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Archive for the ‘Transfer News’ Category

The transfer window

Friday, July 22nd, 2011

You may have noticed the standards in the Allsvenskan diminish slightly these past few weeks. As I write, clubs from Holland, Denmark and Belgium are pillaging the league and running off with the competition’s best players.

Dutch side FC Utrecht have been the greediest having bought both Alexander Gerndt and Marcus Nilsson from Helsingborg, and Johan Mårtensson from Gais. FC Copenhagen’s new manager Roland Nilsson was expected to clear out his old side Malmö FF and Helsingborg, but so far he has only managed to sign IFK Göteborg’s key defender Ragnar Sigurosson. Mjällby’s Moestafa El Kabir finally makes his long awaiting departure from Sweden and has signed for Serie A side Cagliari. Guillermo Molins has gone to Anderlecht where he’ll join his old MFF teammate Berang Safari, while Örebro defender Michael Almebäck has been bought by rivals Club Brugge. Too broke to pay up now, Glasgow Rangers has signed Örebro’s American midfielder Alejandro Bedoya on a pre-contract that will come into force in November. Even the kids aren’t safe, with Arsenal pouching 16-year old Kristoffer Olsson from IFK Norrköping.

The talent drain won’t stop there either. For Mervan Celik, Mathias Ranegie and Teteh Bangura, leaving is just a matter when and not if.

The flow of talent in the opposite direction is not nearly as rich. Andreas Vasquez returns to Gothenburg after three years in Switzerland, this time signing for BK Häcken. To date Vasquez’s most famous moment was scoring an impressive cross-kick goal from just outside the penalty area back in 2007 when he played for IFK.

The other notable ‘signing’ has been Halmstad’s assistant coach Michael Svensson coming out of retirement and registering as a player. Considering how many goals Halmstad have conceded this season, it’s a move that reeks of desperation.

UPDATE: The chase for AIK’s Tetah Bangura heats up and the longer he stays in Solna, the more ludicrous the rumours. A little over a year ago he was on trial at fourth-tier club Köping, and now he is supposedly being watched by Man U.

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January/February Round Up

Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011

It’s been a long time between blog posts but the silence is probably a fair reflection of the lack of transfer activity in Swedish football. Of the five players I swore would not be playing in Sweden by 1 February, only one actually ended up leaving: Elfsborg’s Denni Avdic was signed by Werder Breman. But apart from that the January transfer window was more notable for the deals that didn’t happen and the players that came back, rather than the players that left.

Juventus was supposedly interested in Alexander Gerndt and Fulham was reportedly keen on Trelleborg keeper Viktor Norling, but apparently neither were interested enough to make a bid. It has been alleged that Schalke 04 made a bid of 25 SEK million for Helsingborg’s Rasmus Jönsson, while Malmö were busy rejecting bids from Germany for Daniel Larsson. The most recent rumours linked Birmingham City to Örebro SK’s American midfielder Alejandro Bedoya, but even if that’s true, they’ll have to wait until July now.

In fact the talent was arguably flowing in the other direction. The biggest name to return to Swedish football was David Elm, who along with his brothers Viktor and Rasmus, was integral to Kalmar’s title winning team in 2008. David had spent the past two seasons with Fulham struggling to get a game outside of the League Cup, and will be returning to play for Elfsborg. Joining him will be Lasse Nilsson, who also returns to Sweden after an unsuccessful spell in Europe.

The transfer window also saw a number of players return to their original clubs: Martin Mutumba is back at AIK, Sharbel Touma to Syrianska, and Dioh Williams to Häcken. Most remarkably of all, Wanderson do Carmo could well be returning to GAIS nine months after signing for Saudi Arabian outfit Al-Ahli Jeddah. It turns out the club can only sign three foreign players and since Wanderson has struggled since arriving last summer, they’re looking to loan him out to make room for another foreigner. They’re even prepared to pay 95% of his wages to make it happen, meaning Gais can potentially retain one of their better players over the past few seasons, retain the transfer fee from selling him, and save on the wages they initially used to pay him. What’s not to like if you’re a Gaisare?

On a sadder note, January also saw a number of veterans leave the game, either retiring or demoted to lower divisions. Teddy Lucic, a former Swedish international with 86 caps and three World Cups, retired. Despite being one of the Allsvenskan’s best players last season, Helsingborg did not offer 36 year-old Marcus Lantz a new contract. In fact no Allsvenskan club offered him a contract, and he’ll spend 2011 playing under former teammate Henrik Larsson at Landskrona. Per ‘Texas’ Johansson, who has been at Halmstad for the past ten years, was also denied a new contract and will now play for Superettan side Falkenberg FF. AIK veteran Daniel Tjernström looked destined to join them in the lower leagues with AIK reluctant to renew his contract, but he was eventually convinced to lower his wages enough to be granted one more year.

Finally, the most interesting transfer activity has been taking place in unfashionable Halmstad, suggesting they could be a club to watch in 2011. New Spanish manager Josep Clotet Ruiz, who last season was an assistant coach at Malmö FF, cannot be accused of not being ambitious as he has been off borrowing players from Real Madrid! In this day and age it is very rare for clubs of this stature to have any contract with Swedish football unless they’re looking to snatch child prodigies from youth academies. Yet being Spanish has obviously helped Ruiz to snare Real Madrid’s Zamora, Raul Ruiz and Javi on loan. Sure, they’re all youth players, but you’d think that anyone deemed good enough to be on Real Madrid’s books is going to star in the league like the Allsvenskan? Along with singings Ivan Diaz (also a former Real Madrid youth player) and Nauzet Perez, Ruiz has given Halmstads BK a very distinct Spanish ambience that could prove exciting to watch.

