15 points off league leaders Manchester City.
Mourinho, speaking at his pre-match press conference, also revealed that he wants to give leading scorer Romelu Lukaku a rest, but admitted that will not happen against Southampton.
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Last season: The Bluebirds are one of the three teams advancing to the Premier League this season. This will be the first time Welsh side appear in the Premier League and one could assume they are hungry for recognition and are here to stay.
The Welsh side finished first in last year’s Championship table with 87 points, eight points ahead of Hull City. Malky Mackay’s team managed to win 25 games out of 46 and lost nine. They had a good home record, where they only lost two games, won 15 and conceded only 15 goals.
They are a consistent side that can score goals away from home and keep clean sheets which may earn them a lot of precious points this season. This is a team that works together as one unit as there is no mystery about why their top scorer is not on the top ten goal scorers of the Championship. However, the Premier League is no Championship.
Transfer Ins:
Gary Medel (Sevilla)
Steven Caulker (Tottenham Hotspur)
Simon Moore (Brentford)
John Brayford (Derby County)
Andreas Cornelius (Copenhagen)
Transfer Outs:
Elliot Parish (Bristol City)
Jesse Darko (AO Episkopi Rethymno)
Stephen McPhail
Nathaniel Jarvis
Heidar Helguson (End of career)
Player to watch: The Bluebirds have just lost last season’s top scorer, Heidar Helguson, who netted eight goals but have still got Peter Whittingham and the Iceland international midfielder Aron Gunnarsson who both scored the same amount of goals.
They also boast players like Fraizer Campbell who scored seven goals and comes from Manchester United’s academy and was with Sunderland for four years with 58 appearances and six goals to his name. He also had one appearance with the England national team in 2012.
The 25-year-old forward is technically gifted – proven by his good dribbling skills, speed, shooting abilities and impressive playing style.
Cardiff also have Craig Bellamy up front who is no stranger to the Premier League – playing for Newcastle, Liverpool and Manchester City previously. Although he is now 34 years old he can help with his experience and push the team’s youngsters to improve their game. In his four-year tenure at Newcastle he managed to score 28 goals for the Magpies.
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Young player to watch: The most promising talent from Tottenham’s academy in recent years Steven Caulker could be able to bring a lot to the table with his abilities at the back. The 21-year-old has earned the trust of Roy Hodgson and is now a part of the England senior squad. His departure from Spurs also brought a lot of reaction from the fans as they couldn’t understand Daniel Levy’s motives, so Cardiff might have hit the jackpot on this one.
Player needing to improve: The whole team will have to improve on the goal-scoring part as they had no top scorer in the top 10 positions of the Championship last season. The forwards will have to find the back of the net as this will be the most important factor in keeping the team away from relegation.
Prediction: This is a team that stood their ground well in the Championship and has proven that their qualification to the Premier League was no fluke. The newcomers could provide other Premier League teams with a few shocks if anyone dares to underestimate them.
If they manage to use their home advantage then they can get nab unbelievably precious points and survive in their debut Premier League season.
Martin O’Neill is desperate to sign his skipper to a new long-term deal.
Lee Cattermole is out of contract in the summer and O’Neill wants a contract penned before the uncertainty of the January transfer window.
Speaking to the Sunderland Echo the Ulsterman said, “Cattermole has been excellent since I came to the football club and he may well have been before, I don’t know about that.
“He’s 24 and he’s the captain of the side. Sometimes he needs to keep his discipline better because over the course of the year I expect he’ll pick up a couple silly bookings. I don’t want to build him up too much though – particularly as he has a contract to sign here.”
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The former England under 21 international has become synonymous with ill-discipline since his arrival on Wearside; Cattermole has seen red four times in a Sunderland shirt. For all his faults, the ex Middlesbrough man has become a lynch-pin of O’Neill’s team. Operating in a more disciplined role under the 60 year old, he is a major factors as to why the Black Cats have become one of the most difficult teams to beat in the Premier League.
Newcastle United loanee Kenedy made the final appearance of his temporary spell as the Magpies were beaten 1-0 by Tottenham Hotspur at Wembley on Wednesday night, and Toon fans are desperate for their club to sign the Chelsea winger, who earns £25,000-a-week according to the Daily Star, permanently.
The 22-year-old moved to St James’ Park during the January transfer window and has played a big part in Rafa Benitez’s men preserving their Premier League status, scoring two goals and providing a further two assists in 13 games.
However, he isn’t allowed to play against his parent club on Tyneside in the final fixture of the season on Sunday, and it remains to be seen whether the Blues are willing to let him go, and whether the Magpies can afford to sign him on a permanent basis.
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Newcastle supporters, 89% of whom revealed on our poll that they would want Kenedy over Ryan Bertrand, know what they want and were quick to take to social media to have their say on the Brazilian after the Spurs match, and while one said “must find a way to sign him permanently”, another said “really hope we get Kenedy back permanently”.
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Back in early April the Daily Star claimed Manchester United had won the race for highly-rated Brazilian wonderkid Roberto Firmino.
