Southamp­ton mid­field­er Car­los Alcaraz faces an uncer­tain future.

The 21-year-old only joined Southamp­ton in Jan­u­ary of last year, but was sent on loan to Ital­ian giants Juven­tus in the 2024 win­ter trans­fer win­dow.

The Argen­tine joined the Saints for £12.3 mil­lion from Rac­ing Club in his home­land and was one of the few pos­i­tives from a dis­mal cam­paign that cul­mi­nat­ed in a bot­tom place fin­ish and rel­e­ga­tion from the Pre­mier League.

Alcaraz scored four Pre­mier League goals and pro­vid­ed two assists in 18 games in his half-sea­son in the Eng­lish top flight but, oth­er than a spell play­ing as a false nine in Octo­ber and Novem­ber, had strug­gled to find a spot in Rus­sell Martin‘s side this sea­son before the shock move to Juven­tus.

Mar­tin would like­ly have been hap­py to keep Alcaraz around as an option, but with Stu­art Arm­strong ahead of him in his favoured posi­tion the loan made sense for all par­ties.

Juventus keen to keep Carlos Alcaraz beyond summer

HITC jour­nal­ist Graeme Bai­ley has now exclu­sive­ly told Southamp­ton FC News that he believes there is a good chance that Italy’s most suc­cess­ful club sign Alcaraz per­ma­nent­ly.

Alcaraz’ cur­rent loan deal includes an option to buy for £38 mil­lion, but the Bian­coneri may look to nego­ti­ate a reduced fee should they pur­sue a pur­chase.

“I think they (Juven­tus) quite like him as a play­er, from what I’ve heard.” Bai­ley explained.

“I don’t think any of us were expect­ing him to go there and be a first team reg­u­lar but he’s been involved.

“It’s a fas­ci­nat­ing sit­u­a­tion for him, he’s an uber tal­ent­ed play­er, obvi­ous­ly clear­ly Rus­sell Martin’s not the biggest fan in the world, so I think there’s a fair chance he goes to Juve, (who might) try and reduce a fee even fur­ther, I wouldn’t rule it out.

“I think there’s a fair chance he does go.”

How has Alcaraz performed on loan at Juventus?

Alcaraz has missed the past two Juven­tus fix­tures with a ham­string injury, but was hand­ed his first start in his new colours by Mas­si­m­il­iano Alle­gri in the game pri­or his forced absence.

Whilst Juven­tus lost that game 2–1 to Napoli, Alcaraz will have been keen to build on his first 90 min­utes for the Turin club so the injury will be incred­i­bly frus­trat­ing for the young mid­field­er; espe­cial­ly giv­en he pro­vid­ed the assist for Juve’s goal in that clash.

That assist was the Argentine’s only goal con­tri­bu­tion in his 177 min­utes in Italy so far, but giv­en he may not have a future under Southamp­ton with Mar­tin in charge, he will be des­per­ate to get back into the side and earn a move to such a pres­ti­gious club.

Alle­gri is a noto­ri­ous­ly defen­sive man­ag­er and Alcaraz strug­gles with defen­sive dis­ci­pline so it is some­what sur­pris­ing that the attack-mind­ed mid­field­er made the move, but per­haps it high­lights how high­ly rat­ed he is in Europe.

To add to the admi­ra­tion from Juven­tus’ side, Alcaraz’ agent told AS last week: “I don’t know what’s going to hap­pen. But I think he’s going to gen­er­ate the move,”.

This seems pret­ty damn­ing for any Southamp­ton fans hop­ing to see the Argenti­na under-23 inter­na­tion­al return to St Mary’s next sea­son.

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