With the exception of Belarus, South Korea and starting this Saturday, Germany, global football is currently suspended. The Premier League has been given the all clear by the government to restart after June 1, behind closed doors, and with that in mind, teams are now training awhile adhering to social distancing guidelines.
However, there are still plenty of questions to be answered when it comes to Project Restart, and we’ll learn more this week as meetings are held and votes taken.
Until football returns, we still have plenty of transfer talk to cover, as transfer rumors are something that can survive anything. So let’s take a spin through the Tottenham Hotspur rumor mill in cyberspace. For today’s Tottenham news and notes round-up go here.
Chelsea winger Willian is out of contract this summer, and thus he’s been linked with a move to several teams, including both clubs that comprise the north London rivalry. Willian is basically the one that got away as he reached an agreement with Spurs in principle in 2013, and even underwent a medical with the club.
Then Chelsea made an 11th hour move and Jose Mourinho swooped in and claimed the Brazilian. A reunion with Mourinho could be in the cards now, but here’s what Mourinho said at the time, to rub salt in the wound:
“That’s the danger of medicals before contracts, but at the same time if you do the contract then the medical after, sometimes you can have a problem by signing a player with problems. So you have to do the medical before, but the best thing to do is to do the medical in secret.”
Elsewhere, on loan right back Kyle Walker-Peters wants to finish the season at Southampton FC, if possible. Premier League clubs voted in favor of extending the contracts of loanees that will see the current deals expire on June 30.
With the season on pause since March 13, and with any restart not commencing until mid-June, obviously the course of the season would run well well beyond that date. If/when the matches return, KWP would rather be a part of the south coast club for it.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly contributes to WGN TV, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Now and SB Nation.
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