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An update has emerged on Rangers and their transfer plans to find a new winger to add to their squad… 

What’s the talk?

According to Bulgarian news outlet Tema Sport, the Gers are interested in a deal to sign Ludogorets right-forward Kiril Despodov this month.

The report claims that he is one of a number of options the Scottish giants are looking at, whilst Galatasaray and Olympiacos are also keen on the attacker.

Laudrup 2.0

Gio van Bronckhorst could find the club’s next Brian Laudrup by securing a deal to sign Despodov in the coming weeks. The winger could be a fantastic signing for the Gers and the Dutchman must work hard with Ross Wilson to ensure that a move can be completed before the end of the window.

Laudrup enjoyed a sublime spell in Scotland as he played 147 games for the club and scored 44 goals across four seasons in Glasgow. The retired Dane also played as a right-winger and managed 11 goals and 15 assists in 63 matches for German giants Bayern Munich in his career, showing off his ability to score and create goals.

In Despodov, van Bronckhorst could find another player in that position who could come in and take the Premiership by storm with his exciting play in the final third, much like Laudrup.

The Bulgarian phenomenon has been in sensational form for Ludogorets this season, with nine goals and 12 assists in all competitions. This comes after he produced six goals and 14 assists last term for his current club, which suggests that he has the ability to make things happen at the top end of the pitch.

He previously played for CSKA Sofia and popped up with 25 goals and 26 assists in 80 matches for the Bulgarian outfit. This means that he has been regularly scoring and assisting goals for two separate clubs, indicating that he could have the potential to do the same at Rangers.

Whilst it is difficult to gauge the difference in quality between the divisions, he has been able to perform in Europe for his side. Despodov has racked up three goals and two assists in the Champions League and Europa Lague this term, showing that he can be a difference-maker in competitions the Gers are familiar with – which is why he could be an excellent signing.

AND in other news, Forget Kent: Rangers dud who lost 11 duels let Gvb down badly, he’s “not happy”…

According to reports by Gazzetta dello Sport (via SportWitness), Tottenham are looking at Dušan Vlahović alternatives, leading to the monitoring of Sassuolo’s Gianluca Scamacca.

The Lowdown: Spurs need goals

Ever since Fabio Paratici arrived in London, Spurs have been linked with a move for Fiorentina’s Vlahović. The 21-year-old striker is in fantastic form this season, having scored 15 goals in 17 Serie A appearances, making him the league’s top goalscorer. Fabrizio Romano has claimed that it will take a bid of £59.5m to lure the youngster away from the Italian side.

These links emerged after Manchester City offered £125m for Harry Kane in the summer. Spurs of course rejected this offer, but retrospectively this seems like a hasty decision. Kane has struggled this campaign, having scored just one goal in 13 Premier League appearances.

At 29-years-old, the Englishman is in the prime years of his career. If Tottenham did decide to sell the striker, they may never receive an offer anywhere near this previous sum, and perhaps that is why they are searching for cheaper alternatives to Vlahović.

The Latest: Spurs monitoring Scamacca

According to a report by Gazzetta dello Sport (via SportWitness), Tottenham remain extremely interested in the signing of Vlahović.

However, the newspaper claim that Sassuolo’s Scamacca is currently being monitored by a couple of major English teams, and is deemed ‘popular’ in the Premier League.

Tottenham are allegedly one of the teams interested in the player, especially if Kane parts ways with the Lilywhites in 2022.

The Verdict: Sound alternative?

Vlahović is also on Manchester City’s radar, as Pep Guardiola remains without a proper striker. If the Premier League winners decide to not go in for Kane in the summer, it is expected that they will pursue the Serbia international, and perhaps that will take the decision out of Paratici’s hands.

However, Scamacca could prove to be a good alternative. Despite scoring just five goals in 17 appearances this season, the youngster has shown enough potential for Davide Ballardini, one of his managers at Genoa, to liken the 22-year-old to a young Christian Vieri.

