Roy Hodgson admits Crystal Palace face a fight to keep Michael Olise at the club amid links suggesting the winger could move to Manchester City this summer.
A vacancy on the flank in attack has appeared in Pep Guardiola’s squad after Riyad Mahrez departed to Al-Ahli in Saudi Arabia for a £30m transfer fee. It means City could dip into the market as a result.
Links emerged towards the end of last week suggesting that both Chelsea and City have an interest in the winger, who is said to have a release clause of £35m in his Selhurst Park deal. However, it is unclear how concrete the interest from the Etihad Stadium club is at this stage.
The France under-21 international is set to miss the beginning of the new season with a hamstring injury. But with the loss of Wilfried Zaha too, Hodgson admits clubs are “circling” around Olise and that Palace face a fight to keep him.
Speaking to London News Online, Hodgson said: “We have a fight on our hands to make sure he stays with us. We had two outstanding wingers who were almost the best in the league – Michael Olise on the right side and Wilf on the left. We don’t have Wilf anymore – clubs are circling around Olise.
“We’ve lost five senior players from last season and brought one in – Jefferson Lerma. He’s good and we’re happy to have him in – but there is still that hole of five senior players in the squad, two of whom were two of the real stars of the team.
“There’s a bit of work for the chairman and sporting director to do between now and the end of August, because the team we put out today was in our opinion, at this moment in time, our best team, but we don’t have the strength behind that team that we had last year.”
