Bruce dismisses Upson speculation

Steve Bruce has dismissed speculation linking central defender Matthew Upson with a move to either Newcastle or Barcelona.

The Birmingham boss insisted there had been “no approach” from either club for Upson who has been in sparkling form during the current campaign.

Upson, who has 18 months left of his current contract, will be entitled to open negotiations over a new deal following Saturday’s game with his former club Arsenal.

He had a clause inserted which allows him to renegotiate after his 60th league game for City since moving from Highbury in the January 2003 transfer window and that milestone will be reached this weekend.

But Bruce knows the importance of holding on to one of his most prized assets in building for the future.

He said: “We’ve broached the subject of the contract with Matt. He’s got this clause in his contract and the managing director (Karren Brady) is meeting with his agent very, very shortly.

“We want to keep all our best players and certainly Matthew Upson is paramount to where we want to be. He’s been excellent for the last 18 months or so.

“He’s approaching 60 Premier League games which, when you consider he’d only played about 12 prior to coming here, is marvellous.

“We’ve had no approach from Newcastle or from Barcelona or whoever – apart from an approach for him to play in a charity friendly in Barcelona last night.

“They wanted both him and Jesper Gronkjaer to go but I couldn’t let them. I didn’t want them to be travelling when we’ve got such an important fixture at Arsenal coming up a few days later.

“If you’ve got good players, they’re always linked with other clubs but we’ve not spoken to representatives from either club.”