Southampton could sell Ryan Bertrand for £10 million this summer as the Leicester City target has just 12 months left on his contract at St Mary’s, according to The Mirror (11 June, page 53).
Considering that there is a paucity of genuinely top-class left-backs available for hire at the present time, The Foxes might be smelling a bargain here.
Bertrand, a proven Premier League performer with England caps and a Champions League winners medal on his CV, is one of the best around in his position.
And with Ben Chilwell once again emerging as a target for some of England’s biggest and wealthiest clubs, it should come as a surprise to absolutely nobody that Bertrand has been lined up to replace the academy graduate at the King Power Stadium.
Leicester’s links with the ex-Chelsea youngster go back a while. And as long as he remains out of contract in 2021, Southampton may be forced to sell one of their most important and long-serving players on the cheap.
The Mirror claims that £10 million could be enough to take Bertrand from the South Coast. That, coincidentally, is exactly the same fee that Southampton paid to sign him from Chelsea half a decade ago.
And with Leicester expected to demand around £80 million for Chilwell, signing Bertrand as his replacement would leave a further £70 million in the bank to spend elsewhere.
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