Starboy and the skipper: destinations in a midfield scramble

Bellingham! Rice! Lavia! Caicedo! JWP! It's hot girl summer! Except all the girls are ball-playing number sixes.

Romeo Lavia, trying to kiss all the boys during his hot girl summer.

The market for ball-playing sixes is HOT this summer. Really hot. In fact if the number six market were weather, it would actually be last summer. Except last summer was all about number nines: Haaland, Darwin, Jesus. This summer is all about spines: Bellingham, Rice, Caicedo, Lavia, Tonali, Phillips, Kovacic and Ward-Prowse are all out, with their guns out, burning up the parks and leaving them all wilted and yellow. Not only are selling clubs out in force, but so are the buyers. All of the top six apart from Spurs, plus Newcastle, are in the market for a progressive no. 6, and most want to make marquee signings. Not squad players, but lynchpins, players who promise to be their engine for years to come. The implications for Saints are clear. There’s never a bad time to have Romeo Lavia and James Ward-Prowse on long contracts, but summer 2023 is a very, very good time.

Let’s look at the suitors. For several seasons now, Liverpool have been courting Jude Bellingham with all the subtlety of Nadine Dorries chasing a peerage. They failed to make the top four with a planet-sized hole in their midfield and Bellingham signed for Madrid. Arsenal have been floating around Declan Rice for ages in a similar way. With Xhaka set to leave and Partey stretched to manage a whole season, Arteta is searching for depth, and for that rare, elusive thing separates smiling silver medallists from teams that challenge Man City. For the first time in at least 15 years Arsenal are a genuinely exciting project, and have usurped Liverpool as City's most attractive rival. Rice’s arrival has been fêted for months. But in rare show of force, City have tabled a bid - having already signed Mateo Kovacic and cast doubt on the future of Kalvin Phillips, who could also make a late entry to the market. It was telling that Arsenal reportedly sent bids for Timber and Havertz on the same day as Rice. Everyone and their mums know Rice is their top target, but it's a cute way of signalling that he's not their only concern. Casemiro has been a revelation at United, but with 62 years between him and Eriksen they aren't exactly the future of the team. Neither are McFred. I… have no idea what Chelsea’s transfer strategy or requirements are. Stamford Bridge appears to be a clearing house for the Saudi Pro League. Todd Boehly is running round like a dog with two dicks and I dare not guess who he might sign, but they will certainly be active. In City-esque fashion, Newcastle have wrapped up their business quickly and quietly with a £70m move for Sandro Tonali. West Ham will need to replace Declan Rice.

Anyway Saints. Romeo Lavia is such a beautiful curveball into this market. Bellingham was supposed to be the top prize this summer, long destined for Liverpool. Now on paper it’s Declan Rice, a legitimate position, but you have to wonder if Lavia might be preferred if people had had more time to adjust their expectations. Rice is stylistically distinct from Lavia too, who is actually more similar in profile to Bellingham, an interesting comparison when you consider their shared inheritance but starkly different pathways. Both are nineteen years old, progressive, technical, ball-carrying sixes that thrive on tight spaces. But whereas Bellingham became teenage sensation by swapping Birmingham for Dortmund at seventeen, Lavia was cooped up in the City academy until last season. Had they not had such different trajectories, how might we compare them? Bellingham is a generational talent, the pick of the draft, without question. But I suspect the gap is smaller than people might think.

Jude Bellingham, officially the hottest girl this summer.

As it is, Bellingham’s departure and Lavia’s late entry have blown the market apart, instigating a scramble for the Belgian, undercutting other deals and the price of other targets. After 26 appearances, Lavia has been credibly and seriously linked with Chelsea, Arsenal, United and Liverpool. His father met with United representatives in March, and Chelsea actually bid £50m on deadline day in January, on Joe Shields advice. Arsenal are presently the most advanced, having a verbal agreement with the player and a bid in the works for 15 days now, an important contingency if Man City pip them to Declan Rice. Having lost Bellingham, Liverpool have enquired about the conditions of Lavia's leash back to City. Meanwhile, Brighton have been strutting around for two seasons telling anyone who will listen that they don't have to take any deal for Caicedo they don't want. This is the sacred right of the club who are presently best of the rest, and I remember well how bullish Saints were when it were us, but unfortunately they are no longer the only game in town. Chelsea have reportedly told them flatly that they will not meet their £80m asking price, and the Mirror reports that Lavia has moved ahead of Caicedo in Arsenal's thinking.

It's quite remarkable then, that the Southampton centre-mid who is most in demand isn't called James Ward-Prowse. That would have seemed unfathomable 12 months ago. I don't see starboy and the skipper as strictly rival products in this market, but the contrast in their prospects is stark. The most enticing thing about Lavia is his ceiling. He could start for a top six side tomorrow, but performing as he is at nineteen there's no telling how much further he could go. Ward-Prowse is a fantastic footballer but very clearly at his peak. He was never a player who ever promised he could reach the level that he has, but through sheer graft, has gradually honed himself, season by season, into a first-rate Premier League midfielder. This is to his credit, but isn’t suggestive of a player who still has room to grow.

James Ward-Prowse, looking quite hot, but not as hot as last summer, when he was super hot. He is staring into your eyes, trying to see his future.

His contract situation is complicated by the change in circumstances. In 2021, Ward-Prowse signed a new five-year deal, of which the subtext was: “Give us control of your exit, and we'll make you the best paid player in the club's history. If a club offering Champions League football comes in, and the fee is good, we won't stand in your way. If not, you stay and pass into Southampton folklore”. To add to the intrigue, The Athletic’s reporting initially implied the inclusion of a clause to this effect in the contract itself. Later that day, this detail mysteriously disappeared from the article.

This seemed like a sensible deal for all parties at the time, when a move to the top-six was a very real prospect. However when summer 2022 came and went, it felt like that ship had sailed. Twelve months later, the beleaguered captain has been dragged into the Championship by a broken team and the top six have moved on to bigger fish. Brentford, Newcastle, West Ham and Aston Villa have all been linked, but you sense that we’re courting them, rather than they us, as with Lavia. Ask a Saints fan twelve months ago and they’d tell you upwards of £50m was non-negotiable. £30m now seems more likely, £25m or less would be hard to swallow. But the question remains: who exactly is paying?

Last season, a big reflection of mine as we limped towards relegation was that many fans seemed to feel that we simply didn't deserve a talent like Lavia. Southampton were so nakedly terrible that his obvious class seemed grotesquely out of place. In a different way, there is a feeling that we do not deserve Ward-Prowse either. Neither player has outgrown us, but we have shrunk, debased ourselves to the point we feel we don't deserve to hold onto them. But whereas the sky’s the limit for Lavia, and I'm happy for him, Ward-Prowse's loyalty could have priced him out of an exit.

P.S. Apologies that I’ve been quiet for a couple of months. I'm not having a hot girl summer. I’m trying to finish my PhD and get on the academic job market. Come the start of the season I should have a bit more time to blog.

---