Savinho has been left out of Manchester City‘s squad for their first game of the new Premier League season as speculation continues over his future.
City will kick off their campaign against Wolves on Saturday afternoon, with Pep Guardiola‘s side looking to regain the Premier League title after losing it to Liverpool last campaign.
They have a bloated squad, and Guardiola has expressed the need for his side to offload players before the transfer window closes – though the winger is not one of the players he is looking to lose.
Spurs are keen on signing Savinho, who moved to City from Girona in Spain a year ago and the move appeals to the 21-year-old winger because he wants to star as a Premier League regular rather than a fringe player in the season with a World Cup at the end.
Daily Mail Sport exclusively revealed that Frederico Moraes of ProManager, Savinho’s agent, left Brazil on Thursday to fly to Europe with a view to further negotiations next week.
Guardiola, meanwhile, revealed on Friday that the youngster would not be part of the side to take on Wolves at Molineux – but cited an injury as the reason for his exclusion.
Savinho has been left out of Manchester City’s squad for the first game of the Premier League season
Pep Guardiola’s side need to sell players from a bloated squad but are reluctant to lose the winger this summer
After being asked whether Savinho would be travelling with the team for the game, Guardiola took a long pause before replying: ‘No. Savinho is injured. Sorry, I didn’t remember. He is injured from Palermo, a few weeks he will be out.’
Spurs boss Thomas Frank wants to sign both Savinho and Crystal Palace’s Eberechi Eze – it is not a case of one of the other. They have different profiles and would fulfil very different roles in the squad if he managed to secure them both.
He is desperately short of creativity with both James Maddison and Dejan Kulusevski injured long term and this was evident from open play in the Super Cup, when the two Spurs goals came from set pieces.
City knocked back an enquiry for the Brazil international, revealed earlier in the week, and are thought to only be entertaining offers of more than £50million.
Were City to do business with Spurs, they would turn their attentions to Real Madrid…