The Top 10 January Targets in Europe
Karim Benzema, Real Madrid’s 26 year-old striker, has a market value of around £30m. The Frenchman is seemingly always on the brink of a move away from Spain with Arsenal as favourites if he were to leave. With 5 goals and 5 assists in 11 matches so far this season he seems a perfect target for Liverpool too though.
Juan Cuadrado, 26-year-old striker for Serie A club Fiorentina. It seems that the Viola are keen to tie Cuadrado down to a new deal in order to distract the Columbian from all the attention he is receiving especially from Manchester United. With a price tag of around £28m he would be a good sell for the Italian side, who really want to keep the winger but can’t afford his wage request.
Paris Saint-Germain’s 27 year-old striker, Edinson Cavani, has asked his club to lower their asking price to facilitate a move away from the French champions. Amid summer speculation that linked him with Manchester United, Cavani insisted he was happy even if there were some small issues about the position he was being asked to play. The £40m Uruguayan striker has started all nine of PSG’s Ligue 1 games this season, scoring three times but of the four occasions he has been deployed as a centre-forward, he has failed to find the back of the net. A far cry from when he scored 38 goals in 43 games in all competitions for Napoli in 2012/13.
Adrien Rabiot, the 19 year-old PSG French midfielder, very much looks to be on his way out. Already a two-time Ligue 1 winner, Rabiot has appeared in a total of 43 first-team games for Laurent Blanc’s side, but with the likes of Yohan Cabaye, Blaise Matuidi and Marco Verratti ahead of him in the PSG pecking order, the 19-year-old has found his game time restricted with no appearances yet this season. It has been claimed that Rabiot has already signed a pre-contract deal with Roma, even if the likes of City and Chelsea are both monitoring the situation
Borussia Dortmund 25 year-old winger, Marco Reus has been linked with the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Bayern Munich. These days, no transfer window is complete without Marco Reus being linked to at least five top-level clubs and the same is happening again this year. With a price tag of around £25m the German, who has a contract with Dortmund till 2017 and a buy-out clause of £20m for this summer. Borussia are club sitting at the wrong end of the Bundesliga, time seems to have come for Marco to move on!
Columbian striker Jackson Martinez is very much on the Liverpool transfer radar and there are many reasons why. At £30m the 28 year-old would not be a cheap buy but his outstanding strike rate for FC Porto has seen him become one of the hottest available players out there. Since signing for the Portuguese side in summer 2012, the striker has put away 69 goals over the course of 102 games but since declaring last February that he would like to play outside Portugal, time seems to have come for his move to actually happen.
Petr Cech is still a Chelsea player, but at the age of 32, he still wants to play regularly and there are many clubs prepared to offer the Czech keeper the opportunity. This season, Cech has played just 66 minutes of Premier League football for Jose Mourinho’s side. With at a price tag of £7m, considering he remains one of the best goalkeepers in the world and still has years ahead of him one can imagine he suitcases are already packed with the destination being Liverpool, at least according to the world’s best tipster.
31 year-old Dani Alves is being linked to Manchester United especially considering he will be leaving Barcelona in 2015 anyway. The player is reported to have declared: “This will be my last season at Barcelona. Next year I will move to England. I want to play in the birthplace of football.” Alves has been at Camp Nou since 2008, where he has won a haul of honours, including two Champions League titles, four La Ligas, two Copa del Reys and two UEFA Super Cups and Louis van Gaal is reportedly weighing up a bid for the adventurous right-back to shore up his defence. At £15m it doesn’t seem an easy buy for a 31 year-old, but, defensively, things are looking a bit desperate in Manchester.
German midfielder Sami Khedira has a price tag of around £15m, the same as Alves, and it just seems like a so much better buy, if Madrid agree to rid themselves of the 27 year-old. Khedira is a World Cup, Champions League, La Liga and Bundesliga winner. He plays in an in-demand position and, crucially, will be out of contract with Real Madrid at the end of the 2014/15 season. Interested parties are the usual EPL suspects, with Arsenal as favourites due the already present German contingent.
24 year-old Dutch midfielder Kevin Strootman in summer 2013 was being linked with the Old Trafford side before opting to join Roma. Today, with a price tag of £30m it is believed that Van Gaal is close to an agreement with the player about a move to Old Trafford. Despite the cruciate ligament injury that ruled him out of action for the latter stages of last season’s Serie A and the World Cup, Strootman has returned to fitness but somehow seems not to fit in anymore.