The Juventus manager, Maurizio Sarri, has decided his midfield is missing a key ingredient in the pint-sized French enforcer N’Golo Kanté and has instructed the vice-president, Pavel Nedved, to pull out all the stops to lure the Chelsea midfielder to Turin. With more than three years left on his contract, the midfielder is unlikely to come cheap and will probably cost north of £70m if Chelsea are to even bother entertaining the notion of letting him go.

Mo Salah earns jittery Liverpool 4-3 win after RB Salzburg storm back Read more

Manchester United, eh? Eager to close the stable door long after the horse has bolted towards the horizon with Romelu Lukaku on its back, the club hierarchy are hoping to bolster their fairly toothless attack in January. Somebody in their recruitment department has thrown three darts at a wall covered in Panini stickers and hit those bearing the mugshots of the RB Leipzig striker Timo Werner, Lyon’s Moussa Dembélé and his Barcelona namesake Ousmane Dembélé (no relation). Also ready to bid for the Juventus outcast Mario Mandzukic, it’s almost as if United realised their summer transfer policy was a mite ill-conceived, although their January one doesn’t seem any more coherent.

United are also interested in bringing the Leicester playmaker James Maddison and Real Sociedad (on loan from Real Madrid) midfielder Martin Ødegaard to Old Trafford, in a state of affairs that suggests the club hierarchy are seriously deluded if they think the current shambles they’re presiding over is likely to be a more attractive option than the many other clubs who are bound to be clamouring for the services of both players. Newcastle’s Sean Longstaff seems a far more realistic target, as the club he currently represents is of a few Premier League outfits that is run even more haphazardly than the one giving him the glad eye.

Nobody really thinks Tottenham would be dumb enough to sack Mauricio Pochettino after a poor run stretching back only two months, but that hasn’t stopped the newspapers from reassuring us they aren’t about to hand him his P45. Whether or not the Argentinian actually wants to stay at White Hart Lane is another matter altogether and – oh look, would you believe it? – Manchester United are believed to be monitoring his situation. With Pochettino’s days at Spurs looking more numbered than a set of balls in a lottery tombola, the club’s fans are worried Harry Kane will join the stampede of senior players who follow him out the door whenever he decides to leave.

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And finally, the Rangers striker Alfredo Morelos is attracting admiring glances from the other side of the Atlantic, where MLS club LA Galaxy are interested in signing the prolific 23-year-old. With no red cards and 13 goals in 17 appearances this season, the hot-headed Colombian has been recalled to his national team’s squad for matches against Algeria and Chile in this month’s international break.