Having spent every minute of his decorated career at Bayern Munich, could Germany legend Thomas Müller be ready to muddy his spats in the Premier League? “No,” would seem to be the obvious answer, considering the 32-year-old Raumdeuter is still banging them in for the Bundesliga champions. Nevertheless, that hasn’t stopped British media outlets from pouncing on a story from Bild that claims Newcastle and Everton have both hatched ambitious plans to sign him in the summer.
Currently in Ecuador on international duty with Brazil, at various points yesterday Bruno Guimarães was off to Newcastle, then he wasn’t, then he was again. With so much uncertainty the Mill isn’t about to claim to have a clue what the future holds for the Lyon midfielder, but Fabrizio Romano, our man in the know, says a €40m (£33.5m) deal has been agreed between the clubs and “subject to details involving agents and the clubs being finalised, Guimarães will take a medical when he returns to Brazil”. Arsenal and Juventus are monitoring the situation with interest.
Contact-haver-in-chief Romano also claims Southampton are ready to offer a club-record £25m to make the loan move of Chelsea striker Armando Broja to St Mary’s a more permanent arrangement, but with Romelu Lukaku having such an indifferent time of things, it seems unlikely that Thomas Tuchel would be willing to let the young Albanian leave Stamford Bridge.
The future of Rumour Mill-staple Tanguy Ndombele remains completely up in the air. Unwanted at Tottenham, the French midfielder had been linked with a move to Paris Saint-Germain, who need to get rid of Julian Draxler, Danilo Pereira, Leandro Paredes or Ander Herrera to free up a dressing-room peg and training ground parking space for him. Everton and Valencia are both ready to hijack the deal should PSG fail to shift any deadwood.
Having laughed a £9m offer from Newcastle for central defender Dan Burn out of the gate, Brighton would quite like to sign Abel Ruiz from Braga but have had their opening bid for the 21-year-old Spanish striker rejected by the Portuguese club.
Left out of Arsenal’s travelling party to Dubai for their warm-weather training camp, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang has been offered to Sevilla and Barcelona on loan, but neither club is prepared to cover his £300,000 weekly wages. Arsenal, by contrast, are prepared to cover the wages of Douglas Luiz and are ramping up their efforts to sign the combative Aston Villa midfielder before the window closes.
And finally, in Cameroon representing Senegal at the Africa Cup of Nations – for whom he scored against Cape Verde on Tuesday – Marseille striker Bamba Dieng is attracting interest from Newcastle, Burnley, Crystal Palace and West Ham. The 21-year-old is reported to be available for £8m from the cash-strapped French club.
