Liverpool have reportedly had an offer of £4 million turned down for Charlie Adam, with Blackpool boss Ian Holloway expected to hold out for around double that fee.
Scottish midfielder Adam could hand in a transfer request to try to push through a move to Anfield but Holloway is keen to hang on to his skipper until the end of the season unless a too-good-to-refuse offer is put forward.
Holloway had previously stated his intention to only sell Adam to a big club, which he said would include Liverpool, and he has hit out at "derisory" bids of around £3.5 million from Aston Villa. Considering that Villa splashed out £24 million for Darren Bent and Adam's importance to Blackpool's hopes of staying in the lucrative Premier League, Holloway is reluctant to let Adam go cheaply but reports said he could be tempted by around £8 million if the player wants out.
Before news of the Liverpool bid surfaced, Holloway said he did not want to think about Adam's future until the summer.
"Realistically, with the choice he (Adam) might have in the summer, our heads might be turned by a huge offer which is so ridiculous, we'd have to accept it,'' Holloway said. "But until then, you can't get what you want - you have to work towards getting it. Every day that comes closer to the end of the season, Charlie's contract is ticking, so it's all quite simple for me. Everything else is an absolute load of baloney.''
In terms of bringing players in during the transfer window, Blackpool have missed out on Barnsley winger Adam Hammill, who opted to join Wolves, and it seems talks with Peterborough about their midfielder George Boyd and striker Craig Mackail-Smith have hit a stumbling block.
"We were only offered £3.5million for Charlie Adam. Peterborough want that for two lads who were in a team that got relegated from the Championship,'' said Holloway, quoted in the Blackpool Gazette. "I don't mean that as an insult at all but I'm saying let's have a look at reality.
"They know we're a Premier League side but they don't know where my chairman (Karl Oyston) is. He likes to do good deals and are those players worth £2million (each)? Maybe they are, but who will buy them for that sort of price and what does that make Charlie worth? This is why it is so hard to quantify anything you own. Your house is only worth what someone will pay for it, not what an estate agent tells you.''
Meanwhile, Holloway said he can understand Steve Bruce's shock that Bent would want to leave what the manager is building at Sunderland.
On Saturday Holloway's side play host to the Black Cats, who will be without their top scorer Bent following his decision to join Aston Villa earlier this week. With the Wearsiders currently sixth in the Premier League and in the running for European football, Bruce has been left stunned by the striker's defection to a Villa outfit struggling at the opposite end of the table.
Holloway sympathises with his counterpart, describing the way Bruce has taken Sunderland forward since his appointment there in the summer of 2009 as "phenomenal''.
Asked what sort of job he felt Bruce had done at the Stadium of Light, Holloway said: "Absolutely terrific, and the shock for him now is that someone would want to leave his club and go somewhere else. He is trying to build, grow it and make it better than it has ever been. How quickly he is doing it is quite phenomenal, so I think that is what will hurt him more than anything.''
He added: "I understand how he might feel, but this is life. Any footballer will have his head turned, that is what happens, because you are only in it a short time.''
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