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The Window Reopens

Tuesday, June 29th, 2010

One of the unheralded bonuses of a World Cup is that it gives football fans and the media something to focus on in the preseason. In non-World Cup/European Championship years, we’re forced to spend the summer listening to tedious will he/won’t he transfer gossip, 95% of which ends up amounting to nothing. Despite the Fabergas-Barcelona story (or more accurately non-story) occasional rearing its head, we’ve pretty much been allowed to focus on actual football. But this Thursday the transfer window opens up again and it won’t be long until we’re reduced to gossiping like schoolgirls.

For the Allsvenskan, this is one of two times in the year where the league gets robbed of its meagre talents. Clubs from the rest of Europe, most notably Holland, will use their inflated wealth to buy up players at will, not unlike Scandinavians buying up alcohol on international ferries.

The first player to get poached has been Elfsborg’s Emir Bajrami, who was bought by FC Twente back in May. Bajrami’s 30 million kronor price tag is the highest for an Allsvenskan player since Ajax forked out 80 million kronor for Zlatan Ibrahimovic back in 2001.

Bajrami’s teammate Denni Avdic is also likely to tread the well-worn path between the Eredivisie and the Allsvenskan. With 12 goals Avdic is the competition’s most productive goal scorer, and like Bajrami he has managed to force himself into the Swedish national team. Other talented young Swedes who are also likely to picked up include Malmö’s Guillermo Molins, Kalmar’s Tobias Eriksson, Häcken’s Tom Söderberg, Trelleborg’s Viktor Noring, and BP’s Miiko Albornoz.

Being the standout team thus far this season, Helsingborg’s squad will no doubt attract some unwanted attention, and they may struggle to hang onto talented youngsters Joel Ekstrand, Rasmus Jönsson and Marcus Nilsson.

As was the case last winter, most of the media attention will be on Gais’ Wanderson do Carmo. This was an ongoing transfer saga last winter too, and it is quite remarkable that he hasn’t bee bought already. Wanderson wants to leave, Gais want to sell him, and there are plenty of clubs who want to buy him…you can’t get conditions more conducive for a transfer. And yet when the winter break passed, nothing had happened apart from a meek last-minute bid by Feyenoord, which quickly collapsed when their cheque bounced.

One would imagine Gais would be looking to finalise a deal quickly this time around, yet the rumour mill has been unusually quiet and I personally wouldn’t put it past the Gais board to once again fail to sell the competition’s most saleable player. If Arsene Wenger wants to keep Fabergas, maybe he should be taking notes.

IFK keeper Kim Christensen, obviously disappointed to have been overlooked for the Danish World Cup squad, has moved to FC Copenhagen in the hope that playing in the capital might help him get noticed by selectors. Örebro’s big target man Kim Olsen has also decided to return to Denmark. AIK’s turbulent season continues with the squad haemorrhaging players. Over the summer the club have lost Miran Burgic, Jorge Ortiz and Martin Mutumba, while Sebastián Eguren returns to Villareal.

All this before the transfer window has even officially opened.

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The January Transfer Window in Sweden

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

At midnight last night the international transfer window closed shut and thus ended the pillaging of Swedish football for at least another five months. Whenever a transfer window opens up, the Allsvenskan sees its best players pouched by clubs in Holland, Germany and England, and more recently Denmark and Norway too.

This year AIK were the biggest victims, losing the core of their premiership winning side. Iván Obolo returned to his native Argentina, Jos Hooiveld was sold to Glasgow Celtic for £2 million; Goalkeeper Daniel Örlund is now at Rosenborg BK, while out of contract Markus Jonsson is currently off selling himself around Europe and will likely sign for a Greek or Turkish club soon.

Brommapojkarna’s Philip Haglund was bought by Dutch side Heerenveen, and Helsingborg’s Andreas Landgren went to Udinese. But on a brighter note, other promising young Swedes, Malmö’s Guillermo Molins and Elfsborg’s Emir Bajrami, have remained.

None of these deals are particularly surprising. Ivan Obolo was being linked to other clubs before the season even started. In fact the only unexpected news is about a player who didn’t get sold: Gais’ Wanderson do Carmo. He was the competition’s equal highest goal scorer and arguably the player of the year. He wants to leave Gais. Gais are desperately poor: they want to sell. If rumours are to be believed there are no shortage of clubs interested, including Ajax, Feyenoord, and most unbelievably Chelsea. (Although I personally find his last one highly dubious.) And yet, despite these prime selling conditions, no sale took place and as I write this Wanderson is still a Gaisare.

A last minute deal with Feyenoord feel through due to the club’s financial problems, and no other offers were forth coming before deadline. As this is Sweden’s preseason, their transfer window will remain open until the end of March. The only other leagues that will continue trading are those whose seasons also run through the summer: Russia, Norway, Finland and Iceland. In the next two months Swedish clubs can continue to trade with one another and amongst clubs from the above four countries. If Wanderson does leave Gais before July, when the next window opens up, at this stage it is most likely to be to Russia, Norway or the Middle East.

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