Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Besler Linked with Sunderland and Fulham

The news on whether Matt Besler stays or goes continues to be a talking point among Sporting KC and US national team fans. The latest news has been coming from Greg Seltzer. Last week, Seltzer shot down the rumored move to Freiberg for Besler. He said that Freiberg isn't even looking for a central defender at this time.

Seltzer is also saying that Sporting is asking for what would be a club record fee. The club record fee is $6 million that the club received from Fulham back in 2008 for Eddie Johnson.

Seltzer had an update to the situation today, naming two of the clubs interested in Besler, and an apparently deadline in the proceedings. Seltzer said that there are 10 clubs interested in Besler at this time. Only one of those nine teams is in the Bundesliga, the other nine are apparently in England. He names two of those by name, Sunderland, who has apparently not put in a bid yet for the defender, and recently relegated side, Fulham, who have apparently put in a bid. A move to Sunderland would see him join fellow World Cup veteran, Jozy Altidore who joined the club ahead of last season.

For me, Sunderland would be an interesting, but rough move for Besler. Sunderland performed a great escape last year, avoiding the drop with some big results down the stretch, but the question will be whether they've improved the rest of the squad as well so they aren't in that situation this season. With Fulham you're going to a recently relegated side who likely will be a favorite to yo-yo right back to the Premier League in the 2015-2016 season. Besler could certainly play a role in that.

I'm still not sure which way that Besler is going to end up going, but according to Seltzer we won't have to wait long. Besler apparently has a deadline of this coming Monday for when he's going to make a decision.

2 comments:

Blando said...

Sunderland owned by an American from Independence, MO ... it's like he never left his hometown if he went there! Joking, but having an American owner, Jozy and a decent coach (I like Poyet) wouldn't be the worst thing in the world.

Anonymous said...

Freiburg are indeed looking for center backs. They just signed a Serb from Benfica. Freiburg are looking to replace their top cb from last season, who looks to be moving to Dortmund soon. Looks like Besler will be moving to England.