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Arsene Wenger and his Arsenal side are currently half-way around the world in Sydney for their pre-season tour, where they utilised the back-drop of the Sydney Harbour to launch their rather sumptuous new third kit.Among those modelling the new strip was striker Olivier Giroud, despite the persisting reports linking the Frenchman with a move to Premier League rivals Everton after the arrival of compatriot Alexandre Lacazette.

However, in the wake of his appearance in the kit launch, it seems his chances of staying put in north London for the new season have taken a boost – according to the bookmakers at least.

The odds on the 30-year-old remaining at The Emirates after this summer’s window have shortened to 6/5 with both Paddy Power and Betfair.

The former Montpellier man had reportedly grown frustrated at a lack of playing time last season. Despite the fact he often delivered when called upon from the bench Wenger often left him out of the starting XI week after week.

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According to reports in the Daily Mail, Southampton are lining up a move for Lazio centre-back Wesley Hoedt as a potential replacement for Liverpool target Virgil van Dijk.

The Daily Mail says that the south coast outfit are preparing for the departure of their captain, with the £60m-rated star due to discuss his future with the club this week after previously telling them he wants to leave this summer.

The 26-year-old spent last week training on his own at Saints’ Staplewood base after he was left out of the squad that travelled to France as part of their pre-season preparations by manager Mauricio Pellegrino.

Liverpool have already been forced to issue an official apology to Southampton after being accused of tapping up the Dutchman, but it hasn’t stopped the rumours that the centre-back could still move to Anfield before the window closes at the end of the month.

The Daily Mail says that Southampton have opened talks with Lazio over Hoedt, and they are now considering a £12m bid for yet another Netherlands international.

Here are three reasons Hoedt is the ideal Van Dijk replacement…

Defensive abilities

While he wasn’t a regular in the Lazio side in Serie A last season – he spent two spells on the substitutes’ bench as he struggled to break into the side past Stefen de Vrij, Bastos and Wallace – Hoedt still made 23 Italian top flight appearances and he showed his defensive qualities.

The 23-year-old made 109 clearances and 23 interceptions in those outings, while he successfully won 22 tackles.

Van Dijk has proven during his 18 months on the field for Southampton how good he is from a defensive point of view, but his Dutch counterpart has certainly shown that he can be a Premier League success too.

In possession

Van Dijk has quickly established himself as one of the best centre-backs in the Premier League during his time at St Mary’s, and much of that is to do with how comfortable he is in possession and at bringing the ball out of defence before finding the right pass.

Hoedt showed a similar ability for Lazio in Serie A last season, with a passing accuracy of 87% in his 23 appearances, while he showed his ability to not only clear the ball but also take it forward before distributing it by successfully completing six of the seven take-ons he attempted.

Strength in the air

At 6’4” tall, Van Dijk has proved himself to be one of the strongest centre-backs in the air in the Premier League since he moved to Saints from Celtic two years ago.

The Southampton captain won 96 headed duels in 21 English top flight appearances last term before suffering a season-ending injury against Leicester City in January.

Hoedt stands at just under 6’4” himself however, and he also showed how good he can be at beating his opponents in the air by successfully winning 52 of the 62 aerial duels he faced in 23 Serie A outings during the previous campaign.

Do you agree, Saints fans? Let us know below.

Everton had their first competitive game of the season on Thursday night when they entered the third qualifying round of the Europa League.

The Merseyside outfit have brought in seven new signings this summer, and a handful of them were on show in the first leg against MFK Ruzomberok at Goodison Park.

Cuco Martina and Michael Keane were handed starting spots at the back, while Davy Klaassen slotted into the midfield and Wayne Rooney was also given the nod.

Sandro Ramirez also made an appearance, but from the substitutes bench.

It was not the most impressive of performances from Ronald Koeman’s side as they struggled to make the most of their dominant possession.

In the end, Everton grabbed a slender lead thanks to a goal from veteran Leighton Baines, who struck in the 65th minute.

The team were understandably a bit rusty as they try to get themselves fit for the new season, but they have just two weeks until Premier League action gets underway.

At the full-time whistle, fans took to Twitter to assess the performance, and the majority were unhappy with the display.

Martina was also singled out for criticism.

Newcastle United midfielder Jack Colback is not expected to play again for the club following a bust-up with manager Rafael Benitez, according to the Daily Mail.

What’s happened?

The 27-year-old, who made the controversial move to St James’ Park from arch rivals Sunderland in 2014, has seemingly got on the wrong side of Benitez.

The Daily Mail reports that Colback has been shunned from the first team and ordered to train alone.

The publication states that the midfielder was already training on his own, but was called up after one of the players suffered a knock.

It is believed that Colback refused, which incensed Benitez, who will reportedly leave the player out of his squad for today’s Premier League opener against Tottenham Hotspur.

The Daily Mail adds that the midfielder has been offered to other clubs, but no deals are close to happening due to the Englishman’s £40,000-a-week wage demands.

Can his Newcastle future be saved?

Benitez can be a stubborn character, so if Colback has fallen out with the Spaniard, then it does not bode well for him.

