According to a recent report from Sky Sports, Manolo Gabbiadini could be set for a move away from Southampton this month. The Italy international made the move to St Mary’s back in January 2017 after impressing at Serie A outfit Torino in years previous, although a lack of regular football under Mark Hughes and now Ralph Hasenhuttl has called his future at the South Coast outfit into question.

And reports suggest that the Saints are speaking to a trio of clubs about a possible move for the 27-year-old, although Southampton supporters would soon forget about the Italian were their side to launch a January move for Liverpool’s Daniel Sturridge.

The Breakdown

Ultimately, while things haven’t quite gone to plan for Gabbiadini so far this season, there have been some glimpses of brilliance from the Italian ace during his time at St Mary’s, not least in netting six times in his first four games for the club upon arrival at the start of 2017.

And in bagging the winning goal in their 1-0 success over Swansea City back in May, the match that ultimately kept Southampton in the Premier League, he has certainly endeared himself to supporters during his time at the club – some are likely to be baffled as to why he hasn’t featured more.

And with genuine ability in the final third of the pitch, alongside Southampton’s struggles for goals in the last 18 months or so, it would be something of a loss were they to cash in on Gabbiadini this month, although it would be compensated somewhat were they to return for Liverpool’s Sturridge before the deadline at the end of the month.

The England international may well have forced his way back into Jurgen Klopp’s thinking this term with 11 Premier League appearances for the league leaders, but on the whole he isn’t likely to dispose the likes of Roberto Firmino, Sadio Mane, and Mohamed Salah from the starting eleven on a regular basis.

And with his contract up at the end of the season, the Reds could well seek to cash in on the 29-year-old this month, especially given Divock Origi has also forced his way back into reckoning by netting the winner against Everton in the Merseyside derby last month.

And Southampton should see to reignite their interest in the 29-year-old this month in a bid to bolster their own flagging striking ranks, as other than Danny Ings, Hasenhuttl is certainly lacking sufficient depth and quality in his forward ranks.

Englishman Ings may have netted seven times in the Premier League for the Saints so far this season, but other than that the other striking options at Hasenhuttl’s disposal have seriously struggled to produce the goods, with Gabbiadini, Charlie Austin, and Shane Long managing just three goals between them.

And with Sturridge’s excellent goal-scoring record in the Premier League, having bagged 77 times in just 211 top-flight appearances, his arrival would no doubt bring the sort of predatory instincts needed to move the Saints away from the bottom three – between him and Ings, they would surely score plenty of goals in a side that have created plenty of chances this term.

As such, while Gabbiadini’s seemingly likely exit will no doubt be a loss to Southampton, the St Mary’s faithful would soon forget about the Italian were Hasenhuttl to lure Liverpool’s Sturridge to the South Coast.

Southampton fans… what do you think? Let us know!

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Leeds United produced a remarkable performance to overcome Derby County at Elland Road on Friday night. The win ensured that Leeds would remain top of the Championship table.

The Whites were utterly dominant throughout the 90 minutes, and Frank Lampard’s side could find no response to the intensity, movement and relentlessness of their opponents.

Goals from Kemar Roofe and Jack Harrison were enough to seal the points but those were far from the only two standout performers. To a man, Marcelo Bielsa’s side were excellent. The likes of Luke Ayling, Liam Cooper, Ezgjan Alioski, Adam Forshaw and Jack Clarke all shone for Leeds.

Pl>ymaker FC’s Theo Ogden found two rebelious Leeds fans in the home end at Loftus Road in QPR’s 2-1 FA Cup win. Find out what happened next in the video below…

Another man who rose to the occasion was centre-back Pontus Jansson. The 27-year-old produced an imperious display. As well as being consistently solid at the back, he also had the confidence to stride out of defence with the ball at his feet and launch attacking moves.

After the final whistle, plenty of Leeds fans took to Twitter to praise the 20-cap Sweden international’s showing…

[ad_pod ]Newcastle fans have taken to Twitter in annoyance after it was revealed by The Chronicle that Atletico Madrid winger and January target Gelson Martins snubbed an offer to talk to the Magpies about a move to Tyneside.The struggling Premier League club submitted a loan offer to the Spanish club for the Portuguese international’s services, which was accepted by Atletico.However, after Ligue 1 side Monaco made an offer of their own, Martins decided to join them and help their battle against relegation to Ligue 2 – they are currently languishing in 19th place in the French top-flight.Newcastle are still in talks with the French club over a deal for Italian left-back Antonio Barecca, but will be disappointed by their failure to lure the former Sporting Lisbon attacker to St James’ Park, especially after having an offer accepted.Be sure to check out the incredible story of the man who rose from a Tanzanian refugee camp to become one of Australia’s biggest football stars in the video below…Martins’ decision to not hold talks means that the Magpies are still yet to see a new signing arrive this month, with a report from the Telegraph suggesting that Rafa Benitez will walk away from the club in the summer if he does not get bodies through the door.They will be used to this kind of disappointment by now, but let’s see how Newcastle fans reacted to missing out on Martins on Twitter…