But today Liverpool officially announced that they’d signed the 23-year-old, subject to a medical. The Daily Star are now reporting Liverpool paid Bundesliga side Hoffenheim an eye-watering £29million to bring him to Anfield.
Firmino’s arrival is the fifth signing Liverpool have made already this summer, with James Milner, Danny Ings, Adam Bogdan and Joe Gomez also joining the Anfield ranks ahead of next season.
The real question on everyone’s lips at the moment is whether Firmino is the man to add the extra bit of bite in the Reds’ attack, which has been missing since Luis Suarez’s departure to Barcelona last summer.
Will Manchester United regret not signing him when they had the chance? Will Liverpool benefit greatly from the Brazilian?
We booted up our copy of Football Manager to find out, and the results will have United fans with heads in hands, and Liverpool fans jumping with joy. Here’s how it went down…
Brendan Rodgers didn’t do much more business after signing Firmino. He did bring in defender Dede from Cruzeiro for £8.5m and midfielder Josh Brownhill from Preston for £775k, who he loaned straight out to Newcastle for the season.
Liverpool got off to a pretty weird start to the Premier League season, winning two of their opening six games – against Manchester City and Arsenal. But they also drew two and lost two in that period, losing to West Ham and Leicester and drawing with Bournemouth and Leicester.
Firmino scored three goals during that opening sequence of fixtures and immediately showed signs of becoming a very important player for Rodgers’ side.
The Reds followed up a dodgy start to the campaign with a run of nine games unbeaten (W7, D2) before not winning a game in their final four games of the calendar year (D2, L2).
After the New Year it was business as usual for Rodgers’ men and they remained unbeaten until late March when Man United arrived at Anfield to end Liverpool’s 11 match run without loss with a 2-1 victory.
Firmino, though, was making all the difference for Rodgers’ side, netting seven Premier League goals during that brilliant run of results. It was a run that had Liverpool well and truly in the race for the title, but the loss to Man United handed the initiative to their arch rivals Man City.
Up to this point Man United had been struggling after winning just two of their previous eight league fixtures. It was a period in the season that resulted in them losing their top four status for the second time in three seasons.
Liverpool, on the other hand, reacted well to that loss to United and went on another run of six matches unbeaten. That included 4-0 win over rivals Everton at Goodison Park on the same day league leaders Man City slipped up against Norwich.
The title race went to the wire with City boasting a three point lead over Liverpool on the final day, though Liverpool had a slightly better goal difference. But while Man City comfortably brushed aside West Ham with a 3-0 win, Liverpool lost 3-2 at home to Norwich.
City won the league by six points in the end, but Liverpool fans were generally delighted with how the season went. Man United finished fifth and a huge 12 points behind fourth placed Chelsea. Louis Van Gaal was promptly sacked.
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Firmino ultimately has the last laugh as he ends the campaign as Liverpool’s top scorer with 19 goals in all competitions…
And his overall stats were pretty good, netting a goal every 216 minutes and hitting the target 39% of the time with his efforts on goal.
So on the basis of this experiment Man United will have regretted not signing Firmino. They instead kept hold of Robin van Persie, who ended the season as the club’s top scorer with 15 goals.
Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers is eyeing up a cut price move for Valencia left back Aly Cissokho, according to the Daily Mirror.
Rodgers is keen to add stability to his back four after inconsistent performances from the likes of Jose Enrique and Martin Skrtel last season as well as the retirement of club legend Jamie Carragher.
The Reds have not yet done much business this summer and are waiting to see what happens with star man Luis Suarez before making any major acquisitions.
Valencia are facing another summer of struggle and perhaps losing their best players as their financial woes worsen.
The La Liga side have sold the likes of David Silva, David Villa and Jordi Alba over the past few seasons and are set to lose key men like Cissokho again this time around.
Liverpool believe they could secure a £4million deal for the France international in the coming weeks.
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Dutch champions Ajax have completed the signing of 21-year-old striker Daniel Hoesen from Fulham for an undisclosed fee.
Hoesen was signed by Roy Hodgson in 2009, after catching the eye as a 17-year-old playing for Fortuna Sittard in the Dutch second division. However, Hoesen struggled to break into the first-team at Craven Cottage.
As a result he went out on loan to Finnish side HJK Helsinki and then back to Fortuna last season where he proved to be a potent goal threat scoring 13 goals in 33 appearances for the club. Consequently, Ajax coach Frank de Boer has taken a punt on the young Dutch striker who has no experience of playing top-flight football in either the Premier League or the Eredivisie.
Hoesen told the official UEFA website: “I am extremely happy and it is fantastic to play with a top club like Ajax. I moved to Ajax at a young age and that was a nice experience, but luckily Fortuna gave me the chance to play myself into the picture. I am thankful to them for that.”
Ajax will soon learn the fate of who they will be playing in the Group Stages of the Champions League later today.
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Leeds United welcome Queens Park Rangers to Elland Road on Sunday in what is their final match of another hugely disappointing Championship season.