The 57-year-old coach is not afraid to make his frustrations known, and it appears that he tends to want things to go his own way.

During his time at Liverpool, Benitez publicly criticised the club’s former American co-owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett for their lack of transfer spending.

This summer, the ex-Real Madrid boss has admitted that he is unhappy with Newcastle’s activity in the window.

Given how Benitez conducts himself, it is difficult to envisage Colback coming back into the setup, and it may even be better if he doesn’t.

If the Magpies are to retain their Premier League status this season, then they need to have a focused and united camp.

They cannot afford any distractions or negative energy within the dressing room.

News that Liverpool have agreed a deal to sign Naby Keita next summer may not be all that surprising to most people.

The Reds have been tracking the RB Leipzig midfielder all summer as Jurgen Klopp looks to sort out a problem position just in front of an often leaky defence, but hopes had all but disappeared that the midfielder would appear in a red shirt this season.

It would have been surprising, then, if the deal that’s reportedly been agreed had been for this summer, but instead it appears to be one to bring the Guinea international to Anfield next summer, which is what Leipzig seemed to want all along: they didn’t want to sell their best midfielder until after their maiden Champions League campaign.

There has, however, been an even more surprising development on the Liverpool transfer front, as Jurgen Klopp has reportedly turned his attention to Thomas Lemar of Monaco, and is set to test the French champions’ resolve with a large bid.

That seems to have come out of the blue, but maybe there are reasons for that.

For one thing, Liverpool have now definitely qualified for the Champions League, and as a result they are in a stronger position to sign players than they were before the Hoffenheim tie. But it might also have to do with a potential end game in the Philippe Coutinho saga.

It’s no secret that Barcelona would like to add the Liverpool playmaker to their squad, and although it would seem that the Brazilian is more of a long-term Andres Iniesta replacement than anything else, their moves have stepped up since the departure of Neymar. That’s probably a gesture designed to keep fans happy in the face of the humiliation of losing one of their best players to a club not usually thought of as one of European football’s traditional elite.

It seems like a case of buying a player they might have wanted next summer a year earlier, both to save face and to spend the money they’ve been given by the French club whilst they have it.

That might work into Liverpool’s hands somewhat. Since Coutinho’s transfer request saga the other week, plenty of comparisons have been drawn with the Brazilian playmaker and Luis Suarez, who wanted to leave Liverpool in 2013, but was persuaded to stay another year and then got his move to Barcelona. But whilst that might be an accurate summary, it might just be the quirks of transfer timings that see Coutinho stay another season.

The signings of Lemar and Keita might seem to suggest that Liverpool are splashing money they know might be coming in from Barcelona and are attempting to replace Coutinho, but not getting Keita for another year scuppers that idea to a certain extent, even if Lemar does look like a more direct replacement for the Brazilian.

Nailing the Keita transfer down for next season, though, might embolden Liverpool to keep Coutinho for a year and let him go next summer safe in the knowledge that Keita won’t be pinched by another club in the meantime.

There are of course caveats and anything can happen in this market. There is so much money floating around that it can’t help but turn heads, both for players and for clubs.

There’s also the fact that Barcelona’s board in in such a difficult position with its own fans that they might simply look elsewhere over the next few days to bring in a quick purchase simply to placate supporters who were horrified to see Neymar leave and Paulinho arrive as the first signing after the sale.

But it looks like Liverpool’s joyful last week or so, with three wins, Champions League qualification and a massive win over a top six rival will be topped off with some genuinely exciting transfer business which will make the feeling around the club even more buoyant than it already is. And that’s no bad thing when your next two fixtures are Manchester City away in the Premier League and Sevilla at home in the Champions League.

Tottenham Hotspur advanced through to the fourth round of the EFL Cup as they recorded a narrow 1-0 victory against Barnsley at Wembley on Tuesday night, and Spurs fans were impressed with the performance of Juan Foyth on his debut.

Mauricio Pochettino decided to hand the summer signing his bow alongside Jan Vertonghen at the heart of the defence, and he kept a clean sheet as Dele Alli’s second half goal proved to be the difference between the two teams.

The 19-year-old only joined the north London outfit in an £8m deal from Argentine club Estudiantes de La Plata at the end of August, but he put in an assured display at the back and looked comfortable on the ball on what was ultimately a relatively easy night for the teenager from a defensive point of view.

Tottenham supporters were quick to have their say on his showing via social media, and while some described it as “amazing”, others believe he could a ‘potential heir to Toby Alderweireld’.

Here is just a selection of the Twitter reaction…

After another Premier League weekend, attention now turns to Europe for a handful of England’s top clubs.

Tottenham Hotspur are one of the elite bunch that will compete in the Champions League this week as they look for back-to-back victories.

Mauricio Pochettino’s men were arguably given the toughest group of the draw when they were placed in a pot alongside defending champions Real Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and APOEL.

The North London outfit got off to the best possible start, though, as they sealed a 3-1 triumph over Dortmund at Wembley in their opening Group H match.

On Tuesday, Spurs will face Cypriot side APOEL on away soil and it gives the club an opportunity to put themselves in a strong position in the group given that Madrid and Dortmund will be going head to head at the same time in Germany.

