Liverpool close in on £120m deal for PSG's Barcola

Liverpool are closing in on the signing of Bradley Barcola from Paris St-Germain for a fee that could rise to £120m.

Sources have indicated to BBC Sport that talks have progressed in the last 48 hours and a full agreement is now close for the France forward.

PSG had valued the 23-year-old at £145m but Liverpool are poised to agree a package that will be worth a minimum of £100m and can rise to £120m based on significant individual and team success.

Barcola is right footed but prefers to play on the left wing and his likely arrival adds further doubt around Cody Gakpo’s future at Anfield.

Multiple sources have told BBC Sport both Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City have shown interest in the Netherlands forward.

Liverpool are also in the market for a right winger, having explored moves for Yankuba Minteh of Brighton and Crystal Palace’s Ismaila Sarr.

The Reds have had offers of £50m and £60m for Gambia winger Minteh rejected by Brighton.

Barcola has become a main target for Liverpool as they look to add potency to their attack following the departures of Luis Diaz and Mohamed Salah in the past two summers.

He moved to PSG from Lyon in 2023 for a reported £38.5m and has won three Ligue 1 titles, two Champions Leagues, the French Cup twice, as well as the Uefa Super Cup and the Fifa Intercontinental Cup.

Barcola, who scored three goals for France in this summer’s World Cup, can also play on the right or through the middle and could provide cover for Alexander Isak as Hugo Ekitike recovers from a serious Achilles injury.

West Brom sign Spanish winger Tunde from Levante

Kareem Tunde made 21 La Liga appearances for Levante last season

West Bromwich Albion have made their eighth summer transfer window signing by bringing in Spanish winger Kareem Tunde from La Liga side Levante on a permanent basis.

Tunde, 21, has signed a four-year deal with James Morrison’s high-flying Championship side.

Albion won their first three games of the season, starting with the Carabao Cup win at Rotherham followed by Championship wins at Norwich and then at home to Burnley last Sunday, but they were defeated by Newcastle in the third round of the Carabao Cup on Wednesday.

In attendance at St James’s Park was Tunde, who watched his new team-mates in action as they were narrowly beaten 3-2. He met the Albion squad for the first time on Thursday.

“This move is a chance for me to experience football and life in a new country and that is something that I’m really looking forward to,” Tunde said.

“I know the group is in a really positive place right now and everyone has been really friendly to me since I arrived.

“I want to help the team by providing assists and scoring goals, and I can’t wait to get started and play in front of our fans.”

Tunde came through the famed La Masia academy in Barcelona, but he broke into first-team football with Levante; last season he made 21 La Liga appearances as the club fought their way to survival and then emerged as a substitute in their opening day defeat at Espanyol on Sunday.

Tunde follows the return of Conor Townsend from Ipswich Town and the additions of goalkeeper Matt Ingram, defender Nolan Galves, midfielders Rabby Nzingoula, Felix Horn Myhre and strikers Barney Stewart and Jimmy-Jay Morgan.

The Baggies face a meeting with last season’s beaten play-off finalists Middlesbrough on Saturday and Tunde could make his debut.

Man City to make offer for £120m-rated Fernandez

Enzo Fernandez has been Chelsea’s vice captain since 2024

Manchester City are set to make an opening offer for Chelsea midfielder Enzo Fernandez

The Argentina international has been identified by manager Enzo Maresca as a player who can bring quality to his midfield after a series of high-profile exits.

Chelsea are aware of City’s interest and set an unofficial deadline for the deal to be completed earlier this summer at a minimum fee of £120m.

Nevertheless, City are expected to return with another attempt to sign the 25-year-old before next week’s transfer deadline.

Fernandez could become one of the most expensive signings in Premier League history, behind only Liverpool’s £125m move for Alexander Isak last summer.

Fernandez maintains a positive relationship with new manager Enzo Maresca, who left Chelsea in controversial fashion on New Year’s Day and moved to Etihad Stadium in June.

It could potentially be the second time City break their transfer record in the same window having paid £116m to recruit Elliot Anderson from Nottingham Forest.

There have also been four major midfield departures, with Tijjani Reijnders sold to Saudi Arabian club Al-Quasiah for £52m, while Barcelona have signed Rodri for £65m, Newcastle have agreed a £52m deal to sign Nico Gonzalez and Bernardo Silva departed earlier in the summer before joining Real Madrid.

It has been a turbulent period for Fernandez at Stamford Bridge, during which he and his agent, former Paris St-Germain midfielder Javier Pastore, courted interest from Real Madrid, only for the Spanish club to issue a statement denying any attempt to sign him.

The situation has been ongoing since Chelsea were knocked out of the Champions League by PSG in March, after which Fernandez became increasingly critical of the club.

New Chelsea manager Xabi Alonso spoke in July about a private conversation he had with Fernandez, who signed for £107m from Benfica in 2023, but declined to disclose details of the discussion.