The Yorkshire outfit looked to be on course to be well involved in the Premier League promotion race when they started the campaign so well and topped the standings in September, but a dreadful run towards the end of 2017 and throughout 2018 has left them 15 points adrift of the top six going into their last fixture.
The Whites’ season was summed up in their 2-1 defeat to Norwich City at Carrow Road last weekend, where they took the lead through Kalvin Phillips in the first half, before the Canaries equalised on the stroke of half-time and then added a second after the break.
It was the eighth defeat of Paul Heckingbottom’s 15 games in charge since he replaced Thomas Christiansen in February, and another disappointing performance and result against Rangers could seal his fate already given things haven’t really improved too much.
The 40-year-old made one change for the trip to Norfolk as captain Liam Cooper replaced Paudie O’Connor in the backline, and the former Barnsley boss may be considering making further alterations against Ian Holloway’s men in an opportunity to give some fringe and younger players a chance to impress.
Here is how Leeds must line up against QPR, ahead of Bailey Peacock-Farrell in goal…
As we mentioned previously, Heckingbottom decided to bring his captain Cooper straight back into the starting XI following his suspension, and Paudie O’Connor may have felt hard done by that he was the man to drop out of the defence.
However, it was an understandable decision from the Leeds boss seeing as he probably wanted a vocal leader in the team, and the 40-year-old should look to stick with the same back four – with teenager Tom Pearce at left-back, loanee Matthew Pennington at right-back in what could be his final game for the club, and Cooper alongside Pontus Jansson in the middle.
Kalvin Phillips – one of three Leeds players who will be praying Heckingbottom stays this summer – and 19-year-old Ronaldo Vieira started in midfield against the Canaries, but now with Adam Forshaw back to full fitness and ready to play 90 minutes, he has to start against Rangers.
That means one of Vieira and Phillips needs to be dropped, and the Leeds boss should choose to put the latter on the substitutes’ bench despite his goal at Carrow Road, with his performance generally not being up to scratch in recent months.
The 40-year-old manager should go with a 4-4-2 system against Ian Holloway’s side to allow him to experiment in attack, and with Pablo Hernandez set to miss out following the birth of his baby and Samu Saiz out of form, Ezgjan Alioski and Kemar Roofe must start on the left and right flanks respectively.
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With Roofe dropping back into midfield, Caleb Ekuban out of form and Pierre-Michel Lasogga looking unlikely to return to Elland Road when his loan spell from Hamburg expires after this match, Heckingbottom has a big opportunity against Rangers.
He has already called up teenage strikers Sam Dalby and Ryan Edmondson – the latter is just 16 years of age – to first-team training this week, and both should be given the opportunity to start as a front two against QPR with the Elland Road crowd ready to get behind them.
It certainly won’t hurt to see if they are ready now and what they can offer in the future, and it’s not as though Heckingbottom’s other options are exactly impressing right now.
Southampton have arguably been the success story of recent years in the Premier League, the surprise package who many were convinced would struggle to eventual relegation. Rather than flirt with the relegation spots, The Saints actually had an on/off relationship with the Champions League spots.
Ronald Koeman’s arrival on the South Coast 12 months ago was met with a raft of departures from the same venue. Lallana, Chambers and Lambert all left St Mary’s whilst it appeared Morgan Schneiderlin was waiting in the departure lounge with a boarding pass neatly tucked under his Tottenham branded blazer.
But alas, Schneiderlin stayed and the critics were confounded.
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The Saints would eventually finish only two points off European football and may have heightened expectations to levels that will be difficult to match. So with Koeman about to enter the dreaded ‘second season syndrome’, what can Southampton truly expect to achieve next term?
Southampton’s season arguably finished at the right time, it was clear to see their exploits were beginning to take their toll and their end of season form, bar the obliteration of Aston Villa, was disappointing; picking up only one victory in the last six games.
Whether they simply switched off as they had already achieved what they could only dream of pre-season is unknown, but they certainly were a less daunting prospect to opposition in the closing weeks of the season.
This summer will again test the resolve and the ambition of the decision makers at St Mary’s, it is clear that some of their players will have again attracted the interests of more ‘desirable’ destinations. They must stay stronger in the face of such advances, if Southampton are to establish themselves as a long term member of the upper echelons of the country’s top tier, they must retain the core of this squad.
However, if last summer is anything to go by, fans of Koeman’s men should not hold their breath; they are a club ran sensibly and the long term future of the club will surely be preserved, this could mean once again they are decimated by departures.
This season Southampton were an unknown quantity and for much of the early season were under rated and respected. They caught many teams by surprise, they should expect no such allowances next year and their card will now be marked. Next year may prove to be a wholly different challenge for Koeman and his troops; no longer will they be given the freedom of the green grass of every pitch they play on.
This campaign has been a journey that few anticipated and even fewer expected to last season long. However, next season may prove to be an even tougher assignment for Southampton. But from the dark skies that were overhead last year, the struggles they may face could prove to be a great deal more trivial than many expected them to encounter this term.
This year has been like a holiday for Southampton, sitting at the top table at Monte Carlo, next year will be the true indicator of whether that trip was a long weekend or a more permanent excursion.
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