FORMER Saints defender Jannik Vestergaard has opened up on a failed January 2020 Leicester City transfer and insisted: “It seemed done, but Southampton blocked the move.”

The Dane completed a summer move to Brendan Rodgers’ Foxes last week, before making his debut off the bench in a 1-0 opening weekend victory over Wolves on Saturday.

This move comes a year-and-a-half after the described failed transfer, in which Vestergaard saw his contract run down to its final year and reached the EURO 2020 semi-final at Wembley with his country.

It only took a deal worth £15m to eventually prise him away from Ralph Hasenhuttl’s Saints squad, but defensive problems were paramount in the opening day second-half defeat to Everton.

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Reflecting on the prior failed move, Vestergaard said: “In football, many things happen very quickly.

“It seemed done at the time, but it suddenly wasn’t, Southampton blocked the move.

“You need to be ready for anything. So I spent 18 months more at Southampton and played some of the best football of my career.

“Things take their course and I've ended up in a better state.”

For much of his early Saints career, 6foot 6’ Vestergaard’s performances didn’t match that of his £20m+ transfer fee from German side Borussia Monchengladbach.

He did begin to show some of that worth, though, with brief purple patches and long, raking cross-field passes during the 2020-21 season.

The onus is now on Saints to replace Vestergaard and sure up a defence that looked otherwise rocky at the weekend.