Carlos Alcaraz: Brentford considering a January move for a long-term aim in the face of Crystal Palace interest
Brentford are still interested in midfielder Carlos Alcaraz, whom they tried to sign before he joined Southampton.
The 20-year-old joined Saints from Racing Club in January and has five goals and two assists in 30 games. Racing Club was approached by Crystal Palace, Brighton, and Everton in January, but Southampton’s £12 million bid completed the deal.
Palace, along with AC Milan and Benfica, revived their interest in the summer, but the player remained with Southampton despite their relegation. Brentford have been monitoring his development in the Championship after the Argentine club inserted a 15% sell-on option into his contract.
His impressive start to the season earned him his first Argentina senior call-up on Thursday. On October 13 and 18, the 2022 World Cup winners will meet Paraguay and Peru in World Cup qualifiers.
Brentford have plenty of central midfielders, but Alcaraz can also play further up the field as an offensive midfielder or false nine. With Mikkel Damsgaard, Kevin Schade, and Josh Dasilva all out, the Bees have less choices in those positions.
Meanwhile, although acknowledging that he is “happy” Rasmus Hojlund is finding scoring form for Manchester United, head coach Thomas Frank is determined to keep him quiet tomorrow.
Hojlund scored twice in Galatasaray’s 3-2 Champions League defeat, and Frank commented, “He’s scoring goals.” I know he’s not playing for Brentford, but I’m Danish, and I’m glad to see a Danish player succeeding.
“I must say, he put in a strong performance against Galatasaray, scoring two excellent goals.” He seemed to be in a decent place. But let’s hope we can keep him quiet! That is the goal. We have to be careful not to give him too much space to run into; he’s swift and adept at timing his runs.”
Frank continued: “We need to see the situations early and try to stop the balls into him — that’s definitely a key area for us.”
Frank stated that defender Ben Mee is the most likely to return among his injured players, adding, “He has a muscle injury.” He’s doing well and is probably the closest to returning.”
