Former Barnet striker Izale McLeod says that he is on the edge of completing a deal with an unnamed Football League Club. The 27 year old has been conspicuous by his absence since leaving Underhill at the end of last season, and appears to have been linked with more or less every club at League One and League Two level over the summer months.
One such club has been the Glovers, with suggestions that he had been spotted in Yeovil around a month ago - although nothing has materialised since then, with manager Gary Johnson making moves for Reuben Reid and James Hayter, who are likely to be the main contenders for the front line pairing at Huish Park, for the coming season.
The Sky Sports website names Portsmouth and Crawley as being the main two clubs that have interest in the player, although there have been plenty more. McLeod himself will not reveal which one will get his services, but says he has more or less made his decision:
"Hopefully, I'll be signing for a new club shortly because I've been in talks with one in particular for a while now and we are very close to completing things, which is great because pre-season will be starting next week. I don't really want to say what club it is or what division they are in at the moment, but it is a club which match my ambitions for the upcoming season. There has been quite a bit of interest over the summer, but hopefully this one will be the one I sign for and it is just a case of dotting the i's and crossing the t's."
For what it's worth, if his suggestion that "pre-season will be starting next week" is to be taken literally, then that would tend to rule out the Glovers, given they have been back on the training ground for the past week. Johnson's remarks late last week also suggest that he is wanting to wait until he's seen his current crop of players and trialists in a couple of pre-season friendlies before he can decide where he needs to add extra blood for what he believes are two available positions.
Portsmouth are due to start their pre-season training schedule on Monday, although there are question marks over when they will be allowed to sign players, given that the Football League have refused to lift their transfer embargo, despite having only ten registered players, and no goalkeeper. With the club still in administration, and Tal Ben Haim on £36,000 per week wages, plus a £1 million per season image rights contract, administrator Trevor Birch still needs to lower their annual wage bill, which varies between £9 million and £11 million according to which source you read. Hence until they overcome that problem, they will be unable to agree anything other than a verbal deal with McLeod.
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8 July 2012 : 
