Spurs watching £25.48m Brazilian striker


TRANSFER TALK


The Daily Star are suggesting that Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal have only just joined Liverpool in the race for 24-year-old (25 in March) Gremio striker Luan Vieira. Barcelona, Manchester United, Juventus, Espanyol and Leicester City have been reported as tracking the talented Brazilian.

Whoscored list him as having played 15 games as a centre-forward (3 goals, 1 assist), 3 games as a central attacking midfielder (1 goal, 1 assist), 3 games as an attacking left-sided midfielder, 2 games as a left-sided forward (1 assist), 1 game as an right-sided attacking midfielder (2 goals) and 1 game as a right-sided midfielder.

The new season has just started in South America and he has played 1 Libertadores game in which he opened his scoring for the season.

I think it is safe to say he is a versatile player, which as we know, Pochettino likes as it helps cover for injuries as we have seen this season with Son Heung-min taking over from Harry Kane or Victor Wanyama playing in defence.

The same website list his weaknesses as crossing and aerial duels and his strengths as long range shooting, passing, through balls, dribbling and key passes. He might also need to improve his physicality for the Premier League, being a slight chap.

Website FourFourTwo have a scouting report on him which suggests he "can dribble with the ball at a fast pace. Confuses defenders with split-second changes in direction. Pure magic in his feet. Luan is everywhere on the pitch and he’s happy to set up goals as well as score them."

The truth is both clubs will have already done their homework on him and will have been scouting him for a while. You don't suddenly start watching a player in April you want to sign in the summer. You can't build up a picture of him in that time, you need to see him react to adversity and in different situations and you can't tell all of that through watching a game on video.

The story comes from TMW who say we are interested in him, they don't say we have just become interested in him, that is a press invention and an example of how easy it is to misrepresent.

The Italian website suggests a fee of £12.75 million (€15m - AUS$21.25m - US$15.93m) might be enough to tempt Gremio to sell. Last August Brazilian radio station Futebol da Gaucha suggested that Liverpool had made a £30m (€35.30m - AUS$49.97m - US$37.50m) bid.

Spanish newspaper Mundo Deportivo once called him the ‘new Neymar’ and back in August a report in his home country Brazil suggested Gremio wanted £38.22 million (€45m - AUS$63.68m - US$47.77m), reducing to £25.48 million (€30m - AUS$42.45m - US$31.85m) in January.

The reason for the reduction in fee is that his contract expires in September 2018 and the Italians have been unable to convince him t sign another. Meanwhile, his agent is actively seeking a move to a bigger club in Europe for his client.

Gremio vice-president Alberto Guerra said at the time of the Liverpool bid in August that he would analyse any offer that came in.

"Every good player is targeted. If a proposal arrives, we will analyse."