Premier League Bosman List : Dimitar Berbatov, Didier Drogba & all the players available for free

With less than two months to go until the January transfer window opens, Premier League clubs are now having to decide whether to keep hold of some of their star players or risk losing them for free next summer.

Didier Drogba, Nicolas Anelka and Jose Bosingwa are among five first-team players at Chelsea whose contracts expire at the end of the season, and manager Andre Villas-Boas could decide to cash in on some of his fringe players in the new year.

Dimitar Berbatov is also out of contract in the summer, though Manchester United hold the right to extend the player's deal by a further year. But with Paris Saint-Germain being linked with a move for the Bulgarian, the Red Devils will need to exercise the clause before he is allowed to discuss a summer switch in January.

Arsenal's Tomas Rosicky and Fulham's Andy Johnson may also be on the move if they cannot agree fresh contracts with their clubs, while time is running out for Blackburn Rovers and Bolton Wanderers to tie top-four targets Junior Hoilett and Gary Cahill down to new deals.

With a number of players in England's top flight out of contract next summer, Goal.com runs through a club-by-club guide of who could be moving on in the coming months.

Jonathan Woodgate is proud to be part of Stoke's renaissance

By JOE BERNSTEIN

Jonathan Woodgate is proud to be a Stoke City player, but as someone who once shared a dressing room at Real Madrid with the likes of Zinedine Zidane, Raul and David Beckham, he does not buy into the notion that the Premier League's toughest team bear comparison with Barcelona.

'We wouldn't get a kick, would we?' he says, raising his eyebrows at Gary Neville's suggestion that Stoke put opponents under pressure in much the same way as the likes of Messi, Iniesta and Xavi.

'That is not being disrespectful to Stoke, but how would we get the ball? Teams like Barca are in a different league. They keep the ball against elite teams. Look what they did against Manchester United in the Champions League final, and United are the best in England.

'If Zidane and Roberto Carlos had come to the Britannia Stadium, I know they'd have just puffed their chests out and gone out to be the best players on the pitch. Big players have winning mentalities.' 

At 31, Woodgate's horizons expanded long ago beyond the Middlesbrough suburb of Nunthorpe, where he grew up. Capped at 19, he seemed destined to become England's best centre-back since Bobby Moore until a conviction for affray while at his first club, Leeds United, was followed by a horrific injury record that cost him around three years of his footballing life. 

Last year, he was told he needed a metal plate inserted in his pelvis to correct a chronic bone problem. It would have ended his career. Woodgate refused to give up, opted for different treatment and is still playing. 

So it was a worldly-wise Woodgate who chatted and signed autographs for children at Langdale Primary School in the Potteries last week as part of Stoke's community work. 

He credits moving to Madrid as a life-changing experience, even though his debut - an own-goal and a red card - was a personal nightmare and injuries restricted him to 10 starts in three seasons before Fabio Capello, then managing Real, sent him back to England on loan. 

As one whose eight-cap international career never lived up to its promise, Woodgate is missionary like in his belief that the next generation of young English players, such as Jack Wilshere, would benefit from playing abroad.

'Madrid made me as a character and a person,' he says. 'When you're young you do some stupid things and I was no angel. But when I went to Spain it made me grow up. 

'It was the best thing I ever did. I was injured a lot but I learned the language and tried to fit into the culture. It has massive benefits from a football point of view as well. 

'I'd advise anyone to do it if they had the chance, including the England players. I saw first-hand what makes the really big players - that winning mentality. They just refuse to be beaten. Raul made a big impression on me, the way he trained hard every day. 

'The Premier League is totally different to international football. We play one way, and they play another. We like the hustle and bustle, they are accustomed to passing the ball. Our younger players, like Jack Wilshere, are all learning but they are still playing in the Premier League. Why don't they go abroad?

'I'd love them to do that; it would be brilliant, playing in a different league, a different type of football where it's not 100 miles an hour, where players are comfortable on the ball, as you have to be at international level. 

'It would benefit the England team enormously because, at the moment, we are just not good enough to win a World Cup.' 

