Everyone should try to sign Bradley Barcola

One of the biggest transfer stories of the offseason has been Leroy Sane’s likely departure from Bayern Munich and the myriad of players they’ve been linked to as a replacement on the right wing. The Bavarians seem willing to spend to get the final piece to their Champions League contending puzzle while Harry Kane is still in his prime, and today has produced my favorite link yet.

Sky Germany is reporting that Nico Williams is their top target, but their backup is Paris Saint-Germain attacker Bradley Barcola. I like Barcola as a left winger so much that I disagreed with PSG’s signing of Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, which pushed Barcola into either a bench or right wing role.

While PSG certainly justified that signing by winning the Champions League with Kvara playing a big role, I haven’t changed my opinion on Barcola one bit. This is one of the most productive attackers in world football, and a big team should build their attack around him. He’s good at literally everything.

His shot locations absolutely rock.

And his key pass locations do too.

There are quite a few Premier League clubs who are in the market for a left winger who’s a bit more of a goal-scoring threat than a playmaker at the moment. Chelsea and Arsenal top that list. Barcelona shouldn’t spend a lot of money, but they’ve been sniffing around players of this profile who would cost in the €70m range. I’m kind of shocked there isn’t a bidding war.

With the Kvara-Dembele-Doue first choice front line looking pretty well established going forward for PSG, I assume Barcola is available for the right price. I’d be willing to pay more for him than I would for Williams or Rafael Leão.

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More news and rumours

• Thomas Frank is expected to become the new Tottenham manager by Wednesday, with Spurs paying Brentford a £10m fee. Here’s a report saying he’d really like to bring Bryan Mbeumo and Nathan Collins with him. On the podcast, the boys spent quite a bit of time talking about why they think Frank to Spurs is a good fit:

• With Mbeumo likely being very expensive and preferring the kind of wage package he can get from Manchester United, Spurs could turn their attention to Bournemouth attacker Antoine Semenyo. Him having split time at left and right wing almost exactly equally and producing from both sides will make him attractive to a lot of teams.

• Jobe Bellingham’s move from Sunderland to Borussia Dortmund is official, and ahead of the Club World Cup registration deadline.

• Apparently Victor Osimhen has told Al-Hilal and Galatasaray they’re going to have to be patient, because he’s waiting for Man United. Meanwhile, Viktor Gyökeres is furious with Sporting Lisbon for going back on a gentlemen’s agreement to sell him at a reasonable price, despite Man United “calling every day.”

• Liverpool have reportedly upped their offer for Florian Wirtz to £118m and called it their final offer. I don’t know what the final terms will be, but I imagine this does get done soon.

• Despite Madrid-based AS saying that Real will make a final push for Martin Zubimendi, David Ornstein says it’s all bollocks and he’ll join Arsenal soon. OK.

• Chelsea and Newcastle are interested in signing Mohamed Kudus from West Ham, which I wouldn’t be thrilled about if I was a fan of those clubs. He’s fine. He wouldn’t be a disaster signing, but I don’t think he’s great. If West Ham can get someone to pay £50m they should be thrilled to take the money.

• Brighton are going to sign Diego Coppola from Hellas Verona for €10m, which is a very cheap bet on a high ceiling project defender. He doesn’t currently do anything correctly with his feet, but he’s one of the biggest aerial monsters in world football.

• Burnley have put a £50m price tag on defender Maxime Esteve, whose name I always read as “Maximum Steve.” Bayern have inquired, and he’s previously been linked to Tottenham too. He’s a ball-playing lefty who’s big, so that ticks a lot of boxes, but his aerial numbers aren’t actually too impressive.

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