Callum Wilson expected to torment rather than join London clubs

While Chelsea and now Arsenal have been eyeing up the much admired Callum Wilson at AFC Bournemouth, the Cherries are likely to head off any interest very quickly in their much prized no 13 this summer as they plan a take down of the Premier League's elite. Having lost Lewis Grabban less than 12 months ago, it is Eddie Howe's aim to build his squad around Callum Wilson in the top flight, even if Arsenal and Chelsea wanted to pay well over the odds for Wilson's services. The tight knit group of young players that the Cherries now have give Wilson every reason for believing he is best served at this moment by staying on the south coast.

Callum Wilson and Dan Gosling at The Valley this season.

AFCB are a club on the up and that has more than been recognised by the leading Premier League sides. In fact they are already wondering  what the Cherries might achieve having ripped their way through the lower leagues in the past few years and with Wilson leading the line the Cherries could be another team seeking a top half finish in 2015-16. It is the pace of the Coventry-born striker that has alerted the scouts of Arsenal, Spurs, Southampton, Swansea, West Ham and Aston Villa, along with the goal haul of 23 goals in a gruelling Championship campaign that saw the Cherries crowned as Champions. But the top team's scouting networks are much larger than the sights of the Championship where they know newly promoted clubs will slap huge price-tags on their best players - Wilson is no exception.

The worry for some of those clubs keen to entice AFCB's leading striker to their set-up is that any team that one of their rivals might beat them to it. Wilson is still getting better and he has already pulled defences apart in the Championship in his first season at that level. If he can give teams a torrid time in the Premier League he will then be more likely to be a target for larger budget clubs. He could be more than ready to upset defences in the top division, and with a strong performance in the UEFA European Championship Finals for England this summer (17-30 June) he could soon rival Harry Kane for the headline writers. Gareth Southgate should name his England U21 squad before the end of May and Wilson will be heavily watched if he gets the chance to play in the Czech Republic.

Callum get Junior Stanislas to take his picture
 with the AFCB fans behind him at Charlton.

Wilson will also want to play games in the Premier League and not sit on the bench as a squad player and that is why I think he has everything to gain by staying at AFCB this summer.
Danny Ings is the last striker from AFCB to have taken to the Premier league with great success, but it has taken him a year to make his name in the top tier. It appears that Callum Wilson will do so as well, but I'll expect it to be in the red and black of AFC Bournemouth that he will have to prove himself first.