Youngster signs for Irish club
Sunderland academy product James Talbot has found a new club, with the young goalkeeper signing for League of Ireland side Bohemians FC.
Bohs manager Keith Long was happy to bring the Irish youth international to the club ahead of the new season starting in February:
James gives us a different profile as a goalkeeper. I believe he will come in and prove to be a very good acquisition for us.
He’d five years’ schooling at Sunderland. He’s extremely talented and he’s a local boy too.
There were high hopes for James at Sunderland where he came through with Jordan Pickford. He’s hungry to come in and prove himself.
Success for Seb
Seb Larsson moved back to Sweden in the summer when his one-year deal with Hull City expired as the former Sunderland player joined AIK.
That move has been a huge success for the midfielder, as he has helped the Stockholm based club win the Allsvenkan for the first time in nine years.
Robin Jansson clinched the title for AIK as he scored on the stroke of half-time in a 1-0 win at Kalmar. Once the final whistle went and the championship was won, the visiting fans went a bit crazy.
AIK fans are preeeeeetty chuffed about winning the Swedish league for the first time since 2009. pic.twitter.com/2duOWvXfdv
— MUNDIAL (@MundialMag) November 11, 2018
Speaking after the game, Larsson said winning the title is exactly why he chose to return to Sweden:
Wonderful, this is why I came home, to experience this, I felt the ambition of AIK as a club, and even if we’ve taken it slowly but surely the last few games no-one can complain, we deserve this.
Price hike for Mavrias
Former Sunderland winger Charis Mavrias signed for Scottish Premiership side Hibernian recently, athough has so far been restricted to being an unused substitute as he looks to build up his fitness.
After signing for Sunderland in 2013 for a fee of £2.5m, the Greek international struggled for playing time at the Stadium of Light and was ultimately released without making much of an impact - other than a goal against Kidderminster in the FA Cup third round.
Despite not getting a return on their investment, it has emerged that Sunderland could have got Mavrias for much less than the fee they forked out for. According to reports in Greece, the board of Panathinaikos only wanted €1m for the player but were successfully convinced by the technical director of the Greek club - and the former Newcastle United defender - Nikos Dabizas that we would pay three times that amount.
Target signs new deal
Jack Ross had hoped to sign out of favour Celtic forward Ryan Christie during the summer transfer window but was unable to complete a deal due to the uncertain future surrounding Papy Djilobodji and Didier Ndong:
Ryan obviously isn’t playing much at Celtic at the moment, though he did come off the bench in a league game at the weekend.
He’ll have interest from elsewhere and we’re not in position where we can do anything immediately. That may be problematic for us as these hours wounds down. It may not be, things could change [with Ndong and Djilobodji].
There’s been dialogue with clubs so we could potentially move something forward quite quickly.
That appearance off the bench has now turned into regular appearances, as Christie has taken his chance with Brendan Rodgers’ side, scoring three times in the last five games.
That fine form has seen him rewarded with a new three-year deal at Celtic Park and the 21-year-old said Rodgers gave him hope of a future with the Scottish champions:
I spoke to the manager early last week and he let me know that he definitely saw a path for me at this club and that’s all I really needed to know.