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BBC
Argentina forward Lionel Messi, 29, will not be leaving Barcelona, according to his father, with talks under way over a new contract. (Sun)
Chelsea goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois, 24, is already planning his summer move to Real Madrid.(Sun)
The Blues want £12m from Bournemouth for another goalkeeper, 29-year-old Asmir Begovic.(Daily Mirror)
Atletico Madrid boss Diego Simeone has opened the door for Antoine Griezmann, 25, to leave the club in the summer. Manchester United are one of the few clubs able and prepared to meet the France forward's release clause of 100m euros (£86m).(Daily Telegraph)
Manchester City have set a record transfer fee for a 13-year-old by paying Southend United £175,000 for defender Finley Burns. (Times - subscription required)
Midfielder Lucas Leiva has cast doubt over his future at Liverpool, with Inter Milan one of the clubs linked with the 30-year-old. (Daily Express)
The Reds could face competition from Barcelona for 21-year-old Borussia Monchengladbach midfielder Mahmoud Dahoud, who has been a long-term target of Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp. (Daily Star)
Crystal Palace have failed to agree personal terms with Arsenal full-back Carl Jenkinson, 24, following lengthy talks with the player and his representative. (Guardian)
Manager Slaven Bilic says West Ham will not sell 29-year-old French midfielder Dimitri Payet to Marseille on the cheap. (Times - subscription required)
Payet's departure seems inevitable. His car was vandalised outside his home, and he has been deleted from the WhatsApp group of senior players. (Daily Mail)
The Hammers have agreed an £8m fee with Southampton for unsettled 33-year-old defender Jose Fonte. (ESPN)
Everton manager Ronald Koeman is unsure if 34-year-old defender Phil Jagielka, who has been linked with Sunderland, will be at the club beyond this month. (Daily Express)
Koeman, meanwhile, has ended his interest in Algeria and Standard Liege striker Ishak Belfodil, 25. (Guardian)
Leicester City striker Leonardo Ulloa, 30, has asked for a transfer. (Sky Sports)
Foxes defender Luis Hernandez, 27, is expected to join Malaga on loan. (eldesmarque.com)
Manchester United winger Ashley Young, 31, is considering a move to the Chinese Super League, with Shandong Luneng willing to offer him £16m net in salary. (Daily Mirror)
Vincent Janssen's agent says the 22-year-old forward turned down interest from Galatasaray to fight for his place at Tottenham. (Omroep Brabant)
Middlesbrough manager Aitor Karanka has welcomed rumours of Chelsea's interest in 20-year-old Spanish winger Adama Traore. (Evening Standard)
Newcastle United are interested in re-signing Crystal Palace winger Andros Townsend, 25, on loan. (Newcastle Chronicle)
Birmingham City manager Gianfranco Zola has confirmed 30-year-old defender Jonathan Spector is leaving the club. (Birmingham Mail)
Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger believes India will follow China in trying to lure stars from European football. (Daily Mail)
Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino is not sure Manchester City are out of the Premier League title race, despite City boss Pep Guardiola indicating they are. (Daily Star)
Pochettino is also "concerned" over the hip injury that has kept 24-year-old playmaker Erik Lamela out for the past three months. (Daily Telegraph)
Guardian Rumour Mill
Ashley Young is suspected to have spent many hours this week launching himself through the air with his arms outstretched. No, he hasn’t been rehearsing his penalty-winning technique, he’s preparing to jump at the offer of a £16m net annual salary that Chinese outfit Shandong Luneng are lining up for him. That’s a lot of money to hand over but the club are confident that even if Young does not play well, he could teach them how to trick people into thinking they’ve seen a big hit.
Nothing any Chinese club could offer Thibaut Courtois, meanwhile, could persuade the goalkeeper to leave Chelsea. All Real Madrid have to do, however, is point to a map: the Belgian is increasingly eager to return to Spain, where he spent several happy years with Atletico Madrid and where his partner and daughter still live apparently, so Chelsea are resigned to letting him go to the Bernabéu in the summer. They are also prepared to relinquish their other goalkeeper, so long as Bournemouth cough up £12m for Asmir Begović. That all sounds like extreme complacency to the Mill, but sources say that Antonio Conte does intend fielding a goalkeeper next season. Surely, then, it’s only a matter of time before the media clamour for Joe Hart begins.
