Gossip: Carr Cheikh's on M'Bengue again.

Graham Carr has been spotted at yet another Toulouse game, and yet again it's the same two names that have cropped up as the targets of his scouting trip.

Cheikh M'Bengue and Franck Tabanou have both been watched numerous times by Mr Ben ahead of a summer in which many fans are expecting the team to be significantly strengthened. However, the fact that both of these players can play left-back will continue to raise doubts over the future of a certain Jose Enrique unfortunately.

Now in fairness we could just be doing things properly and be looking out for replacements BEFORE a player departs, or even IF he departs. It's a strange concept for NUFC as usually the club are more reactive rather than pro-active when in comes to player acquisition.

We've been linked with M'Bengue since January and reportedly had a bid in the region of £4 million turned down not so long back. Toulouse are said to want closer to £6 million for the player though, but at that money I can only see Cheikh arriving if Jose was to leave.

Frank Tabanou is slightly different however as he can play all the way down the left side. The 22-year-old has played understudy for the injured M'Bengue for the majority of this season, but his preferred position is the one that is currently occupied by Jonas Gutierrez.

Tabanou has made 62 appearances for Toulouse and has scored 8 goals along the way so he is hardly prolific. However, after a bit of research, I noticed that four of those eight goals have come when he has been employed as a left-back, which makes things look a lot better.

Being honest I don't much about either player. I know M'Bengue is said to be a tough-tackling, physical, pacey defender whilst Tababnou is supposed to be quite a technical player with a trick or two up his sleeve. Beyond that though, pass.

I do like the sound of that Tabanou though. I think his versatility would ensure that we'd get more use from him and it would add more numbers to the left side of the pitch as, lets face it, beyond Jonas Gutierrez and Jose Enrique (if he stays) we don't have much else in the form of a left side. Shane Ferguson is, of course, another option.

So it may be just rumours from the Daily Mail, but we've been linked with both of these players for a few weeks now. Time will tell if we are after them or not, or even if Mr Ben was indeed casting his eye over the pair or whether it was someone else who caught his eye.

Rumours - you gotta love 'em!