Tottenham head into this fixture on the back of a 3-2 win over West Ham United in the Premier League, and the fans are hoping to extend their winning run.

West Ham may have failed to earn any points from their London derby with Tottenham Hotspur at the London Stadium on Saturday but there were positives for Slaven Bilic to draw from the 3-2 defeat.

For starters, the Hammers showed huge resolve to get themselves back into the match after conceding three times, with Javier Hernandez applying a typically deadly finish from close range on 65 minutes and Cheikhou Kouyate following up in the dying embers of the match to create an incredibly dramatic stoppage time.

Meanwhile, Winston Reid and Jose Fonte both held their own defensively – Tottenham’s vibrant attack proved to be too hot to handle on the counter-attack but it could have been a lot worse – Kouyate made it a real contest in the engine room and summer signing Marko Arnautovic applied himself well, but failed to mark his performance with some end product.

So, West Ham fans, who was your Man of the Match from the 3-2 defeat? Let us know by voting below…

According to reports in The Sun, £6m-rated Sheffield Wednesday striker Gary Hooper is a January target for three Premier League teams.

What’s the word, then?

Well, The Sun says that Crystal Palace, West Bromwich Albion and Brighton and Hove Albion are all eyeing the in-form attacker as they look to boost their frontlines in the New Year.

The top flight trio have got 11 goals in 21 top flight matches between them so far this term, although the struggling Eagles haven’t contributed to that total at all as they are still yet to find the net.

Why do the trio want Hooper?

Because he has proven during his career that he is a consistent goalscorer.

The 29-year-old has netted eight goals in 12 appearances for the Owls this season, with seven of those coming in his last seven outings.

The brace against Leeds United last time out was particularly important seeing as Carlos Carvalhal’s men came into the fixture having been beaten by arch-rivals Sheffield United and Birmingham City in their previous two matches.

Hooper has scored 20 goals in 43 starts for Wednesday, while he netted 20 in 70 appearances in total for Norwich, 82 in 132 for Celtic and 47 in 90 for Scunthorpe United previously.

Would Sheffield Wednesday be tempted to sell?

It’s difficult to say.

Obviously the Owls are aiming for automatic promotion this season having been beaten by Huddersfield Town in the play-off semi-finals last term, and Carvalhal will know that he needs his main goalscorer at the club to achieve that.

However, while The Sun says that Hooper is rated at £6m, Wednesday would be mad to sell him for that fee considering the inflated prices we have seen during the last year or so, with the interested clubs also likely to be desperate in January and perhaps willing to pay a higher amount.

With the likes of Steven Fletcher and Jordan Rhodes already on their books, an offer of £12-15m could be enough to tempt them to sell considering he will be 30 in January and his current deal is due to run out in 2019, although the Portuguese boss would have to be able to bring in a replacement with the money.

This weekend, Jurgen Klopp meets his old friend David Wagner for the first time in the Premier League in what is sure to be a frantic game of football between one side in crisis and the other revelling in the good times.

The roles are the opposite to what you might have expected, though, given their respective managerial jobs. It is Klopp who is fighting off the critics at one of Europe’s grandest old clubs, and Wagner who is on a high at a club perhaps best known these days as strugglers from a rugby league town.

Defeat for Liverpool this weekend, then, could be nigh-on catastrophic given that newly-promoted Huddersfield represent the Reds’ most winnable league fixture in a while, and that the last time they won in the Premier League was on September 23rd. It’s clear that losing would cause plenty of talk about Klopp’s future. The manner of defeat last week already set tongues wagging.

For the Terriers, too, victory is almost as unthinkable. But in a very different way.

Whilst it might be true in the 21st century that Huddersfield is a town more proud of its heritage as the home of rugby league than its football team’s former glories, the Terriers were the first team ever to win three English league titles in a row, between 1923/24 and 1925/26. That feat has been matched since, but only by Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United.

They won’t win the league this season either, but if victory this weekend could conjure an ominous sign for Jurgen Klopp, then it will end October spookily for Huddersfield, too.

On March 13th 1926, the Terriers beat Manchester United 5-0 at their old Leeds Road home. The very next week, they travelled to Anfield to play Liverpool, winning 2-1. Both wins helped them on their way to their third league title in a row, which they won by five points. They were the greatest team in the land, but when you’ve reached the top there’s nowhere else to go. They haven’t won a major trophy since.

That wasn’t actually the last time Huddersfield beat Manchester United and Liverpool in successive top flight fixtures, but you still have to go back to September 1930, when the Terriers beat United twice and Liverpool once in the space of five days. That year ended in a fifth place finish, which is probably as unobtainable as first for Wagner’s side this season.

Those were the glory years, but that was a very different time. It has been almost a century since Huddersfield could even dream of winning two in a row over the two clubs who have, in the intervening decades, superseded the West Yorkshire side and established themselves as the powerhouses of English football.

Two weeks at the start of a Premier League season won’t undo all of that, but it is worth remembering that, although a Huddersfield win this weekend will make the story firmly about Liverpool’s failure rather than the Terriers’ success, victory for the newly-promoted Yorkshire side is probably a much more interesting angle.