Woodgate insists blaming Capello for England's poor performance at the last World Cup finals masks a simple truth. 'Capello has taken a lot of the blame for what's happened with England, but the truth is that we're not better than Spain, or Germany, or France, or Brazil or Argentina,' he says. 

'It's hard to ask our players to go from one style to another and I just don't think we're good enough, basically. That includes me, by the way, and I'm not an international any more.' 

Woodgate can speak with the candour of a player for whom every match, including Sunday's Premier League game for Stoke at Sunderland, is a bonus.

Less than 12 months ago, he knew his career was in serious trouble when a surgeon said he needed the same treatment as Carlo Cudicini, the Tottenham and former Chelsea goalkeeper who had smashed his pelvis in a motorbike accident. 

According to the specialist, Woodgate's chronic injury problems stemmed from an unstable pelvis. The only solution was to insert a metal plate across the joint that holds it together. 

Woodgate sought a second and third opinion, but they said the same thing. When specialist No 3 delivered his gloomy verdict in Swansea, even Woodgate's natural optimism took a massive hit. 'I did think to myself my career could be over,' he admits, voice dropping to a near-whisper. 

'When you see three pelvic surgeons and they say the same thing, all you can think is, "Oh my goodness, is this it?". 'I remember driving back home to Middlesbrough after my visit to Swansea, hardly saying a word to the driver. My head was all over the place. 

'By that time, I'd also been to Australia for an operation on my adductor muscle, and that hadn't got me back playing either.' 

He adds: 'I knew if I had the plate installed, that was me finished. I would have struggled to play again. No outfield player has managed to carry on with a pelvic plate - you need to do too much twisting and running. 

'So, in the end, I just thought, "I'm not getting that done". 'I looked for something else, I looked for different avenues. When you're injured, you have this almost illogical thought that "something will happen". And thankfully in my case, it did.' 

Salvation finally came in the form of Tottenham's medical chief, Wayne Diesel, who sent Woodgate to a specialist in Denmark. 

He was encouraged to return to London and undergo a series of injections of bisphosphonates, drugs normally used to prevent loss of bone mass.

'I had four injections, one a month,' recalls Woodgate. 'They nail you, I swear you can't move afterwards - it just screws your body up. I was warned before I had them, they'd be like having the flu for three weeks afterwards. Not nice, but it had to be done.' 

At the start of 2011, Woodgate was back in full training, much to the delight of Spurs boss Harry Redknapp. Woodgate's contract with Spurs ran out in the summer but he was determined to earn a new one. 

His dream was shattered at the first day of pre-season training on July 4 when Redknapp invited him to report in, but a club official intervened and refused to allow Woodgate to train.

'Harry would have kept me, definitely. He'd ring me every week, even when I was in Australia, to encourage me and say he needed me back. But I think his hands were tied,' reveals Woodgate. 

'The manager told me to come in for training but as I was walking towards the dressing room to get changed, a Spurs official stopped me on the grass verge outside and said I couldn't train. I felt humiliated. We all went into a room. Harry fought my corner, he was dying for me to stay, but Spurs said they felt I wouldn't get to the top again.

'I couldn't do anything about it but go to another club and try to prove people wrong. I did worry that nobody would have me after 18 months injured, but I think Harry must have had a word with Stoke manager Tony Pulis, because they came in really quickly.' 

'I wanted to play for a good club in the top flight and I remember turning out against Stoke at The Britannia Stadium. It was an atmosphere no opponent looked forward to.' 

Stoke are in their fourth season in the Premier League and able to attract such players as Jermaine Pennant and Peter Crouch, who both played in the 2007 Champions League final for Liverpool. 

Woodgate is determined to do his bit, too. His one-year contract, with an option for a second if he plays enough games.

'I want to play 40 games this season. Did you think I'd say 20?' he says, smiling.

'Playing more is probably better for me because training is sometimes harder than the games.

'I want to play as long as I can. I can't understand people who retire early. I bet they end up regretting it.'