The 6 foot 5 Scamacca is described by Whoscored as strong in the air and someone who ‘likes to tackle’, so perhaps he could be the perfect man to spearhead Antonio Conte’s new look Tottenham, performing the sort of role that Romelu Lukaku did for the manager last season at Inter.

Tottenham Hotspur have been handed a major injury boost concerning Cristian Romero.

What’s the latest?

In recent comments cited by the Tottenham Hotspur website, Antonio Conte revealed that the 23-year-old centre-back, who suffered a hamstring injury while on international duty with Argentina back in November last year, is on course for a return to first-team football later on this month.

Speaking about the defender’s recovery, the Spurs manager said: “Everything is going in the right way with Cristian. For us, he’s an important player. It was a pity that he suffered a serious injury with his national team. We hope for him to recover very soon. I hope to have him available at the end of this month.”

Fans will be buzzing

Considering just how impressive Romero has been since his £42.5m move to Spurs last summer, the news that the centre-back looks on course to make a return to action this month is sure to have left the Tottenham Hotspur faithful buzzing.

Indeed, over his seven Premier League appearances so far this season, the £31.5m-rated defender has helped his side keep one clean sheet, as well as making an average of 1.7 interceptions – the most of any Spurs player in the current campaign – 2.3 tackles, 2.4 clearances, 40.7 passes and winning a whopping 69% of his duels per game.

These returns have seen the £29k-per-week man average a rather extraordinary SofaScore match rating of 7.15, ranking him as Conte’s fifth-best performer in the top flight of English football.

As such, it is clear for all to see that the sooner Romero makes a return the better for Tottenham, meaning that the 52-year-old Italian’s recent update regarding the centre-back is undoubtedly fantastic news for everyone involved with the club.

In other news: Conte must already axe “incredible” Paratici signing with THFC swoop for £78k-p/w gem

Sheffield Wednesday are back in action with a clash against League Two side Hartlepool United in the Papa John’s Trophy on Wednesday evening after drawing against Wycombe Wanderers in their previous League One clash at the weekend.

On the chalkboard

In terms of which players Owls manager Darren Moore could select to be in his starting XI to take on Hartlepool, one figure that played a big part in the draw against Wycombe that should be in the team in midweek is Callum Paterson.

As a result of the current injury issues Wednesday have at the moment, especially in the defensive areas, Moore deployed Paterson in the back three alongside Chey Dunkley and Ciaran Brennan at the weekend.

In the game against Wycombe, despite conceding two goals on the day, Paterson managed to put in a good display and show to Moore that he is a capable defensive player even though he’s predominantly played in attacking positions for Wednesday this season.

Even though he gave away a free-kick that led to Wycombe’s equalising goal, Paterson still managed to make eight clearances, three interceptions and one tackle as well as winning six of the nine duels he was involved in.

This performance earned Paterson an overall match rating of 7.2/10 from SofaScore, higher than Dunkley and Brennan, showing that he is more than capable of playing in a defensive position when called upon by Moore.

With Paterson previously being described as “irreplaceable” by Neil Warnock when they were both at Cardiff City, it seems as though that’s what he could be for Wednesday now as well considering their defensive injury issues and his mostly solid performance against the Chairboys.

Even though their next opponents are currently in League Two and haven’t won any of their five previous league games, it gives Moore the opportunity to play the £1.6m-rated Paterson in defence again to see if he can show off his versatility potentially even improve on the performance from last time out.

If he can, this could make him a real key figure for Moore until he gets some of his injured defensive players back up to speed again.

In other news: SWFC dealt potential double fitness blow ahead of Hartlepool, fans will be worried – opinion

Celtic are expected to make Jota’s loan move permanent before the end of the season, according to Anthony Joseph.

The Lowdown: Jota out injured

Jota has been in fine form under Ange Postecoglou this season, scoring eight times and registering six assists in 18 games in all competitions.

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Unfortunately, the 22-year-old suffered a hamstring injury against Hearts earlier this month and will be sidelined for a ‘few weeks’, meaning he could miss the League Cup final against Hibernian at Hampden Park.

