Southampton striker Manolo Gabbiadini has been a feature on the summers rumour mill with a fair bit of speculation linking him with a move away from St Mary’s Stadium and a possible return to Italy.
Talk of him leaving the club mostly hinges on his poor goal return last season given the marked contrast in form following his arrival. A reported £14.5million deal with Napoli in January 2017 saw him score six times in 12 appearances but his goals came in a flurry and then he went on a barren run. That continued in 2017/18 as in 33 appearances he only found the back of the net five times.
Some fans take it as proof he’s not designed for the Premier League and want to see us cash in on him and move on, others believe it’s all down to service and are expecting a much better return under Mark Hughes this year and they lean on the goal he scored this pre-season against Jiangsu Suning and the role new capture Stuart Armstrong played.
The assumption being Armstrong will now play creator for him.
For those fans in the latter camp a report in Tuttomercatoweb will make pleasant reading as they quote Silvio Pagliari talking to Sky Sports Italia, and Gabbiadini’s agent insists he’s going nowhere this window as he wants to put his poor performances last year right.
“Gabbiadini definitely stays at Southampton, and we have to overturn last year’s performance in which we did not do very well. Team suffered a lot: a few goals, a very strange championship despite being very strong.”
