With an incredibly chaotic summer of transfers about to begin under head coach Paolo Di Canio and director of football Roberto De Fanti, rumours were circulating as to who would be the next barely-known player to walk through the door at the Stadium of Light.
With deals for defender Modibo Diakité, Swiss midfielder Cabral, French defender Valentin Roberge and French midfielder El-Hadji Ba having already been set up, reports on this day eleven years ago suggested that Sunderland were eying up a loan deal for a young Manchester City striker.
Swedish international John Guidetti had spent the previous season battling a virus but before that, he was on loan at Feyenoord in the Eredivisie, where he scored a total of twenty goals for the Dutch side.
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With City chasing Napoli’s Edinson Cavani, Aston Villa’s Christian Benteke and Fiorentina’s Stevan Jovetić, it felt as though it would be difficult for Guidetti to make inroads towards the first team during 2013/2014.
Reports on this day were suggesting that due to Guidetti’s links with our director of football, there was a distinct possibility that the Swede could end up on Wearside, where regular game time would be on offer to him.
The Wearside outfit’s incoming director of football, Roberto De Fanti, moves to the north east with a background as a FIFA-licensed agent, and one of his clients is Guidetti.
And the twenty one year-old forward is facing an important chapter in his career, knowing that he’s unlikely to be involved in too many of Manchester City’s Premier League matches next season.
City handed him a new contract last October which ties him to the Etihad Stadium until 2015, so any club wishing to buy him would have to pay somewhere close to £5 million.
That may seem inflated for a player who spent the majority of last season sidelined with the virus which attacked his nervous system after he was forced to miss out on appearing for his country at Euro 2012.
A player of Guidetti’s potential calibre would’ve been seen as an upgrade for Di Canio’s side, given the lack of striking options at our disposal during 2012/2013.
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Having also been linked with Jozy Altidore and Livorno’s Paulinho, there was some excitement surrounding the continental names that seemed to be on our radar.
Alas, in the case of Guidetti, a knee injury curtailed any potential moves for the striker later in the summer.
In January 2014, he moved to Stoke City, where he only made six appearances without making an impression- matching the performance of Di Canio as Sunderland boss during the 2013/2014 season!
