Former Portsmouth favourite and Glasgow Rangers target Abu Kamara linked with move to Champions League hopefuls
Former Pompey favourite Abu Kamara is attracting more interest this summer
Abu Kamara is once again at the centre of transfer speculation as the new season quickly approaches.
However, much to Pompey’s disappointment, it’s the Champions League rather than the Championship that could be playing host to the former Fratton favourite next term.
According to Football League World, newly-crowned Swiss Super League champions FC Basel have the Hull winger on their wanted list and even sent scouts to watch the 22-year-old score the Tigers’ winner in their pre-season friendly victory over Sunderland on Tuesday night.
The St Jakob-Park side still have to navigate their way past the play-off round to make the 36-team group stage of the Champions League, but they feel they would be in a better position to proceed in the competition with Kamara in their ranks.
Like Scottish Premiership giants Glasgow Rangers - who have also been linked with the forward - Basel are reportedly hoping Hull’s financial issues and recently-imposed three-window transfer restrictions could help them seal a bargain move for a player who was signed from Norwich for £4.5m last summer.
Abu Kamara remains hugely admired by Pompey
Kamara, whose eight goals and 10 assists for Pompey during their 2023-24 League One title-winning season prompted Hull to spend big on him 12 months ago, remains a player the Blues hugely admire.
The Fratton faithful would, no doubt, love to see him back at PO4 following a mixed maiden season at the MKM Stadium.
However, sporting director Rich Hughes identified reasons that would make Fratton Park returns for Kamara and fellow former fans’ favourite Alex Robertson difficult to deliver earier this month.
When asked about potential moves for the duo this transfer window, he told BBC Solent: ‘It's always really tough to do it and I think you take Hull as a sort of working example - they've gone under an embargo and I think the natural reaction would be they have to sell players.
‘But, also, you can't lose sight of the fact that they may not be able to replace them and I think that's probably the flip side of that coin - so that becomes really difficult.
‘So, he’s Hull's player, we completely respect that, and is he a player we'd be interested in? Yes, absolutely. Is it one that we'll be able to do? We have to wait and see and see how that pans out. Again, when you talk about these unknown factors, you look at Hull's situation and, again, there's an incredible amount of grey areas in that sort of set up to get a deal done.
‘As with Cardiff, I suspect without knowing the inner workings of their club - they've been relegated, their prerogative and aim would be to get back promoted straight away, which I think is quite natural.
‘The new head coach will have known Alex Robertson from his time at Man City and I'm probably sure that Brian Barry-Murphy spoke about building a team around Alex Robertson.
‘So, again, probably a difficult one but without knowing the inner workings of their finances and any of the detailed elements of the deal, it'd be hard to say whether it would be Cardiff's prerogative to want to sell the player.’