Birmingham are aiming to sign a former England Under-21 international
Birmingham City are reported to be the leading contenders to sign a Manchester City academy graduate with past experience of winning promotion from the Championship.
The Blues have ambitions of reaching the Premier League for the first time since 2011 after storming to the League One title with a record-breaking 111 points last term.
The St Andrew’s outfit are blessed with one of the biggest budgets in the division and are expected to add further marquee names to a squad that has already done exceptionally well under the stewardship of Chris Davies.
One player understood to be on the club’s radar at this moment in time is former England Under-21 international Tommy Doyle. He played just seven times for Pep Guardiola’s side after coming through the youth team setup and is currently playing in the top-flight with Wolves after a loan move in 2023 was made permanent 12 months later for around £4.3m.
Birmingham City battle Sunderland to sign Tommy Doyle
Birmingham City have emerged as the frontrunners to sign Wolves midfielder Tommy Doyle this summer despite strong interest from two other newly-promoted sides.
EFL Analysis claims one of those is Wrexham. The Welsh side, who have won promotion in all of the last three years, are thought to be actively trying to sign Doyle at this moment in time, but the outlet claims Birmingham are already ahead of them in the queue.
TEAMtalk has also credited Sunderland with interest after their promotion to the Premier League. The Black Cats recently made Enzo la Fee’s loan move from AS Roma permanent by activating a £19m option to buy but are still in the market for further midfield reinforcements after the departure of one of last season’s standout performers Jobe Bellingham to Borussia Dortmund.
It sets up an intriguing race for clubs to land Doyle, with the 23-year-old struggling for game time at Molineux and seemingly not being a part of Vitor Pereira’s plans with Joao Gomes, Andre, Jean-Ricner Bellegarde and Marshall Munetsi among others being ahead of him in the pecking order.
Why Birmingham City are interested in Tommy Doyle
Tommy Doyle joined the Manchester City academy at the age of eight, following in the footsteps of both of his grandparents Mike Doyle and Glyn Pardoe, who played in the Sky Blues league title-winning team of the 1960s.
Doyle made a huge impression at academy level named the Premier League Player of the Tournament for three successive years at U18 and Premier League 2 levels while playing for England at every age group between Under-16 and Under-21, notably forming part of the team which won the European Championship in 2023 with the latter. He also won a series of honours with City’s all-conquering youth team squad, including the FA Youth Cup and league title while playing alongside the likes of Cole Palmer, Liam Delap, Jamie Gittens, Morgan Rogers and James Trafford among others.
Doyle gained experience on loan at Hamburg and Cardiff City before really showing signs of his qualities at Championship level during a loan spell at Sheffield United where he won automatic promotion in 2022/23, scoring four and assisting seven in 38 games across all competitions, winning goal of the season and helping the team to an FA Cup semi-final.
He’s not quite been able to push on at Wolves despite making 58 appearances for the Old Gold, with the majority of his football coming from the bench.Speculation of an exit has mainly been fuelled by Wolves boss Vitor Pereira, who spoke candidly about Doyle’s status in the squad in April. He said: “We are not a team to have 80 per cent of possession, so he has problems. If we are a team that has the ball every time, doesn’t allow counter-attacks and keeps the ball to dominate the opponent, this is the team for him.
“But we need to understand that we face top teams, top players. We need to run a lot and he’s missing this physicality, especially when we play with two midfielders.”
Doyle is thought to be available for around £3m and could prove a real coup based on his performances at Championship level so far. He earned huge praise from ex-teammate Kyle Walker in the past, when he said, via Wrexham Insider: “That’s Tommy in a nutshell. Good passer of the ball, gets on the ball on the half-turn.
“He likes to spray and he does this a lot in training. The gaffer always gets him on set pieces when we’re doing certain things because he’s got good technique. And I think these sort of games you give him space and he can lift his head and he can hurt you,”
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