Marcus Thuram with leave Borussia Monchengladbach on a free transfer amid interest from Premier League trio Tottenham Hotspur, Newcastle United and Aston Villa, the Bundesliga club’s sporting director tells Sport1.
The Frenchman’s first league goal since the Qatar World Cup could hardly have come at a better time. Bayern Munich, for what feels like the umpteenth time in the last decade or so, came unstuck against their perennial ‘bogey team’ at Borussia Park,;Thuram’s late winner securing three confidence-boosting points for Daniel Farke’s inconsistent side.
With 11 in just 19 starts now, the former Guingamp ace will certainly take some replacing, his contract expiring in July.
“We’ve decided to allow Thuram to leave,” Roland Virkus explains.
Not that Gladbach have much choice in the matter. An explosive, tricky, left-sided attacker in the Marcus Rashford mould; Thuram is entering the final few months of his current deal. In truth, he never appeared to have any real intention of signing a new one.
Marcus Thuram could move to the Premier League for free
“The fact that he plans to leave on a free transfer is not a positive situation. I can’t sugarcoat it,” Virkus adds.
“We stretched ourselves with Marcus Thuram. We have to accept that there are bigger clubs Marcus might move to.”
Newcastle and Aston Villa have held talks with Thuram’s representative, alongside the likes of Inter Milan (FC Inter News). Tottenham Hotspur are also admirers of a player legendary Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger once likened to Thierry Henry. Neither Richarlison nor Heung-Min Son have found the net consistently under Antonio Conte of late. Though the latter, in his defence, did end his recent drought against West Ham United on Sunday.
“He is a great guy. A little crazy maybe. But what he brings to the pitch is phenomenal,” former Gladbach team-mate and now-Chelsea enforcer Denis Zakaria says of Thuram; described as ‘world-class’ by one Bundesliga chief.
Bayern Munich, Chelsea and Manchester United are also expected to be in the race for one of European football’s most high-profile free-agents come the summer.
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