According to a recent report from L’Equipe, Idrissa Gueye’s future at Everton is far from certain heading into the remainder of this month’s transfer window. The 29-year-old made the move to Goodison Park back in the summer of 2016 after a year at Aston Villa, and in that time has become a mainstay in the Toffees team under a combination of Ronald Koeman, Sam Allardyce, and now Marco Silva.

Yet reports suggest that Ligue 1 champions Paris Saint-Germain have launched an opening bid for the midfielder as they seek reinforcements in the middle of the park, and while Gueye’s possible exit would no doubt spell bad news for Everton fans, it could be exactly what Tom Davies needs to get his career going at Goodison Park once again.

The Breakdown

Ultimately, there is little doubting that Gueye has been the main man in the Everton midfield pretty much ever since making the move to Merseyside two-and-a-half years ago, with the Senegal international in that time appearing a remarkable 94 times for the Toffees, including appearances in all but 13 of their last 99 Premier League matches.

Clearly, the 29-year-old has consistently produced the goods in the heart of the Everton midfield in recent times, with few better in the division off the ball in making tackles, interceptions, and overall breaking the play up, while Gueye has also improved on the ball in the last 12 months or so to become very much the all-round central midfielder.

As such, potentially losing him to PSG is sure to come as a huge blow to Silva and indeed the Goodison Park faithful, yet one man who might benefit from his exit is fellow midfielder Davies, who simply hasn’t been able to dispose the 29-year-old in the Toffees team.

The 20-year-old came up through the ranks at Goodison Park to make his senior debut for the Toffees back in April 2016, which has since paved the way for 81 further appearances for the Premier League outfit.

However, while missing just five games last term in their run to ninth place in the division, the England Under-21 international simply hasn’t been able to regularly force his way into Silva’s first team thinking this term with just nine Premier League appearances to his name – in fact, he has started just once in the league since the start of October.

But with Gueye potentially on his way out of the club, and Andre Gomes’ long-term future uncertain given he is only on loan until the end of the season, the chance could be there for Davies to finally prove his worth to manager Silva, as there is little doubting that the 20-year-old has genuine ability in the middle of the park.

The Englishman is supremely confident on the ball in dealing well under pressure as well as looking to move forward and pick a pass, and while he isn’t as good off the ball as Gueye, albeit very few are, he has the height and indeed the strength to improve that facet of his game – and were the opportunity to present itself to Davies, it’s one he simply has to take.

As such, while Gueye’s possible exit will likely come as bad news to Everton fans up and down the country, it could be exactly what Davies needs to finally get his career going at Goodison Park.

Everton fans… what do you think? Let us know!

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Aston Villa defender James Bree has completed a loan move to Ipswich until the end of the season having made just 21 starts since signing for the Midlands outfit in January 2017, according to BBC Sport.

The versatile defender is below Alan Hutton and Ahmed Elmohamady in the pecking order at Villa Park and will surely relish the opportunity to get some minutes under his belt – he will have his work cut out for him, though, as the Tractor Boys are rock bottom of the Championship, having taken just 18 points from 29 games.

Villa, meanwhile, are looking to push for a play-off spot and will surely be hoping that the deadline day loan signing of Tyrone Mings from Bournemouth will give them some much-needed security in defence; Dean Smith’s side have let in 46 goals this campaign, only relegation battlers Rotherham and Ipswich have conceded more.

The decision to let Bree go, then, is a brave one considering the lack of depth in the backline – the 21-year-old can play at the heart of defence, too – and the frequency at which the quality of the current right-back options is called into question.

The Villa Park faithful certainly seem to think that allowing the former Barnsley man to leave was a mistake, as they reacted on Twitter…

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Chris Davies fears that desperate defending is costing Celtic.

Sunday’s 2-0 win away to St. Johnstone was achieved at some cost with Mikael Lustig, James Forrest, Odsonne Edouard and Ryan Christie joining the growing injury list.

After collecting the points Brendan Rodgers and his backroom team assessed the damage to their squad with one second-half incident particularly costly.

Celtic had two good penalty claims ignored as Edouard was stretchered off and Christie struggled for breath after taking a kick to the ribs.