Kyogo Furuhashi’s £4.86m move is the most expensive signing of the Postecoglou era so far, however, it seems as if the Hoops will break that over the coming months.

The Latest: Joseph’s tweet

Joseph took to Twitter on Tuesday afternoon to share a huge update regarding Jota’s future.

He revealed that Celtic are ‘expected’ to trigger their £6.5m option-to-buy agreement for Jota from Benfica before the end of the campaign.

The Verdict: Injury to help push through transfer?

With Jota sidelined for a ‘few weeks’ and not available for selection under Postecoglou, the Hoops could actually use this time between now and Christmas to get everything in place for a permanent transfer.

The option-to-buy figure at £6.5m is already in place, however, the length and details of a permanent contract may not be. His wage during a loan spell with Real Valladolid last season was worth £7,100-a-week, so perhaps that may need increasing off the back of his displays this year.

Numerous clauses may also need adding before a transfer can be announced, so Michael Nicholson could be wise to get a deal moving between now and the New Year with Jota and his representatives.

In other news: Devlin claims Celtic may now seal move for 12-goal beast before 2022 training camp

After pursuing him over the course of the summer transfer window, Aston Villa must finally sign River Plate star Julian Alvarez amid a recent update.

What’s the story?

Reports in recent months had claimed that Fernando Hidalgo, the agent of the 21-year-old, is set to meet with Villa’s representatives over a move to Dean Smith’s side ahead of the new Premier League campaign.

Now, Argentinian publication Ole (via Sport Witness) have claimed that the Midlands club have been “studying” Alvarez’s profile for the past year, and are willing to negotiate a deal for the versatile attacker.

Forget Buendia

Despite signing another creative Argentine in the summer – Emi Buendia from Norwich City – Villa haven’t really seen the best out of him just yet, with Smith’s insistence in seeing him operate as a number ten failing to bring its rewards (he’s managed just one goal and no assists in eight Premier League games).

In Alvarez however, they can find someone who is considerably younger at 21, but has already been making waves in his native Argentina.

The River Plate youngster is someone who can play anywhere across the frontline, and after a highly impressive campaign in his native Argentina, he was named as part of his country’s Copa America squad this summer.

Like Buendia, he is very much a creative attacker bagging four goals and setting up another seven in just 20 appearances last season – including a couple of games where he plundered a hat-trick of assists against Godoy Cruz and Central Cordoba respectively.

This campaign has seen him take his game to another level, scoring 11 times and providing another six assists in just 15 games in the Argentina top-flight.

It’s no surprise then that Marcelo Gallardo, his manager at club level, has previously hailed the young Argentine as someone who “every coach would love to have.”

The £18m-rated star could come in and even usurp his international compatriot Buendia at Villa Park.

Meanwhile, Villa have now made contact with this man…

West Brom have a challenging fixture ahead of them away to Blackpool tomorrow night, and will be hoping to secure three points to put them closer to the top two spots in the Championship currently held by Fulham and Bournemouth.

The Baggies have only won two of their last five games, which will be frustrating for manager Valerien Ismael, who will have been tasked with the challenge to take the side back to the Premier League next season.

One player that has been proving he has potential to play for the side if they get back to the Premier League, is Callum Robinson.

The £5.4m rated forward had a fantastic international break with his national side, the Republic of Ireland, where he contributed in holding Portugal to a 0-0 draw and even beat Cristiano Ronaldo to be Man Of The Match award in the game.

Despite this impressive performance, the 26 year old attacker was left out of Ismael’s starting XI against Huddersfield Town last weekend, in which the side lost.

With Livermore red carded, an in game substitution for a forward in a ten man team clearly wasn’t in the manager’s thought process as he tried to maintain some damage limitation for the rest of the game.

When asked by Birmingham Live, Ismael gave this response about not including Robinson;

“For sure we would have liked to play with Robbo but we have another game on Tuesday so we have to manage this.

“We wanted to put Robbo in but come the red card we had to change the game plan so this situation is due to the comeback from Alex because that took one change from the three possibilities.

The Baggies manager will be hoping to emulate the Robinson we saw during international break, in West Brom’s difficult title challenging campaign ahead.

