Premier League strugglers Southampton will let Florin Gardos and right-back Jeremy Pied leave St Mary’s when their contracts expire at the end of 2017/18.
Who knows whether Florin Gardos and Jeremy Pied would have developed into crucial first-team players at Southampton had they stayed injury free on the South Coast?
There is no doubting the talent of the defensive duo after all.
Southampton paid a hefty £6 million to sign Romanian international Gardos from Steaua Bucharest in the summer of 2014, while right-back Pied arrived at St Mary’s for what looked like an inspired bargain deal when his contract at Ligue 1 high-flyers Nice expired.
Gardos has missed a total of 54 games in his three-and-a-half years in England and has not made a single appearance this season, having fallen well down the pecking order.
Pied, meanwhile, has featured four times this season but, after missing almost the whole of his debut campaign with a serious knee injury, has never looked like challenging Portugal international Cedric Soares for a first-team berth.
And the Echo adds that both Gardos and Pied are now free to negotiate with potential new clubs and sign a pre-contract agreement in time for the summer.
It is unlikely they will be missed on the South Coast.
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