Looking at the penalty claims, Davies said as quoted by The Evening Times: “I think we might have had a couple in our game. It’s almost as if the desperation of the defending if you like that sometimes the clarity can go from what is an actual foul.

“The key thing on the Ryan one is whether (Jason) Kerr actually touches the ball, which we don’t think he does. We could have had that one. The Odsonne one? The manager said after the game that he thought it might have been harsh on (Joe) Shaughnessy, but I certainly think we could have had one.”

Celtic were back in training on Monday preparing for the visit of manager-less Hibs, who defeated the Hoops in December at Easter Road.

Oliver Ntcham and Kieran Tierney were pictured in training but neither are expected to be involved against Hibs with next week’s Europa League tie against Valencia a more realistic target.

After Sunday’s match, Celtic had 14 players on the injured list. Any additions to that and Rodgers could be running out of bodies as Celtic chase a treble treble and look to reach the last 16 of the Europa League.

This article is part of Football FanCast’s Pundit View series, which provides opinion and analysis on recent quotes from journalists, pundits, players and managers…

Sheffield Wednesday boss Garry Monk has challenged his side to lay down a marker this week as they face two tough Championship outings in quick succession, starting with Derby County this evening.

What’s he said?

The Owls are currently back in playoff contention after recording back-to-back victories for the first time under the 40-year-old’s stewardship.

First Charlton Atheltic were thrashed 3-1 on their own patch before they had to come from behind to defeat Brentford last time out, and now they face a trip to Pride Park to face a struggling Rams side before returning to the Midlands to combat Nottingham Forest on Saturday.

Speaking ahead of kick-off, Monk clearly wants his side to keep their good form rolling, he said:

“We wanted to start the week off well and we managed to do that with the comeback on Saturday.“We have got a chance to really try and put a marker down this week.“We know it will not be easy. We are playing against two difficult sides.“We need to try and keep that belief we are showing and momentum going.“When our intensity levels and attitude is at its best, we are capable of winning and beating any team in this league.”

Gauntlet thrown

Wednesday, over the past month or two, have been competing with rather mixed emotions. They can start to cement themselves as clear playoff contenders with a string of positive results as we embark on a new decade, but off the pitch it’s a different matter.

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The club have been charged by the English Football League for financial misconduct relating to the sale of their Hillsborough stadium to chairman Dejphon Chansiri, who himself is facing a permanent ban from the sport.

There’s also a strong possibility that the Owls are slapped with a mega points deduction as a penalty with numbers as high as 21 being mentioned by The Athletic.

But all Monk and his side can do is keep ticking along – the more points they pick up, the less likely they are to be pulled into the relegation mire, and maybe even they’ll still get the chance at returning to the promised land of the Premier League.

Best of the decade: Quickfire Quiz on the last 10 years of Premier League football

In other news, Garry Monk’s thoughts on one Wednesday regular is exactly the right attitude…

West Bromwich Albion returned to the top of the Championship table after coming from behind to defeat Birmingham City in the west Midlands derby.

The Baggies have now been handed a two-point lead from Leeds United who endured a late collapse at home to Cardiff City.

Slaven Bilic’s move to introduce Charlie Austin paid dividends as the substitute’s two goals in eight minutes stunned the Blues at St Andrew’s.

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Grady Diangana pegged back Lukas Jutkiewicz early in the first half before being forced off through injury, then just after the break, Harlee Dean scored what appeared to be a questionable second for the home side.

But Austin tied things up with an outrageous half-volley from outside the penalty area before heading in the winner nine minutes from time.

Despite picking up all three points, several of the travelling support weren’t best pleased by the performance of left-back Conor Townsend with many taking to social media to slam him.

‘Shocking,’ ‘liability’ and ‘clueless’ were just three words used to describe his showing while one supporter went as far as saying that he never wants to see the 26-year-old play for the club ever again.

Another suggested that the defender was ‘full of mistakes’ while ‘league one player’ was a further indictment on his performance.

Some couldn’t believe that Townsend was starting above Darnell Furlong…

The left-back has only made eight appearances in the Championship this season with Kieran Gibbs the first choice in the role, but with the former Arsenal man absent through injury, Townsend was gifted a rare opportunity.

Many seem to believe that the better option is to put Nathan Ferguson in the role, thus allowing Furlong at right-back.

That will be something Bilic can ponder over the course of the following week before they host Brentford at the Hawthorns on Saturday afternoon.

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In other news, Luke Dowling’s controversial decision last season is starting to be fully vindicated…

Rangers might have returned to winning ways in the Scottish Premiership on Sunday with a 2-0 win over Motherwell.

However, a number of the club’s fans have taken to social media to criticise Connor Goldson for his performance on the afternoon.