Ex-Ireland player, Kevin Kilbane spoke to The Athletic about Robinson’s striking attributes that make him such a promising player:

“He’s played in a number of positions but when he plays as a nine, he’s not restricted because he always likes to drift out to the left and then cut inside to try to get strikes away.”

“So you always feel he could do a job on the left-hand side but when we play him as a No 9, his work rate is excellent and he always gives us the option of dropping back and helping the midfield out a little bit.”

West Brom and Ismael will be hoping to unleash the Irishman in their upcoming fixture against Blackpool to help them secure three points and gain a win away from home, of which they currently only have three.

In other news: Injury blow dampens West Brom’s transfer plans for Zohore

Graeme Jones is set for his first match in charge of Newcastle as interim manager against Crystal Palace in the Premier League today.

Steve Bruce was relieved of his duties earlier this week and Jones now faces the unenviable task of trying to pick up the Magpies’ first win of the league campaign at Selhurst Park.

Bruce’s denouement came in the form of a 3-2 defeat to Tottenham last week, with Newcastle 3-1 down at half-time before Jonjo Shelvey was sent off in the second half.

How many changes will Jones make to the side? Here is our predicted XI for today…

We are predicting that he will make four changes to the side from last week, with Miguel Almiron, Fabian Schar, Jeff Hendrick and Jamal Lewis all coming in.

In defence, Schar and Lewis could come into the XI for Ciaran Clark and Matt Ritchie. We published an article explaining why the Northern Ireland left-back should start, with the ex-Norwich man deserving of a chance to show that he can be an upgrade on Ritchie in the Premier League following the £39k-per-week dud’s disappointing showing against Spurs.

Clark has started six Premier League games and averaged a SofaScore rating of 6.62. He has won 64% of his duels and made four clearances per match. Meanwhile, Schar has achieved a score of 6.75 in two league starts, winning an exceptional 83% of his duels and making 4.5 clearances per game. This suggests that the Swiss defender could come in and be an upgrade alongside Jamaal Lascelles, which is why Jones could select him for this match.

In midfield, Hendrick could start ahead of Sean Longstaff. The Newcastle academy product had a nightmare against Spurs as he was hauled off after 60 minutes and was given a SofaScore rating of 6.4 as he lost half of his duels. The Irishman scored in his last appearance against Wolves, which suggests that he could come in and add a goal threat to the team.

Almiron watched on from the stands as Newcastle lost to Tottenham due to his late return from international duty, which means he could now be fresh and raring to go for this clash with Palace. The wide midfielder could come in for Joelinton, who we have urged Jones to axe, and play out on the right, with Allan Saint-Maximin switching out to the left-hand side.

We are predicting that the rest of the XI will stay the same, with Callum Wilson, Saint-Maximin, Lascelles, Javier Manquillo, Karl Darlow, Isaac Hayden and Joe Willock all retaining their places.

AND in other news,  Jones must ruthlessly axe £80k-p/w NUFC flop who’s “offering nothing”, he’s dreadful…

Newcastle parted ways with manager Steve Bruce earlier this month following Saudi Arabian consortium PIF’s official takeover of the club.

Bruce kept the Magpies in the Premier League in both of his full seasons on Tyneside, but that was not enough to save him from the sack after Mike Ashley decided to sell to PIF.

One reason why they may have let him go could have been his use of the funds he was given in the transfer market, with a number of players arriving and failing to make a positive impression – one being Scottish international Ryan Fraser.

The winger had enjoyed some terrific years in the Premier League with Bournemouth. He produced 12 goals and 17 assists between the 2017/18 and 2018/19 top-flight campaigns, with Transfermarkt valuing him at a whopping £27m in the summer of 2019.

Fraser then endured a difficult year as he scored once and provided four assists in 28 league games, before becoming involved in controversy as he refused to play the final nine matches.

