Alarms are ringing in the Emirates Stadium corridors after news emerged that Mauro Icardi might need to pack his bags and play football somewhere other than San Siro. You see, Inter’s captain has ruffled the feathers of a group of ultras – as well as Mr Inter, Javier Zanetti – by criticising the behaviour of fans in his recently published autobiography. It’s a book supporters believe belongs on the fiction shelves due to the disputed nature of some of Icardi’s claims against them. The upshot of all this is that he was given verbal pelters throughout Inter’s 2-1 defeat by Cagliari and missed a penalty to boot. A stellar day all round then. Not that this would stop Arsène Wenger, a known admirer of the player, from making a bid in January. Reports in the summer suggested Arsenal were willing to offer €30m plus Olivier Giroud for Icardi. But given how the pound has swan-dived off a cliff in recent months, expect that figure to have crept up somewhat.
There may be a freshly emptied locker for Icardi to put his deodorant and giant headphones into if it all works out because Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain appears to be having an existential crisis and may have to discover himself again. “Me being myself, I’m not happy when I’m not playing,” he hummed. “There is going to come a time in my career, and I think I’m approaching that, when I do need to be getting more regular football.” It may be that he finds himself back where it all began, at Southampton.
Do you remember Memphis Depay? Ah. Well, mercifully for the player it appears that Milan’s manager, Vincenzo Montella, does. He’s expected to fend off interest from Wolfsburg and airlift the player out of Old Trafford in January and then pick up Cesc Fàbregas from Chelsea on his way back to Italy. Despite having last week been reported as being a little less enamoured about signing the Spaniard than many believed, it appears he now has the hots for him once again. Perhaps because he’s been told that he’ll have loads of dosh to spend when Chinese investors complete a takeover of Milan in the coming months. He may have to part with left-back Mattia de Sciglio, mind, whom Antonio Conte would quite like to paint a go-faster stripe on before watching him tear up and down the Stamford Bridge turf in the left wing-back position.
And what’s this? Tottenham are set to make a move for Lukaku. Oh, but hang on, it’s not that one. It’s Lazio’s 22-year-old left-back, Jordan Lukaku, that one’s younger brother.
Someone has told Jürgen Klopp that Andrea Belotti is acing the bleep test at Torino, so expect the young striker to make a £20m move to Liverpool in January. A move that will go down well with Daniel Sturridge, no doubt. Klopp also likes the cut of Ruben Neves’s jib, but the 19-year-old Porto midfielder is high up on the wishlist of Chelsea and Juventus too. Let battle commence. The Mill’s backing one of Conte and Klopp in that dust-up.
Steve Bruce wants to take Jordan Rhodes back to the level of football that he knows and loves by plucking him from Middlesbrough’s bench and dropping him into Aston Villa’s attack alongside another Championship Pelé, Ross McCormack.
Did Maarten Stekelenburg get even a pat on the back from Ronald Koeman for his human octopus heroics for Everton against Manchester City? Nope, just the news that his manager wants to buy a new goalkeeper: Sunderland’s Jordan Pickford. And José Mourinho has been paying special attention to Everton’s Séamus Coleman recently. He believes the 28-year-old right-back may be able to cross a ball into the box for Manchester United without slamming it straight into an opposing player’s midriff, something that’s been beyond Antonio Valencia for the past seven years.
And Newcastle United boss Rafa Benítez is making cooing sounds in the general direction of Partizan Belgrade’s 19-year-old defender Nikola Milenkovic. That’s your lot.