Italy's greatest multi-national XI- from Claudio Gentile to Mario Balotelli

Italy's 2-0 victory over Poland was a landmark occasion, as Italy finished with two black players on the field for the first time ever. Angelo Ogbonna's introduction as a late substitute added to Mario Balotelli's third start in the national side, leaving the Azzurri to end the match with two men of African descent on the pitch.

When also considering the introduction of another sub, Thiago Motta, who was born and bred in Brazil but has an Italian passport, plus Argentine-born Pablo Daniel Osvaldo's presence on the bench, and La Nazionale has a huge multi-national presence in the current ranks.

But this is nothing new for Italy, who have had many naturalised foreign nationals and dual-nationality representatives in their squads in years past. Names such as Raimundo Orsi, Jose Altafini, Julio Libonatti and Omar Sivori have all worn the blue shirt with distinction having come to the peninsula at a late stage in their development.

In honour of Italy's long-standing diversity, takes a look at Italy's greatest multi-national XI, based on their impact on the Azzurri.

After Walcott, Bale and Oxlade-Chamberlain, Southampton are aiming to create a new golden generation for England

By NICK HARRIS

Barcelona's contribution to the fortunes of Spanish football could be replicated with the England team of the future thanks to a remarkable project launched, not by one of the Premier League big boys, but by a club whose recent history has been beset by financial problems and a battle to survive. 

Southampton’s academy, tucked away on the South Coast but with an ethos modelled on Barcelona’s famous set-up at La Masia, has already provided home-grown talent now worth £100 million-plus to Premier League clubs, including Englishmen Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Wales star Gareth Bale. 

Les Reed, the club’s head of football development, insists it is only the start. 

No accident: Oxlade-Chamberlain

‘Alex was not an accident,’ says Reed of a player sold at 17 to Arsenal for £12 million this summer. ‘Maybe at the next stage of our academy’s development we’ll have two Oxlade-Chamberlains in a single year, and then three.’ 

Reed, along with Saints’ Swiss chairman Nicola Cortese, and academy manager Matt Crocker, is a key figure in an upgrade of the academy that will bring it in line with Europe’s best. 

‘The model is Barcelona, who have home-grown players and success,’ he says. 

Crocker adds: ‘The club has always had a philosophy of giving youth a chance and raising its own talent, from Mick Channon to Danny and Rod Wallace, Matt Le Tissier and Alan Shearer. What we’re doing now is continuing those traditions at even higher levels.’

Southampton were among the first clubs to adopt an academy system at the end of the 1990s, when they still were a Premier League club. Relegation in 2005 and the resulting steep drop in income made it more important than ever to keep the home-reared talent flowing. 

The sales of Walcott and Bale to Arsenal and Tottenham helped to keep the club afloat and, after near-extinction in the summer of 2009, it was clear to Cortese and Southampton’s saviour-benefactor, the late Swiss billionaire, Markus Liebherr, that player development should successful,’ says Reed. 

Southampton’s revival from a club who just two years ago were languishing in League One after administration has been swift and strong, and it is hoped that future success will come with more of the home-grown stars for which Saints have become known. 

Oxlade-Chamberlain joined the club at the age of seven in 2000 and was there until August, when he signed for Arsenal a few days before his 18th birthday, for a £12m fee fame remain at the core of the club’s vision. 

Since Liebherr’s death aged 62 in August last year, Cortese has been driven by the desire for Southampton to become a self-sustaining top-flight club, with all areas of the academy expanded and strengthened to realise that vision. 

Saviour: Markus Liebherr (right), pictured with former Soouthampton boss Alan Pardew in 2009

The cost of running it, around £2.3m a year, is seen not as speculating to accumulate but as economically prudent. Saints have already made returns of several times their outlay over the past decade and in the future they want to keep players of the calibre of Bale, Walcott and Chamberlain — not see them go for big money to other teams.

So there is a buzz among Saints fans as they take the Championship by storm, with Nigel Adkins’s side five points clear and entertaining large crowds, while insiders are just as excited about the future. 

