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Hot football transfer gossip: Pogba, Wanyama, Benzema

The words Paul Pogba have become synonymous with hot football transfer gossip over the past year or so, but what do we have to show for it? Nothing. Cast your mind back to the final days of last season, and the badger-headed Frenchman was seemingly nailed on to join Manchester City over the summer. Fans were already slotting him into their future XIs alongside Raheem Sterling and Kevin de Bruyne, but then the Pogba trail went cold and City only ended up spending a measly £105m on the other two. Barcelona were also said to be heavily interested in signing Pogba from Juventus, but they never made a bid. Then Chelsea spent the best part of August with an apparently free run at the former Man Utd man, and they got as far as having an enormous bid allegedly accepted for him, but he just said no. And the whole thing has made us wonder whether Pogba is a bit of a football tease. He likes the attention, but really he loves Juventus and he has no plans to leave the Old Lady. That’s why we’re taking today’s Pogba gossip with a pinch of salt, but here it is anyway.

The futuristically coiffured midfielder has “hinted” that he could leave Juventus next summer, reports Talksport. Or more specifically, he said: “I am at Juventus, but I do not know for how long.” Then he added coquettishly: “We will do this year and then see how things go.” And that is more than enough to get Man City, Chelsea and Barcelona fans excited for the next 11 months or so.

There’s a rather brutal demolition of Tottenham’s transfer policy in the Telegraph, which says Southampton will refuse to deal with Daniel Levy over Victor Wanyama because they aren’t fans of the way the Spurs chairman does business. The paper adds that Tottenham’s negotiation methods have also upset West Brom, West Ham and Manchester United. This might explain why Spurs haven’t manage to snare any players from Premier League clubs for a while.

There’s an alluring young man called Dani Ceballos who is interesting Arsenal and Liverpool, according to the Mirror. The Real Betis midfielder is 19, has been “tipped for the top” and likened to Cesc Fabregas, is in the final year of his contract and could be available in January for a cut-price fee. The catch is that everyone will want to sign him after reading that.

Another promising youngster, Man Utd’s James Wilson, is wanted by your club - probably. The Red Devils have received more than 20 approaches for the striker, says the Mail, and Wilson is tipped to leave Old Trafford on loan to one of those clubs imminently.

Finally, here’s your daily fix of Karim Benzema saying he isn’t going to Arsenal. “I’m not going to repeat myself every time,” he said, before repeating that he is happy at Real Madrid.

@darlingkevin