September 18, 2024

Russell Martin: Southampton boss admits squad will not be 'perfect' for  season opener - BBC Sport

Turkish club in talks with Southampton to sign Onuachu after he rejected deal with the Saints’ indeed…

Involved in a relegation battle towards the second half of the 2022/23 Premier League season, Southampton spent a transfer fee of £18 million to sign Genk striker Paul Onuachu. The Saints were struggling to score more goals in the league, therefore signed Onuachu, who has been one of the best centre forwards in the Belgian league. In the 2021/22 season, Onuachu scored 21 league goals for Genk and followed it with scoring 16 goals in the first half of the 2022/23 season before arriving at the St. Mary’s Stadium.

Onuachu was expected to continue his great goal scoring form for Southampton as well and help the Saints avoid relegation that season. However, that wasn’t the case as Onuachu struggled to adapt to the Premier League and couldn’t score a goal in his eleven first team appearances for Southampton. The Saints were relegated to the Championship and Onuachu joined Turkish club Trabzonspor on a season long loan move where he thrived last season.

Turkish club in talks with Southampton to sign Onuachu

Paul Onuachu - Player profile 24/25 | Transfermarkt

In twenty league appearances for Trabzonspor, Onuachu found the back of the net fourteen times and also provided four assists. Now, he has returned to Southampton but the Saints are trying to offload him this season as they have great squad depth in their attack. The transfer window in Europe’s top five leagues is closed but in other countries like Turkey, the transfer window is still open for another week.

According to reports from Aksam, Turkish club Goztepe are interested in signing the 30-year-old centre forward. The newly promoted Turkish side has already signed Mateusz Lis from the Saints and have brought Kuryi Matsuki and new Southampton signing Juan on a season long loan move from Southampton. Now, the two clubs can complete another transfer move to for Onuachu to join Goztepe in this transfer window.

Now, it remains to be seen whether Goztepe make an official bid to sign the prolific forward from Southampton.

The first thing to consider in the above statement is that it is the international break coming after the start of the season and the transfer window shutting, suddenly the media is struggling for gossip and stories.

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So that makes it very easy to turn their focus onto the clubs that have started the season badly and produce a few headlines.

“The 38-year-old faces the sack by the end of September if he does not turn around the results after a dismal start to the season.

“Some in the Southampton boardroom want Martin to adopt a more pragmatic style to churn out Premier League results.

“However, Martin is adamant he won’t change the playing style regardless of the results that his team suffers.”

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