The 26-year-old has actually not missed a single minute of the team’s 2019/20 league campaign to date but judging by the reaction of some of the supporters on social media, many are still not convinced that the centre-back is good enough.

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Football is very much a game of opinions, though, and a number of the Rangers supporters were seemingly pleased with what they saw from the defender on the afternoon.

It is incredible how one player’s performance can split the fans to such an extent – that was the case on Sunday, though, as Goldson also received a lot of praise on Twitter.

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Goldson has now made 87 appearances for Rangers since arriving from Brighton & Hove Albion ahead of the 2017-18 campaign.

And there is no question that he is seen as a hugely important player by Gerrard having already made 33 appearances during the current season.

Whether the Englishman can help Rangers win the Scottish Premiership remains to be seen, but it seems that he will continue to divide opinion among the supporters.

Meanwhile, the Gers will reportedly no longer have to fight off Premier League interest for one of their players during the January transfer window.

Wolverhampton Wanderers could soon be in for another busy month, although, the only difference is that it’ll be the January transfer window.

The west Midlanders could face over 60 games this season as the FA Cup soon begins, the Europa League will continue into the knockout stages and the Premier League top-six push trundles on.

Manager Nuno Santo has already acknowledged the need to make additions next month, but who and what position remains to be seen.

Earlier this week, the club were linked to Lille anchorman Boubakary Soumare in a reported €50m (£42.5m) move, per Foot Mercato, with the possibility of loaning him back to the Ligue 1 club.

This would align with BirminghamLive’s claim that Wolves would pursue central options on defence and in midfield, making the 20-year-old a very ideal target.

Would the move be the right one? Should he actually be loaned back? Here’s what the writers at Football FanCast think…

Matt Dawson “Wolves have done some remarkable business since being taken over by Fosun, namely landing Ruben Neves for a Championship-record fee and acquiring Joao Moutinho for a measly £5m. Not only that, but they broke their transfer record to land Raul Jimenez on a permanent basis too. For the most part, their work in the market has been impressive. However, if they broke the bank for a player like Soumare it could be a hefty mistake.“Yes it would fit the profile of player Nuno and Fosun are looking to build the side around in the years to come but Wolves should be throwing that sort of money at a proven individual, someone that’s capable at the highest level and can take them further in European competitions.“Soumare is one to watch for the future and after being compared to Paul Pogba, there is clear potential. However, he is not a player for the present, something that arguably Wolves require. Soumare has an eye-catching pass success rate north of 89% but he makes just 0.9 tackles per game. For someone who plays as a defensive midfielder, you’d want more for the type of fee that’s being thrown around. Wolves must swerve this deal.” Viji Jeevathayalan

“With reports suggesting the likes of Manchester United and Tottenham are also reportedly interested in securing his services, Wolves could prove their credentials as an elite Premier League club by snaring Boubakary Soumare from under their noses. At just 20-years-old, the Frenchman has plenty of room to grow and could bring some youth and energy into Wolves’ midfield. As per Sofascore, he has averaged 3.2 duels won per game and has a passing accuracy of 90%. And standing at an imposing 6 foot 2, he certainly has the physical attributes to be trained into a ball-playing centre-back by Nuno Espirito Santo if needs be. At the fee being quoted, it is unquestionably a large amount of money to shell out on what is still an unproven entity. But the size of the clubs involved in the race to sign him shows how highly-coveted he is. Nuno could seal his legacy with a swoop for Soumare.”

Danny Lewis

“Signing Soumare is an exciting prospect for Wolves when it is considered how solid he has been in the Champions League this campaign, averaging 1 tackle, 1.5 clearances and 2 interceptions per game. However, the fact they will be loaning him back to Lille, means that despite spending a considerable sum of money, they won’t actually be addressing the current issue in their squad. It may seem short-sighted, but seeing as they are only two points off fifth at the moment, Wolves should be looking for someone who can help them this season.”

Lewis Blain

“Wolves need to make this signing at all costs, irrespective of whether he arrives this season or next. In Champions League this term, the young Frenchman is averaging three dribbles, two interceptions, 1.5 clearances and one tackle per game, via WhoScored. That’s pretty good going. He could be a much-needed defensive midfield acquisition, thus allowing Ruben Neves to thrive further forward. His former teammate, Arnaud Luzayadio, once said: “He has always been above our generation. He managed to do high-level things for his age. It was easy for him. All of his matches were great matches.” While another ex-Paris Saint Germain player, Metehan Güclü, believed his career could “go a long way; a Pogba-like trajectory.” so might he be Wolves’ Pogba? That would be exciting.”

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And in other news, here’s how Wolves could look following the January transfer window…