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Goalkeeper Link Highlights Media Speculation Overkill

Saints have been linked with a big money move for Manchester City's Angus Gunn, but why would the club want to pay big money given their current goalkeeping situation.

Saints are being touted in the press as being interested in signing Manchester City Goalkeeper Angus Gunn who spent last season on loan at his Father's previous club Norwich City.

At 22 Gunn despite being called up to the England squad last November has never got near a game in the first team for City, nor is he likely too it seems, his only experience being his games in the Championship for Norwich City last season, but it is being suggested that a £15 million deal to St Mary's could be in the offing.

On the face of things this looks to be absurd, only yesterday the club announced that Alex McCarthy had signed a four year deal and of course there is the matter of Fraser Forster, in the goalkeeping department at least Saints seem to be well served by these two who have both shown that they are good enough for the Premier League.

So unless Fraser Forster goes and the issue here might well be his wages meaning that only a loan move could be viable till he has shown he has got his confidence back, then why would Saints want Gunn ?

But more to the point why would Gunn want to come to Saints, at his age he will be looking for first team football or at least the chance of it and that won't happen unless one of our two goalkeepers goes.

This highlights how the media is now saturated with stories put out by agents to stimulate interest in their clients by suggesting that certain Premier League clubs are interested in their clients.

Saints due to their standing over the past five seasons are a club noted for their ability to spot talent and therefore a club that others look to emulate, that image might have been tarnished a little by performances last season, but overall the club is seen as one of the top half clubs in the Premier League, if an agent can give the impression that his client is linked with us, it will make other clubs prick up their ears and perhaps make a bid themselves which in turn will push up the price and indeed the wages of the player concerned.

Social media is a big player in this, it reposts and rehashes stories so that suddenly Angus Gunn a player that few outside of Norwich City and the Championship clubs they played had heard of, now suddenly appears to be one of the hottest goalkeeping prospects in the country.

In turn this leads to supporters griping that their club has failed to sign a player that they actually had no interest in in the first place.

Only time will tell whether Saints actually have been monitoring Gunn, the problem is these days it is virtually impossible to tell where a rumour has started and indeed how much truth is actually in it.

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