Millwall’s 2024/25 Championship campaign has already begun and whilst most eyes this week would have been on the League Cup clash with Portsmouth at Fratton Park, plenty in The Lions fanbase will have remained purely focused on squad strengthening in the summer transfer window.
With a storied playing career for us, 47 year old Neil Harris again returned to The Den as a permanent gaffer back in the second half of last season, and he again recently made no bones about the fact that he knew that he needed to strengthen his first team options and that he fully expected the club to back him in doing just that.
Although the Cup clash will take precedence for a good few hours, this week has again seen rumour mill action on potential targets for us, and there seems to be a groundswell of speculation over our reported interest in Middlesbrough striker Josh Coburn. For those who like a flutter and use PowerPlay Canada, there will no doubt be a plethora of odds available when it comes to us potentially completing this deal, and for Canadian based fans who faithfully follow the club they will undoubtedly be well over those odds, as well as the action on the pitch, and the transfer rumours off it.
The 21 year old has made 53 appearances (17 starts) for the Riverside outfit having come through their Academy ranks, returning 11 goals but injury interrupted his progress in the second half of last season.
A loan spell out with Bristol Rovers in 2022/23 saw a return of ten goals in 29 starts.
Despite the speculation linking a number of second tier clubs with having an interest in him, he remains involved under Michael Carrick though and he is on record as talking the player up, so if Harris does have a real interest in him, this might be a deal that takes until deadline day before it fully goes through.
Again though, Harris has made no secret of the fact that he wants to add to our frontline options and Coburn’s pace and physicality would be an obvious bonus to his options.
He is not the only player we are now being heavily linked with this week though, young Celtic midfielder Daniel Kelly is back in the headlines, and it seems that we could well now be favourites to secure his signature.
The 18 year old midfielder is out of contract at Parkhead at the turn of next year, and he has reportedly been frozen out of first team affairs by manager Brendan Rodgers after rejecting the new contract offer that they put on the table for him, and has been exiled to their B team in effect in the Lowland League, despite seriously beginning to impress last season in their first team.
The player apparently has a number of options, and even German Bundesliga side Bayer Leverkusen have been named as one of the European sides casting their eyes over him, but if the talk is true, we are now considered to be in pole position and his most likely destination.
Whether that is true or not, time will tell, but it does seem to be clear from Rodgers’ own words that Kelly’s time at the club has now come to an end and he sounded quite frustrated by it, so if we do manage to secure his signature this month (or in the January transfer window when he is a free agent), if they are disappointed to lose him, it could bode very well indeed for us.
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