‘Aiming to match Barcelona is a big ambition but you need to strive for that to be successful,’ says Reed. Southampton’s revival from a club who just two years ago were languishing in League One after administration has been swift and strong, and it is hoped that future success will come with more of the home-grown stars for which Saints have become known. 

Saintlets: Academy youngsters dream of following in the footsteps of stars who have made the big time. But the club hope to retain their best young talent in the future

Oxlade-Chamberlain joined the club at the age of seven in 2000 and was there until August, when he signed for Arsenal a few days before his 18th birthday, for a £12m fee that will rise to £15m. He has already scored for Arsenal in the Champions League and netted his first England hat-trick — for the Under- 21s — against Iceland last month. 

Walcott is another who took the Saints-Arsenal route, nurtured from 11 by Southampton until his big-money move at 16 in 2006. Walcott and Chamberlain are both expected to be key England players of the future, while Welshman Bale is now his country’s brightest star. 

Bale was spotted by Southampton at nine and attended their satellite academy in Bath before signing up, making his first-team debut in 2006, and moving to Tottenham in 2007. 

Other Saints academy alumni include Manchester City’s Wayne Bridge, Newcastle’s Leon Best, Fulham’s Chris Baird and Norwich City’s Andrew Surnam.

Career opportunity Theo Walcott moved from Southampton to Arsenal in 2006

The home-grown star of Southampton’s current team is Adam Lallana, an England Under-21 midfielder who has been with Saints since he was 12. 

All these players were produced by the academy as it stands today, with temporary buildings at the heart of a 10-acre site in the village of Marchwood on the outskirts of the city. But work begins within days on a vast and impressive new academy complex, complete with school-rooms, medical centre, swimming pool, state-of-the-art gym, video labs, restaurant and office suites for the youth recruitment department, coaching staff and support personnel.

‘We’ve got an ambition to be not just a Premier League club but a competitive Premier League club,’ says Reed. ‘If we want half our team to come from the academy, which we do, the recruitment needs to be the best, and the development plan for each individual needs to be excellent, as do the facilities, the sports science and the technical quality of the coaching.’

Superstar: Gareth Bale lit up the Champions League last season

Reed, 58, is a coaching veteran, best known for his short spell as Charlton manager in 2006. But he has spent much of his working life innovating behind the scenes, working as FA technical director, as an assistant to Sir Bobby Robson, Alan Curbishley and Kevin Keegan, and alongside Howard Wilkinson in trying to develop ways to improve young English players. 

His research has taken him from drama schools to the Royal Ballet, from the Yehudi Menuhin music school to Nick Bollettieri’s tennis academy in Florida and elite football centres across Germany — academies that have contributed greatly to that country’s international renaissance. 

‘The philosophy of player-development at Bayern Munich,’ says Reed, ‘is “two each year for the first team, two for the league, and two for the rest of German football”. And you find similar aims across the top Bundesliga clubs.’

Reed was initially invited to Southampton as a consultant in late 2009 but is now a Southampton director, and his excitement at the future is obvious. The Saints academy has 104 students aged between nine and 16, plus 22 apprentices between 16 and 18. 

‘We believe we have the equivalent of Manchester United’s Scholes, Beckham and Co already within our system,’ he says. Southampton’s ‘golden’ generation of 16- and 17-year-olds includes James Ward-Prowse, a creative midfielder who made his first-team debut last month, and Luke Shaw, an England Under-17 attacking full back.

Then there are striker Jake Sinclair and Harrison Reed, known as Saints’ ‘young Scholes’ for more reasons than his red hair. Harrison’s father, Dave, says: ‘Saints have academy coaches who have worked with Scholes and they make comparisons with Harrison’s discipline and dedication and his tenacity in that central midfield role. They’ve got high hopes for him. 

‘He’s been at Saints since he was eight. He effectively left home for the club at 15 and lived with a family nearby. That was a wrench for us but it’s a fantastic club and his all-round education has been brilliant.’

Put through their paces: Southampton academy students train

Southampton employ six teachers on site. With class sizes as small as five or six, academic results are often better than predicted at their regular schools.

