Over the weekend three separate, although highly intriguing and worth talking about transfer rumours, started circulating over three Polish players. The players in question all play their football in Top 5 leagues and I will break down these rumours as to how likely they are to actually happen.
The first rumour concerns Jan Bednarek, currently at Southampton, being a target for Aston Villa after summer signing Diego Carlos ruptured his Achilles. The defender, 26, has been at Southampton since 2017 and has been rumoured to leave to another Premier League team all summer. It was first thought that Leicester were keen on securing his services, but now Aston Villa are believed to be seriously considering a move for the 42-time Polish representative, as first reported on Friday by Tomasz Włodarczyk.
Supposedly, Villa are most keen on a loan move without an option to buy, as they are simply looking for a stop-gap replacement for the injured Carlos. Bednarek’s Southampton contract runs until 2025, so the Saints won’t be in a hurry to sell either.
Furthermore, in the last 24 hours it has been reported by Alex Crook that West Ham are also keeping tabs on Bednarek with an eye to making a transfer offer. Hammers boss David Moyes has spoken about his desire to bring in defenders, so it would be unsurprising to see an offer made in the coming days. Juventus and Roma are also believed to have long-standing interest in Bednarek, and as the reports speak of an ‘overseas club’ weighing up an offer, it could potentially be one of the Italians.
If I had to rate how likely Bednarek leaving Southampton is, I’d put it at 60-70%. If an offer comes in from any of the clubs mentioned, it would be hard to see him stay at a side that has more often than not opted to use other defenders so far this season.
The second rumour is Karol Fila of Ligue 1 side Strasbourg, who is close to joining Bulgarian outfit Ludogorets. Fila made a number of appearances for Poland’s U21 team and his move to Ligue 1 last summer was supposed to see him reach the potential the right-back showed at Lechia Gdańsk.
Sadly however, he suffered injuries which he hasn’t properly recovered from, and the 24 year-old is believed to be on his way to Ludogorets as per Meczyki. This would not be a bad move, as the Bulgarian champions are highly likely to progress into the Europa League group stages, and Fila would likely be in the starting 11 on an almost permanent basis.
Fila moving to Ludogorets is a move I would estimate at around 80-90% likely.
The last rumour to speak about is Arkadiusz Milik being shopped around by Marseille. The French side are looking to offload the injury-prone striker, who has scored 16 goals in 62 appearances for the Polish national team and a very respectable 16 goals in 38 appearances for Marseille last season.
However, Marseille have brought in Luis Javier Suarez from Granada, and he is already proving to be a greater goalscoring threat than Milik. According to reports in France, he has been offered to Manchester United (of whom he is a devoted fan), Everton and Juventus. The biggest issue is the price tag, estimated at €20 million, which is prohibiting any further interest from the two Premier League teams. Juventus are believed to hold Milik as a ‘Plan B’ option should they fail to secure the signing of Memphis Depay, as has been reported by Di Marzio.
I can’t see any of these three clubs realistically making an offer for Milik that Marseille would accept, so much like Piątek at Hertha, he may find himself on the bench or in the stands until January if an offer is not accepted within the week. I estimate a transfer at around 20-30% likely.
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