Russell Martin Admits Sulemana Expected To Go

Southampton manager Russell Martin has admitted that Kamaldeen Sulemana expected to be joining a top flight club, either in England or the Continent this summer, but it didn’t quite work out like that with no one matching his release clause price.

Russell Martin has been talking about Kamaldeen Sulemana this week, last season the Ghanian International was not the flop that Tall Paul Onauchu turned out to be, but never really hit top form until the final game of the season when he scored twice against Liverpool.

That may have led him to assume that he had done enough to deserve a move away from St Mary’s to a top division club elsewhere, but that was not the case, as footballleagueworld.co.uk has discovered following statements from Saints manager Russell Martin.

Kamaldeen Sulemana has been conspicuous by his absence in the last few months since Saints returned to pre-season training. There were vague whispers of a mysterious injury suffered in training by the Ghanian, but no real concrete statement was made as to what it was or how long it would take for him to recover, and he has yet to make an appearance for the club this season.

Russell Martin has spoken on the matter.

“I believe Kamaldeen was one of the players who believed he would play in the Premier League or another top league because of the amount of interest in him.”

“But no club ever raised the necessary funds to release Kamaldeen from here.” With that and an injury to deal with in order to get fit, it’s challenging for a young man.

“There are probably still a few [Southampton players] who are frustrated about the transfer window and the information that they were given by certain people outside of the club, and then what actually happens and they end up staying, but if he [Sulemana] is frustrated, he’s been incredible.”

According to footballleagueworld.co.uk, there was interest in Sulemana from Everton in England and Nice, Lille, and Marseille in France, but all resisted using the £30 million release clause in his contract, which Southampton insisted on.

Russell Martin’s words are intriguing in that they appear to imply that Sulemana and others were demanding moves and were not dedicated to the club, but then blames other people, most likely agents, for changing their minds.

He seems to be not only offering Sulemana an olive branch, but smoothing his passage back to the first team and also with the fans by suggesting that the players has “been amazing”

This highlights the problem that Saints had in the summer; many of the squad appeared to believe that they would be in high demand in the summer, but it turned out that the big money moves that their agents told them were on the table weren’t, at least not unless Saints were willing to virtually give the players away, which we now know they refused to do.

Hopefully though Sulemana will now get his head down and work hard as there is undoubtably a player who can play in the Premier League in there, but if he wants to get back to that level either with Southampton or elsewhere then he has to prove to other clubs he is good enough and the way to do that is on the pitch.