There are reports that Dimitri Payet’s car has been vandalised outside his home in London, possibly by a West Ham fan keen to show that the player is totally right to want to leave the city. West Ham, meanwhile, have warned Marseille that they will not let him go on the cheap and are about to demonstrate what shrewd bargainers they are by paying Southampton £8m for 33-year-old José Fonte.
Life on Leicester’s bench has finally become too tiresome for Leonardo Ulloa, who now wants to leave the club. Sunderland’s ears have pricked up at that news. Luis Hernández is also set to leave the King Power. What do you meant you didn’t even know he was there? Well, he’s on his way to Malaga now.
Tottenham’s ears have probably pricked up at the news that Galatasary are willing to take Vincent Janssen off their hands but the stri.., um, the bustling forward is unwilling to give up the ghost at White Hart Lane just yet. Preston North End hope to tie up a deal for Robbie Keane even though the move will unleash a torrent of lame quips about the Irishman fulfilling his lifelong dream to join the club he supported as a child.
Finally, there now follows the compulsory mention of Antoine Griezmann’s imminent transfer to Manchester United. The Frenchman could be joined at Old Trafford by Bernardo Silva, the slinky Monaco schemer for whom United are willing to pay in the region of £70m.
Evening Standard
West Ham stadium probe: High-powered team to be appointed to investigate ‘huge questions’ over London Stadium finances
Jonathan Prynn
A high-powered investigation team will next month be appointed to probe the “complete and utter mess” of the finances of West Ham’s new home at the London Stadium.
Mayor Sadiq Khan’s officials today revealed they have approached “several independent companies” about conducting the enquiry into how the costs of converting the former Olympic athletics stadium at Stratford were allowed to “skyrocket.”
The investigation was first announced in November but Mr Khan today pledged that the “no stones unturned” audit will examine all aspects of the troubled financial history of the stadium.
Mr Khan said: “There are some huge questions that need to be answered about the financing of the London Stadium. We need to find out how on earth the transformation costs were allowed to skyrocket, and whether appropriate checks were made before key decisions were made.
“But just as important in this process will be looking to the future to ensure we get the stadium into a situation where we are able to reduce its cost to the taxpayer and it can operate as a successful multi-purpose stadium that our city can be proud of.”
The bill for turning the arena where Sir Mo Farah, Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill and Greg Rutherford struck gold into a replacement for the Hammers’ Boleyn Ground has soared to £323 million, some £50 million more than forecast by Mr Khan’s predecessor Boris Johnson.
Issues that will investigated include:
The negotiations that led to the plans for the conversion of the stadium from Olympic athletics stadium to “multi-use arena."
How the financial and operations projections that underpinned the use of public money spent on the works were drawn up and who was responsible for them.
Whether the work leading up to the key decisions “was sufficiently robust” to ensure value for money for the taxpayer.
The stadium’s future financial viability.
Under the terms of their deal with the London Legacy Development Corporation, West Ham contributed only £15 million towards the conversion cost with the rest met by the taxpayer.
The annual bill for running the stadium has been inflated by higher than expected costs for installing and operating retractable seating that can be removed for concerts and athletics events during the summer. This was originally estimated as a five day job costing £300,000 but will in fact take three times as long and cost around £8 million.
West Ham won the bid to occupy the Olympic Stadium in March 2013 and played their first game there in August 2016, after 112 years at their former home in Upton Park. However, early games were blighted by crowd trouble and violence.
Mirror
Dimitri Payet transfer saga takes fresh twist as West Ham consider complaint to FIFA over Marseille 'tapping up'
The Hammers believe that the Ligue 1 club are to blame for turning the 29-year-old's head in recent weeks
ByDarren Lewis
West Ham are considering a complaint to FIFA over Marseille's pursuit of Dimitri Payet .
The France playmaker, 29, has been vilified by fans for refusing to play or train since becoming aware of his former club's determination to re-sign him.
Claims that Payet's car and home have been vandalised by angry fans are being investigated but have not yet been verified by the Hammers.But as the increasingly acrimonious affair takes another twist, the club believe the whole controversy has arisen from the manner in which Marseille have gone about their business.
Marseille, sixth in the French top division, have already made two offers for Payet but both have been way below West Ham's £30million valuation.