Former Crystal Palace owner and current pundit Simon Jordan hit out at the winger after he opted against playing for Bournemouth in Project Restart last year. He said:

“To me, he’s saying to Bournemouth: ‘I could have helped you, but I couldn’t be bothered to do so’. You’d have him with you in the trenches…”

He added:

“I’m not suggesting you should have loyalty beyond the realms of your contract but in exceptional times, which we’re in now, you need exceptional people.

“And if I’m Newcastle, I’m looking at this wretched individual thinking: ‘When it came to adversity you didn’t want to stand up’.”

At the time of the move to St. James’ Park, Transfermarkt valued Fraser at £15.75m. This meant that he was worth £11.25m less than he was the previous summer, showing that Newcastle were signing a player on a downwards spiral after a difficult season with the Cherries.

The downward trend continued as he endured a rough debut season in black and white. He played 22 games in all competitions, scoring once and providing three assists – with his solitary goal coming in the League Cup.

At the time of writing (28/10/21), Transfermarkt value Fraser at £9m. This is down £6.75m from last summer and £18m in two years, with his worrying slide in terms of performances on the pitch causing his value to plummet since 2019.

Whilst Newcastle did not pay a transfer fee for Fraser, they are reportedly paying him £62k-per-week and signed him on a five-year deal in 2020. This means that they could end up paying him as much as £16.38m by the end of his contract, assuming he is not sold to another club before the end of that deal.

That is a huge chunk of change for a player who is regressing in quality and value. It is easy to forget about the hidden cost of a ‘free transfer’ and Fraser’s wages coupled with his performances on the pitch show that Newcastle have had a transfer howler with the forward. The fact he has started this season without a goal or assist in seven games does not help his case either…

AND in other news, Newcastle could unlock Willock by signing £100k-p/w beast who helps others “flourish”…

Ryan Jack’s continued injury absence for Rangers is a big problem for the defensive solidity of the team, according to former Gers and Scotland right-back Alan Hutton.

The Lowdown: Jack still out injured

Steven Gerrard’s side have made an up-and-down start to their season, topping the Scottish Premiership table but not always convincing in the competition, as well as being knocked out of the Champions League and losing to Lyon in the Europa League.

Rangers have been without Jack since back in February, with the midfielder still working his way back from a persistent calf problem.

Gary McAllister has confirmed that the 29-year-old is ‘still missing and working hard to get back to full fitness’ currently, as he looks to return sooner rather than later.

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The Latest: Pundit bemoans absence

Speaking to Football Insider after McAllister’s 11-word update, Hutton bemoaned the fact that Jack is still unavailable, claiming the hole in front of the defence has become a big problem:

“The main thing from last year, for me, is Ryan Jack’s missing. I think he’s a huge loss. If you watch the game on Sunday (v Motherwell), Tavernier and Barisic are high up the pitch and Kevin van Veen picks up the ball in behind Tavernier.

“In those kind of spaces, Ryan Jack fills them last season. He goes back into position and covers for the likes of Tavernier. That didn’t happen.

“There was a gap in behind, you need to show him down the line which he wasn’t. He was shown infield which makes Connor Goldson come right out his comfort zone into a wide area.

“Jack Simpson is slow to recognise where the danger is and move across. He can’t cover Goldson who has went out wide. It’s just a kind of mistake after mistake.

“You’re chasing your tail a little bit to try and get a block in. These are the things that seem to be rearing their ugly head game after game.

“It’s simple things but if every single player is making just a little mistake it creates a bigger mistake. From the outside looking in, Ryan Jack is a huge loss.

“He’s very good defensively, he can sniff out danger, can close down spaces really well. They need him back to try and get back into that defensive shape and really help out the team.”

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The Verdict: Vital he returns soon

Hutton is correct in his assessment, with Jack’s all-round game so effective for Rangers last season, with 16 league starts coming his way as Gerrard’s men clinched title glory.

The hope is that he returns in the near future, adding stability to the Gers’ midfield and bringing more consistency to the team, in terms of both performances and results.

An average of 1.1 tackles and interceptions per game apiece in the league in 2020/21 proved to be effective and that can again be the case upon his return.

In other news, one pundit has discussed a potential loan move involving Rangers. Read more here.