Julian Woods, whose 12-year-old son, Henry, has been attached to Southampton since the age of six, says: ‘They’ve always looked after him. In February he broke his kneecap but the care has been tremendous. I know he’s happy here.’

Southampton fans may be enjoying the moment. But behind the scenes, the future is dreamier still.

European Team of the Season so far: Goal machines Lionel Messi, Robin van Persie & Cristiano Ronaldo lead the line

Premier League Team of the Season so far: Robin van Persie, Wayne Rooney & David Silva star in attack

Cristiano Ronaldo outscores Lionel Messi in 2011 - but the Argentine has the last laugh with five trophies to one

Barcelona versus Real Madrid is arguably football's greatest rivalry, but within the fascinating duel of Spain's superpowers there is an individual battle between two tremendous talents: Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.

They could not be more different. While the Argentine is an old-fashioned, street-style footballer who evokes a bygone era with his dazzling dribbles and mesmerising magic on the ball, the Portuguese is the complete modern player - all pace, power, precision and potency.

Messi and Ronaldo will go head to head - along with Xavi - for the Fifa Ballon d'Or in January and while the Argentine is expected to triumph in Zurich, 2011 has been a brilliant year for both players. Individually, Cristiano has the edge over the last 12 months, having netted an incredible 60 goals in 60 games, although collectively, Messi can claim the bragging rights, having led his brilliant Barcelona side to five more trophies under Pep Guardiola - La Liga, the Champions League, the Spanish Supercopa, Uefa Super Cup and Club World Cup.

Ronaldo recently broke the record for the number of league goals in a calendar year. The former Manchester United man has netted 43 times in La Liga in 2011, surpassing Messi's mark of 42 goals set in 2010. And those 43 strikes have come in just 34 games, 27 of which were part of last season's record-breaking total of 40, which set a new Pichichi record in Spain's top flight. But that may yet be beaten this term as Cristiano has already scored 20 in just 16 league games for Jose Mourinho's side in 2010-11.

Ronaldo is often accused of failing to produce against bigger teams, however, and that point was raised recently as the 26-year-old disappointed in the 3-1 Clasico defeat to Barcelona. These stats appear to back up the claim, too, because Cristiano is less prolific against top-class opposition in the Champions League than in La Liga, where standards drop outside the top four or five sides.

For Portugal, the forward enjoyed a happy year in front of goal, scoring seven in nine games, but apart from the winner in a 2-1 success over Messi's Argentina, the other strikes came against lesser lights such as Cyprus, Luxembourg, Denmark and Bosnia.

And although he has shown a more generous side to his game of late, his total of 17 assists is still some way short of Messi's 28.

Madrid are getting closer to Barca, though, and much of that is down to Ronaldo. At his brilliant best, he may just inspire them to even greater things in 2012.

At the moment, however, Messi is still the main man. His international stats may be less impressive, but overall his numbers are very similar to those of Ronaldo. He has more assists than his rival, struck just a goal less than the Portuguese in 2011 - albeit in more games - and offers so much to a Barca side in which he is the undoubted star.

Messi may have hit 12 goals less than Cristiano in the calendar year, but his superior strike rate both in the cups and the Champions League proves he can perform against any adversaries. Indeed, in key games such as the Champions League semi-final and final, the Argentine delivered.

He falls down only internationally, hampered by a system which fails to get the best from his astonishing abilities. That remains a concern for Argentina as the South Americans look to take advantage of possessing the world's finest footballer in their ranks. No wonder, then, they have tried to copy Barcelona's formation in the past, attempting to replicate a system in which Guardiola moved Messi further forward, playing him inside, supported by Xavi and Andres Iniesta behind him. It's a frightening prospect for any side, and one which has led Barca to 13 trophies under their current coach - including five in the past 12 months. But as Pep always says: they couldn't have done it without Messi.

So even though Cristiano outscored Leo in 2011, it's the Argentine who ends the year on top because of his ability to perform on the grandest of stages - and the silverware he has claimed in the process.

But as their clubs commence battle again in the New Year and their own personal duel continues, it remains to be see who will come out on top in 2012.