Turkish Super Lig club reportedly looking at signing former England international from Luton

Turkish Super Lig side Alanyaspor have reportedly opened transfer talks with Luton winger Andros Townsend.

The 33-year-old ex-England international moved to Kenilworth Road in October 2023 after being without a club since the summer and almost giving up on playing once his deal at fellow top flight club Burnley fell through. However, Townsend, who had been at Tottenham Hotspur, Newcastle United and Crystal Palace earlier in his career, before moving to Everton, where a serious anterior cruciate ligament injury saw him out of first team action for around 18 months, was then handed a lifeline by the Hatters.

He went on to make 27 appearances in the Premier League last term, 14 of them from the start, with one goal and three assists to his name. Eight of those starts came in a run of nine matches at the end of the year, as the winger only began six of the final 19 top flight fixtures from January onwards, more often than not used as a substitute.

Townsend has had a limited role in pre-season to date, starting one match, the 1-0 victory over Ukrainian Premier League side Ruhk Lviv in Slovenia, also having the second half of the 3-2 defeat to Goztepe to round off Luton’s warm weather training camp. He had the final 23 minutes of Friday night’s 2-2 draw at Dundee United, with Turkish media outlet Sports Digitale journalist Reşat Can Özbudak stating he is now interesting Alanyaspor, tweeting: “Alanyaspor started official negotiations to transfer Andros Townsend.”

The Turkish club, who finished eighth last season, with 12 wins from 38 matches, are managed by former Turkey international Fatih Tekke, who also played for Trabzonspor, Gaziantepspor and Zenit Saint Petersburg in his career. They were the Turkish Cup runners-up in the 2019-20 campaign, also qualifying for the Europa League the following season.