Russian international Vyacheslav Malafeev admits he would love the chance to move to England.
But Russian admits Premier move unlikely
Russian international Vyacheslav Malafeev admits he would love the chance to move to England.
However, the Zenit St Petersburg star - linked with Tottenham and Portsmouth - doubts he would be allowed to play in the Premier League because he is not first choice for the national side.
Malafeev has 16 caps for Russia, but that has come over a five-year period with CSKA Moscow's outstanding Igor Akinfeev currently No.1 choice under Guus Hiddink.
Malafeev has less than a year left on his contract at Zenit and it is claimed up to six clubs have already expressed an interest in signing him, with Spurs, Portsmouth, Villarreal, Marseille and Olympiakos all linked.
"There are interesting proposals, Olympiakos is a regular participant in the Champions League," he told Nevskoe Vremya.
English interest
"Portsmouth could say lose goalkeeper David James and therefore would look for a replacement, their owner [Sacha Gaydamak] has Russian roots and so players from Russia could be logical, so why not acquire a goalkeeper from Russia?
"Tottenham bought Roman Pavlyuchenko and tried to negotiate with Andrei Arshavin, of course a change of coach could seriouisly affect the team but is unlikely to change their priorities. They want to create one of the strongest teams in the league.
"However, talk about the game in England is probably not valid as I have not enough games for the national side."
Malafeev also confirmed that Villarreal and Marseille were very much interested in him.
"I heard of their interest [Villarreal] but I don't know about it - but it would be a pleasure to play with them," he continued.
"I was also looking out for representatives of that [Marseille] club and perhaps they would be interesting. They are not a bad team.
"I think that in the near future, those foreign teams interested in me, will start to talk with Zenit."