Youri Tielemans says the way he walked around the field at the King Power Stadium, applauding the fans, on the last day of the season, wasn’t proof he is departing Leicester City…
The Belgian sparked rumours galore, including here in his home country, that he could be Anfield bound – as the most obvious Gini Wijnaldum replacement, with the Dutchman moving to PSG on a Bosman.
But Tielemans says it was essentially just miscommunication.
“It was all a big misunderstanding,” he said, reported by journalist Kristoff Terreur.
“Apparently it had been agreed to make a lap of honour with the team. Only: I didn’t know anything about it. When I saw my teammates walk in, I didn’t understand it…
“Afterwards it turned out that they were just gathering inside, but I thought at that point: what a shame for the fans. Just when they were allowed back in the stadium and we had the chance to give them something back. I decided to go and applaud them on my own.”
Tielemans is excellent and at 24, the perfect age to make a big transfer to an elite club.
Jurgen Klopp and Michael Edwards love signing players around this bracket, in fact, but we think the midfielder will simply be too expensive.
He’d cost the same kind of money as Alisson and Virgil van Dijk, and we only spend that on true, elite game-changers – while with Fabinho, Jordan Henderson and Thiago, Tielemans wouldn’t be an automatic starter next term.
The smart money is on Florian Neuhaus.