Silly Season round up: From the realistic to the ridiculous

Ah so January is nearly upon us and the rumours are rife.

Rumours always tend to draw excitement from fans as it gives us something to natter about but usually this is only if the rumour is realistic so this leads me to my first United rumour:

Alberto Gilardino to United

Gazzetta dello Sport are reporting that United have approached Fiorentina in view of signing the striker. Alberto Gilardino has scored 5 goals this term for Fiorentina and has a decent goal scoring record at Parma, Milan and current club Fiorentina. This one kind of popped up out of the blue and the fact that Kiko Macheda is being linked with a loan back to Italy gives what I think is essentially nonsense a decent grounding as he has been touted as part of a deal sweetener.

I don’t expect this to happen and I don’t think you’ll find many United fans crying out for this deal to take place and whilst he broke Scouse hearts last season in the Champions League who can forget this?

Lassana Diarra for £12m

I actually like Lassana Diarra decent player, good engine and you always hear Arsenal and Chelsea fans complaining that they shouldn’t have let him go. He’s a realistic target as he shouldn’t be massively expensive and has faced serious competition at Madrid for a starting place. The fact he plays in a position we actually need strengthening adds credibility. One thing I have noticed is fans regard him as a Chelsea, Arsenal and Madrid reject and ‘we don’t sign rejects’. Lets be a bit mature about this I mean we would have all been happy with rejects like Sneijder, Robben or Van der Vaart so if the man can do the job why not?

Here’s an aside though keep him away from Xavi, after the recent El Clasico having been subbed on to deal with Barca and failing, man of the match Xavi offered him the matchball and said “you’ve been chasing it all night so you can hold onto it now.” Cheek & insult!

Others

From being he can leave full stop now it appears Kiko Macheda will only be going out on loan. It’s a possibility and having seen Welbeck and Cleverley benefit this too could be a good idea. Italy is looking like the likely destination with Palermo and Lazio apparently leading the race.

Here’s a funny one, John O’Shea to Wolfsburg! Steve McClaren is said to be interested in the Irish defender having worked with him when he was at the club under Sir Alex. A fee of €7.5m is being touted but realistically I can’t see this happening, looks like we’re lumbered with JOS forever! ( I kid I like Johnny, his goal against Liverpool goes a long way to making up for ANYTHING he has or will do bad in a United shirt)