Southampton defender Jack Stephens has, perhaps surprisingly, been linked with a move away this summer.
Southampton’s Jack Stephens has been linked with a move away from St Mary’s
A report in the Telegraph has suggested that Southampton’s Jack Stephens could be amongst the defenders who end up leaving St Mary’s in the summer.
The Telegraph reports that the Saints are bracing themselves to potentially lose Virgil van Dijk and Ryan Bertrand, but they also may face a battle to keep hold of Stephens following his fairly promising emergence into the first-team this term.
The 23-year-old went into this campaign having only made one first-team appearance in all competitions in his previous five seasons on the south coast, only making his Premier League debut in January of this year.
Since then, the former Plymouth man has been a fairly key part of Claude Puel’s plans with van Dijk struggling with injury during the latter part of this campaign.
Stephens made his Premier League debut in January
He put in a man of the match display in the Saints’ League Cup semi-final second-leg tie with Liverpool at Anfield and played the entirety of the narrow final defeat to Manchester United at Wembley.
Though Puel’s hand has been somewhat forced with what centre-backs he has been able to use recently, Stephens has looked fairly bright, so perhaps it should not be that great a surprise that he appears to be attracting some attention from elsewhere.
And although the Telegraph does not provide any indication of where Stephens may be headed if he does indeed leave, they suggest his potential exit is set to bag the Saints a healthy profit.
Southampton manager Claude Puel could be about to lose three key defenders this summer
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