For Chelsea, their previous record sale was Eden Hazard’s move to Real Madrid in 2019, potentially worth about £150m if performance-related add-ons were triggered.

Tottenham agree loan for Man City's Marmoush

Tottenham have agreed a loan deal to sign Manchester City forward Omar Marmoush, with an obligation to make the deal permanent for £60m next summer.

The 27-year-old Egypt international follows Savio from City to Spurs after the north London club signed the Brazilian for an initial fee of £75m on Tuesday.

Marmoush joined City from Eintracht Frankfurt for £59m last January but had to play second fiddle to Erling Haaland for much of his time at Etihad Stadium.

He was a second-half substitute in City’s 3-0 Community Shield defeat by Arsenal and then an unused substitute in their Premier League opener on Saturday, a 2-1 home win over Bournemouth.

Spurs have already spent more than £312m this summer on transfers.

They have signed Mateus Fernandes from West Ham, Sandro Tonali from Newcastle and Jan Paul van Hecke from Brighton, while defenders Marcos Senesi and Andy Robertson, and goalkeeper Martin Dubravka, have arrived on free transfers.

Marmoush scored 16 goals in 62 appearances in all competitions for City following his move from Frankfurt.

Eight of those came in 36 appearances in 2025-26, but his Premier League involvement fell considerably.

He started only eight league games and played around 700 minutes, fewer than he managed after joining midway through the prior campaign.

His league return was three goals and three assists, with his 3.53 expected goals figure close to his actual scoring output. The issue was therefore not simply finishing.

Marmoush found himself competing for minutes in a side built around Haaland, while City further strengthened their attacking options.

Spurs forward Dominic Solanke has endured injury problems over the past 18 months, while team-mate Richarlison has entered the final year of his contract.

Marmoush is primarily a number nine, but he has rarely been confined to one role across the front line.

At Frankfurt he was used predominantly through the middle but also appeared as a second striker and from the left. City have followed a similar pattern, using him mainly as a central attacker while also deploying him from the flank and just behind another forward.

That flexibility could suit Spurs manager Roberto de Zerbi. His teams have often relied on forwards changing positions, dropping towards the ball and then attacking the space created when opponents are drawn out. Marmoush is comfortable doing both.

Why can't Real Madrid play at Anfield in the Champions League league phase?

Liverpool have hosted Real Madrid in the Champions League’s league phase in each of the last two seasons

Liverpool, Real Madrid, Inter Milan and Arsenal are among the 36 teams that will feature in Thursday’s league phase draw for the 2026-27 Champions League.

The quartet of clubs, who are all multi-time Champions League finalists, will all feature in pot one of the draw. It effectively means they are all in Uefa’s nine best-rated clubs that are featuring in the league phase of this season’s competition.

However, a new rule introduced by Uefa for this season will limit a fixture possibility that affects all four clubs.

The league phase was introduced at the start of the 2024-25, and sees each team play eight times. Those matches consist of eight different opponents, with two coming from each of the four pots. Each team plays a home and away match against a team from each pot.

But starting from this year, a team is not permitted to host a side that they have previously played a league phase home match against in each of the previous two seasons.

Only two potential fixtures meet that criteria ahead of Thursday’s draw. They are Liverpool vs Real Madrid and Inter Milan vs Arsenal.

In the 2024-25 and 2025-26 seasons, Liverpool faced Real Madrid at Anfield. The Reds won both of those matches 2-0 and 1-0 respectively.

Over the same two seasons, Inter have hosted the Gunners. Inter were 1-0 winners two seasons ago, but lost 3-1 last term on Arsenal’s way to reaching their first Champions League final in 20 years.

As posted in paragraph 16.03 of last season’s Champions League regulations, this rule will take effect from this season onwards.

The regulations state: “UEFA administration may determine alternative conditions for the draw in accordance with the principles set by the Club Competitions Committee and may adapt any of the conditions of the draw to avoid deadlock situations and/or take into account any relevant constraints in light of decisions taken by the UEFA Executive Committee.

“The UEFA Club Competitions Committee has determined an additional condition that may be applicable to the UEFA Champions League draw for the 2026/27 season, deciding that any individual fixture between the same two teams may not be repeated in the same competition with the same home team for three consecutive seasons.

“This means that if any teams that already played against each other in the league phase of the UEFA Champions League in the 2024/25 season are again drawn against each other, with the same home team, in the league phase of the UEFA Champions League in this 2025/26 season, those teams will not be able to be drawn against each other with the same home team in the 2026/27 season.”

Thursday’s draw will reveal who plays who, and which teams are home and away. Uefa will ensure that should either fixture happen, Liverpool and Inter Milan respectively would not host those matches.

The new rule does not prohibit clubs from being drawn against each other for three seasons in a row, it just limits clubs being the same home or away team for three consecutive seasons in that fixture.