Birmingham City’s swoop to try and sign Djurgårdens IF striker August Priske saw him pulled out of Thursday training. There was a desire to make sure the forward didn’t pick up an unfortunate injury.
The Swedish media asked Djurgårdens IF sports director Bosse Andersson if his player leaving training early meant a transfer was close. He tried to sit on the fence, but accepted that it made sense to pull Priske out.
Given the weather challenges in Sweden, the Allsvenskan runs on a different calendar to English football. As it stands, Djurgårdens IF are in preseason and today they faced IF Brommapojkarna.
Unsurprisingly, Priske didn’t take part in the practice match, but he wasn’t hiding away.
The affable 21-year-old turned up to watch. He wasn’t supposed to speak to the media about Birmingham City or anything else transfer related. In reality, he ended up surrounded by a huddle of local journalists all wanting to know if he was off on a new adventure.
Fotbolldirekt had someone in the scrum. In the Swedish website’s article, there’s only destination named… Birmingham City.
Indeed, despite noises about interest from elsewhere, nothing concrete has appeared. It would seem there’s a good chance those claims were to pressure the Championship club. The last genuine interest, other than the Blues, was from Besiktas.
Friske tried his best to answer questions without really saying anything.
Fotbolldirekt quote him as saying: “I won’t say anything. There are no comments. Olle (press officer) said I wouldn’t do any media today. So no, I won’t say anything.”
Asked if he’s out today because he’s feels unfit or whether it’s transfer related, he said: “I don’t know. A bit 50/50.”
Birmingham City target tries to keep calm
Not giving up, Fotbolldirekt put it to Priske that when it was Besiktas recently linked he was more talkative. They wanted to know if that means the Birmingham City transfer is much closer.
“No, but then you turn up with six microphones,” the forward replied. “I felt compelled to say something then.”
Bosse Anderson was also there, and Aftonbladet asked him if it was the club’s decision to keep Priske out today.
The director said: “It wasn’t really important (today’s match). When we are in concrete discussions, it would be dishonest (if he were to risk something).”
