Silly season is barely underway and yet this hasn’t stopped the media from squeezing some absolutely fantastic and extremely unlikely headlines into their publications. Right up there with the most ridiculous of these rumours is The Daily Star’s claim that Liverpool may be interested in signing Arsenal’s out of form wing-wizard Theo Walcott.
What’s more, Chelsea are also said to be keeping tabs on the young winger.
With his Arsenal contract slowly eeking away, Arsene Wenger is in the precarious position of either meeting his demands or backing down and permitting a move to another club. The Star says Theo is pushing for a £85k-a-week deal that would last four years. However, there’s no truth that this is really what Theo’s after as the article provides us with no sources or quotes.
But as the days push on and Theo doesn’t agree a new deal with the club he finds himself in a stronger position when it comes to negotiations. Would Arsenal be willing to pay big wages to keep hold of Theo, or would they let him leave and join a club like Liverpool or Chelsea?
In 19 appearances this season, Theo has netted just once and fan patience with the pacy winger appears to have run out. His recent performance against Fulham was particularly lacklustre and more or less summed up a poor 6 months for Walcott.
So why on earth would Liverpool want to sign Theo Walcott, particularly when they already have a plethora of well-paid wingers? Why push out the likes of Henderson or Downing to give an opportunity to the highly inconsistent Walcott?
Given the rivalry between Liverpool and Arsenal, there’s no chance that Arsene Wenger would let him join them on the cheap. The Reds would have to pay at least 3-4 times the £5m Arsenal spent on Theo back in 2006 when he was brought over from Southampton.
Whilst Theo would fit into Kenny Dalglish’s ‘best of British’ transfer outlook, I can’t help but feel that the strides taken last summer in the transfer market had an air of definitiveness about them.
If Liverpool are to bolster this January, it’ll more than likely be in defensive areas or by bringing in a new striker. Theo Walcott wont be a Liverpool player anytime soon and will likely remain an Arsenal player or favour a move abroad.
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I wouldn’t put anything past Dalglish. Instead of looking for inform players who can fit into his pattern of play, he would rather prefer it if the player is either British or Irish. With a narrow minded attitude like that, he wouldn’t last in his job.