Keane speculation moves on
This weekend has seen a lot of speculation regarding our central defender Michael Keane and a potential £10 million bid from Leicester City.
It isn’t just one national newspaper who have carried the story; at least three to my knowledge have been consistent with it. That suggests there might be more to it than had it just been seen in one publication, but there certainly hadn’t been any mention of it by the Leicester press.
That was until this morning when the Leicester Mercury covered the story. They have reported that Claudio Ranieri, who is close to completing the signing of Sporting Gijon defender Luis Hernandez, wants more defensive options for the Premier League Champions next season who will be playing in the Champions League for the first time.
The Mercury’s belief is that it remains unknown whether they have yet taken it as far as making an offer for Keane but they do understand that he is on their wish list, and that comes as no surprise given the number of times they had him watched last season.
Keane, of course, has previously played for Leicester during a loan from Manchester United. His first ever league start came for them in a 0-0 draw at Bolton in November 2012 and he went on to make 22 appearances for them, scoring two goals.
£10 million sounds a lot, but it very definitely isn’t for a young player of Keane’s calibre, a player who has now made exactly 100 league starts in his career with 61 of those for the Clarets since he first arrived at Turf Moor in August 2014, initially on loan.
It’s difficult to speculate what might happen should Leicester make an offer and push us to a level where a bid is acceptable. Do we really want to sell him? What would be acceptable? And more importantly, would Keane want to go to another Premier League club, giving up his position at Burnley where he is all but guaranteed to be in the starting eleven?
Meanwhile, there is no news on any incoming players although David Baldwin did confirm this week that we are working hard on deals and that we should watch this space.
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