The French club, however, are believed already to have made contact with Payet's camp behind West Ham's backs, to make him aware that they want him.
The club were bought by American businessman Frank McCourt in October. He has pledged to lift them to the top of Ligue 1 and to make them a force once more in Europe.
He is understood to have be ready to invest substantial funds into reaching his goal and, despite the insistence that Payet would be taking a pay cut, there is understood to be a lucrative deal on the table for him.
Payet's camp continue to maintain he wants to return to France for family reasons.
Claims that Payet's wife, Ludivine, has already left however have also been dismissed by West Ham.
Football London
West Ham interest in Brentford striker Scott Hogan has cooled unless he forces his Griffin Park exit
EXCLUSIVE: Brentford are digging their heels in over the future of their prized asset but West Ham retain some confidence a deal can be done
BySam Inkersole
West Ham’s interest in Scott Hogan has cooled in the past couple of days as the striker looks set to return to the fold for current club Brentford.
Football.London understands that the hold-up on a potential deal for the Bees frontman is linked to additional payments on the transfer fee.
The Hammers are set to turn their attentions elsewhere in a bid to make Hogan force the issue at Griffin Park, in a way not dissimilar to Dimitri Payet's attempts to engineer a move from the London Stadium.
Hogan has long been linked with a £15m move to the Hammers, who have struggled to justify the valuation of the Championship striker who has scored 14 goals in the league this season.
A move appeared as good as done last week as Bees manager Dean Smith left Hogan out of their last two games, but nothing has materialised since.
Now, it has emerged that Smith is ready to bring Hogan back into the fold as Brentford travel to Wigan this weekend.
Smith said: “It's unchanged from last week. Scott is still available for selection. He was last week. I chose not to play him and then chose not to bring him on.
“He's trained all week and that will be my decision if he plays or not.
“An agreement normally takes three parties – the buying club, the selling club and the player but there's sometimes a fourth one in the agent. As far as I'm aware, nothing has happened yet.”
HITC
Wigan move for West Ham's Marcus Browne
West Ham United youngster Marcus Browne is set to join Wigan Athletic on loan, HITC Sport understands from sources close to the club.
A number of Football League clubs have expressed an interest in taking the highly-rated Browne on loan, but Wigan are in pole position to land the player.
Browne is highly-regarded at West Ham and he was rewarded for his progress this season with a new three-and-a-half year deal earlier this month to keep him at the club until 2020.
The 19-year-old is on the fringes of Slaven Bilic's first-team after impressing for the club's Under-23s this season.
Browne, who joined West Ham at the age of eight, made his first-team debut for The Hammers earlier this season during a Europa League tie with Astra Giurgiu back in August and he has been named on the bench for several other games this term.
Bilic is a big admirer of Browne and feels a loan move away for valuable first-team experience is the next stage in his development.
Wigan boss Warren Joyce sees Browne as someone who can play a key role in his side's bid to secure survival in the Championship in the second half of the season as he will add to his attacking options at the DW Stadium.
Feghouli says he is not looking to leave West Ham
By London Football News
West Ham winger Sofiane Feghouli insists he is not looking to leave the club, adding he has “a contract which I respect”.
The Algerian has started just twice in the Premier League since joining from Valencia in the summer and there have been reports linking him with a loan move to Roma.
But in marked contrast to the wantaway Dimitri Payet, Feghouli says he is prepared to stay and fight for a regular place and help the club move up the table.
“I’m not looking to leave,” Feghouli told Sky Sports News HQ.
“I know there’s been interest from two or three clubs but I have a contract here which I respect.
“I will always give my all and will do all I can to make the club successful.”
Feghouli scored his first Hammers goal on only his second appearance, in the Europa League victory over Domzale back in August.
But he has played just 13 times since and had to wait until the home game with Manchester United on 2 January for his full Premier League debut.
He then scored his first domestic goal on his next start, against Crystal Palace last weekend, and Feghouli – who was surprisingly omitted from Algeria’s Africa Cup of Nations squad – admits he is starting to feel a bigger part of the team.
He said: “As a footballer when things aren’t going well it’s hard to feel settled, but it’s getting better here and I’m enjoying it.
“London doesn’t feel like home at the moment but London is a great city and I do like it.”
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