For quite a while now, there has been talks going around concerning a new Nike Mercurial Vapor IX, and it now looks like an official launch is drawing ever closer. Anyhow, a couple of Nike players have taken matters in their own hands and have given us an early sneak peak at what is to come in the new year.

As we have revealed previously on our Facebook site, both Luka Modric and Zlatan Ibrahimovic are testing new Nike Mercurial boots, and considering the two gentlemen's boot history, there is a very good chance that we are looking at a new Vapor.

A few days ago, both players were seen training in a new boot model – Zlatan was wearing a black-out boot, and we quickly realised that it was not a Vapor VIII as we took a closer look at the boot and saw the 'rough' texture of the upper.

Luka Modric was bold enough to wear a brand new colourway, which firstly reminded us a lot of the first colourway of the Nike Mercurial Vapor Superfly III – but, when taking a closer look at Modric's boots, you can see that the Nike logo is not white as on the Superfly III, but it's green.

Lastly, we saw a rather clear sign as to what is coming from Nike as Manchester United left back Alexander Büttner posted this picture of his new Nike Mercurial boots on his Twitter account. A daring bronze and yellow colourway that surely will shine on the pitch – and Büttner has clearly had some trouble holding back his excitement for his new boots.

At this point nothing is official regarding Nike's coming Mercurial boot, but we expect to be able to tell you much more during January. Until then, feel free to share your thoughts and expectations with us in the box below.