Have any players impressed you at this World Cup?
Posted on June 20th, 2010 | 148 Comments |
Granted it is still early in the day when I am writing this, and The Sunday Sun are yet to release there next big hitting headline, but everyone seems to be swept away with the World Cup, and in particular what is going on behind the scenes in the England camp.
The latest on the Newcastle transfer front is that we can expect some signings in the next few weeks. But who? Hughton has said that he will be careful to make sure that whoever arrives on Tyneside over the summer will fit in with what we already have. So with that in mind I have been looking at the World Cup and thinking about players that could do a job for Newcastle next season.
First up for me is Cameroonian midfielder Stephane M’bia. Although Cameroon have been eliminated from the World Cup, M’bia has impressed me both thimes I have watched him so far this tournament. Primarily a centre-back, although he did feature at right-back in their opeining game, M’bia currently struts his stuff for French side Oympique Marseille.
We were rumoured to be close to signing him once before when Joe Kinnear was in charge of us, although inevitably nothing came of it. In all reality, M’bia would cost far to much for the club to even contemplate a move for him. I wasn’t aware until I researched this, but the player is rated at over £10 million, which rules us straight out of the running in my opinion. Ah well.
For those who are unaware of who he is, he was the one who was crying his eyes out when the North Korean national anthem was being played before the Brazil game. Dubbed as the Wayne Rooney of North Korea, Jong Tae-Se has already been monitored by English clubs. In fact Blackburn Rovers were heavily linked with the player back in January.
He currently plays his football in the J-League and so would probably be available for a reasonable price, and what attracted me to him was the passion, commitment and a fair bit of skill on show from the striker – and that was against Brazil!
So those are the two players that stand out for me so far, although I have heard a bit of tubthumping about someone called Lionel Messi, who looks alright I suppose, but I somehow doubt very much that we are in the market for him!
So I guess the question is, apart from the usual suspects, who are the players that have caught your eye so far?
There was quite a few Japan players that impressed me actually, like Okubo, and i guess those could be bought for a pack of cigaretes.