Liverpool line up Peter Crouch return, as Sir Alex keeps an eye on Mesut Özil
Peter Crouch is making the news today, but we’ll thankfully stick to the back pages, where Roy Hodgson is reportedly preparing a £10million bid to bring the Spurs striker back to Anfield on a day of long and short stories emerging from Liverpool.
The 6ft 7ins Crouch played for Liverpool for three years between 2005 and 2008 before being offloaded to Portsmouth by then Reds boss Rafael Benitez, and Hodgson – who tried to sign the forward for Fulham last summer – has been encouraged to make a move for the giant frontman by his former Reds team-mates Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher, the latter of whom will soon be offered a new contract according to Hodgson.
In the absence of Chinese millions, any move for Crouch will have to be funded by the sale of the wantaway Javier Mascherano, with Liverpool keen to start a bidding war between Barcelona and Inter Milan to drive up the asking price for the Argentina captain, but one Argentinian definitely heading from Liverpool to Italy is Emiliano Insúa. The left back will join Genoa on Monday for around £4.5million, after an earlier move to Fiorentina fell through.
Insúa was the smallest player in the Premier League last season. A whole 1cm taller is Shaun Wright-Phillips, the England winger who could soon be taking the left back’s place on the specially lowered seat in the Liverpool changing room.
Manchester City’s ever expanding squad means that Wright-Phillips will struggle to get a game this season, and boss Roberto Mancini has reportedly told the winger that he is free to leave Eastlands, with Liverpool apparently ahead of his dad’s old club Arsenal in the race to sign him, with a determined Hodgson confident that he can “do a Joe Cole” and pip Arsène Wenger to the post again. Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha will follow Wright-Phillips out of City’s revolving door, with Aston Villa keen on the former, and Sunderland the latter.
Elsewhere, Sir Alex Ferguson was at Craven Cottage yesterday to watch German World Cup star Mesut Özil play a half as his Werder Bremen side went down 5-1 to Fulham. Despite that, the Scot remains keen, while Arsenal conceded five goals against Polish “giants” Legia Warsaw yesterday. They scored six, but the need to shore up a defence that has more holes than a collinder now takes them to Serie A, where they are eyeing Bologna goalkeeper Emiliano Viviano and Juventus defender Giorgio Chiellini, proving that Wenger must not have caught any of Italy’s World Cup campaign.
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