Will he stay or will he go, a Gylfi Sigurdsson story
Just when the dust seems to be settled, a small gust of wind can come causing a dust storm. The situation I’m referring to is that of Gylfi Sigurdsson at Swansea City. Sigurdsson has been the center of much transfer speculation since the season ended with Everton being the hottest team on his trail.
On Wednesday, Swansea City reportedly turned down a £40m bid from Everton for Sigurdsson ahead of their preseason friendly with Barnet. Paul Clement addressed the rumors head on prior to the friendly saying, “I am planning for him to be here, but there is clearly some very strong interest in him. We will have to see what happens.”
The club doubled down on this statement by saying that the plan was for Sigurdsson to travel with them on their US tour as well. You don’t take guys on the verge of being sold overseas for marketing tours so this quelled the rumors for a few hours.
Fast forward to Thursday and things have taken a complete 180. On the heels of a £40m bid plus add-on’s from Leicester City, Sigurdsson has decided not to travel with the team to the United States.
Swansea City posted this on Twitter on Thursday:
Reading between the lines here, it seems more like Sigurdsson would like to stay home in order to be ready in case a bid is accepted while the team is in the United States.
With rumors swirling around Ross Barkley at Everton and Riyad Mahrez at Leicester City it is only a matter of time until a domino falls setting off a chain of events in the transfer market. Sigurdsson likely prefers Everton as a destination due to the possibility of Champions League football but if Leicester throw enough money, anything can happen.
Sigurdsson has three years remaining on his contract and has stayed loyal to the Swans even after their scrape with relegation which will make it tough to pry him away. If Sigurdsson leaves, Swansea will likely be faced with another relegation scrap but with him, they could achieve a mid table finish.
While there is talent on the roster, Sigurdsson is clearly their star man which has led to the exorbitant price tag that has been placed on him. If sold, Swansea will need the funds in order to find a replacement and upgrade other areas of the squad.
The guys below will be travelling to the United States to play in friendlies for Swansea City:
Lukasz Fabianski, Erwin Mulder, Kristoffer Nordfeldt, Kyle Naughton, Angel Rangel, Kyle Bartley, Federico Fernandez, Alfie Mawson, Mike van der Hoorn, Stephen Kingsley, Martin Olsson, Leon Britton, Tom Carroll, Leroy Fer, Jay Fulton, Matt Grimes, Roque Mesa, Modou Barrow, Nathan Dyer, Jefferson Montero, Luciano Narsingh, Wayne Routledge, Jordan Ayew, Tammy Abraham, Oli McBurnie.
Tammy Abraham will be joining the team on July 16th in Raleigh. Notable guys missing out are Fernando Llorente and Ki Sung-Yueng who are both recovering from injuries and Sigurdsson.
