Leicester midfielder Hamza Choudhury wants to sort his future BEFORE the start of the new season amid Southampton interest with just a year left on his deal

• Hamza Choudhury wants his long-term future settled by the start of the season
• Southampton are keen on the midfielder but Enzo Marezca sees him in his plans
• He only has a year left on his contract and Leicester are open to offers 

Hamza Choudhury wants his long-term future settled by the start of the season amid interest from Southampton.

The midfielder has a year remaining on his contract with Leicester, who were relegated from the top flight along with Saints last term.

New Foxes boss Enzo Maresca sees Choudhury as part of his plans for the campaign ahead yet given he will be a free agent in less than 12 months, Leicester would consider a permanent deal in this window. Southampton have asked to be kept informed of his circumstances but have yet to lodge a formal bid.

Local boy Choudhury fell out of favour under former boss Brendan Rodgers and spent last season on loan at Watford in the Championship. Had Leicester stayed up last season, he would surely have departed this term but there is more likely to be a role for him in the second tier.

James Maddison and Harvey Barnes have already departed this summer for Tottenham and Newcastle respectively, bringing nearly £80million into the coffers. Yet there are a number of others who may leave before the window closes, including Kelechi Iheanacho, Wilfred Ndidi, Boubakary Soumare and Timothy Castagne.

Leicester begin their Championship campaign against Coventry on August 6 but their preparations took a huge hit when a friendly against Tottenham in Bangkok, scheduled for July 23, had to be called off a short notice because of the weather.

Maresca and his squad now travel to Singapore to meet Liverpool in another friendly on July 30 – a week before facing Coventry at King Power Stadium.

Now it remains to be seen if the Saints will make an official bid for Choudhury in the ongoing transfer window to test Leicester’s resolve.

READ MORE: Newcastle Claim Southampton Are Moving The Goalposts Over Tino Livramento

They are getting hot under the collar up on Tyneside, all over the fact that little Southampton FC refuse to lay down and have their tummy tickled by the richest club in the World.

According to The Northern Echo in the North East, Newcastle United are getting very irate about their negotiations with Southampton over the signing of Tino Livramento, they claim that talks are continuing but that Saints keep moving the financial goalposts.

They even see that Saints starting Livramento in their friendly at Reading on Saturday was part of the act, all aimed at trying to push up the price that the St James’s Park club are willing to offer.

From a Newcastle fans perspective they seem to be frustrated that Southampton are not just lying down and doing the bidding, fansite geordiebootboys.com seem to be taking that viewpoint, although they do concede that their club “must believe that Livramento is a worthwhile investment – otherwise they would have walked away a long time ago.”

From a Southampton perspective it is a lot different, a few weeks ago the news out of Tyneside was that Newcastle had set a transfer budget of £75 million and that being the case a top figure of £15 million was quoted as the most they could pay.

Yet here we are now and they have already spent around £100 million on just two players Sandro Tonali & Harvey Barnes, bringing in just £15 million for Chris Wood to balance the books .

Yet they are now upped their bid from the derisory £15 million, ironically the same price they paid last year for former Saints left back Matt Targett(no comparison here) to £30 million.

So given they are the richest club in the world and we are now a poor Championship club, how dare we hold out for more money, indeed how dare we hold out for more for a player who like us they clearly think is a great talent.

Saints need to sell this summer and yes they do need to sell players in certain positions fast in order to bring in money to pay for them, but that does not mean that we should allow ourselves to be held to be pushed into a cheap sale.

Tino Livramento is under contract for another 3 years, for a year during his first two years at the club he was injured and we paid his wages, whilst i am not naive enough to think that a proffessional footballer thinks that means he owes the club anything, it does mean that the lets say £2 million we paid him in wages reduces down our potential profit.

So if Newcastle played silly buggers with us by offering stupendously low money for him a few weeks ago, excuse me for not shedding a tear now for their frustration about Southampton doing the same now by asking for more.

A month ago Newcastle offered a low figure not in the real belief they would get him that low, but to unsettle the player, to make him want to go to St James’s Park and why wouldn’t he, they are the richest club in the World, but also to try and make out they weren’t really that bothered, the aim to be to get an unsettled player to force his current club to sell him at less than the going rate.

This isn’t a Newcastle thing, its a football thing, it is just that some don’t get as upset about it as others when they don’t get their own way and have to pay the going rate.

Southampton FC have been lambasted by their fans over the last few years for selling players, truth is non were dragged away by wild horses, screaming to stay, now things are different, the club will not be held to ransom to sell a player under his market value, they are quite happy for him to stay at St Mary’s another year, if he does then perhaps the £30 million that Newcastle are offering now will seem a snip.