Global football is currently on pause for the most part, but the Premier League is scheduled to restart on June 17, with matches to be played behind closed doors. There are still some questions regarding Project Restart, but contact training is back, and there is high confidence that the PL will return soon and complete the season.
Until football does restart, we still have plenty of news items to cover and analyze. So let’s take a spin through the Manchester United newsphere in cyberspace.
For today’s MUFC news and notes, go here.
This edition of MUFC transfer talk is, well in the words of Dr. Dre, “it’s all about the d.o.e. if money is the root I want the whole damn tree.” Or as Wu-Tang Clan taught us, “cash rules everything around me.”
United Executive Ed Woodward has famously said that this summer transfer window will be unlike any before, mostly because the spending will reduced. This theme relates to both United’s all-time most expensive player, and their top target for the summer.
We’ll start with the footballer who they’re most likely to hold on to, and cover the one they’re not likely to get, for the same reasons, after that.
The list of potential suitors for midfielder Paul Pogba was always extremely short to begin with, but now, in this age of clubs tightening their belts, it’s going to be even harder to potentially move him.
As much as the Frenchman has been linked with a move away, for quite some time, the leading contender to acquire him, Real Madrid, is out of the picture now.
That’s according to the Daily Mail, who report that the Bernabeu fears massive discord in the dressing room if they bring in Pogba on his £15 million net wages at United, which amounts to about £290,000 per week.
That especially won’t fly given the 10% pay cut the players are taking for the rest of the season. La Liga is set to restart on June 11, but they’re still trying to recover from €300m (£270m) losses suffered due to the pandemic shut down.
Money is also an object when it comes to Jadon Sancho, as Borussia Dortmund want a minimum of £100 million (€110m/$123m) in order to do a deal. That’s according to Goal, who also claim the 20-year-old reportedly wants a move back to the Premier League.
It has been said, over and over that United are leading the race to acquire him, ahead of Chelsea, but BVB seem committed to holding their price. Sancho is supposedly not interested in renewing his Dortmund contract, but it runs until 2022.
The Pogba deal in 2016, at £89.3 million, still holds the United and English transfer fee record. So it’s quite a leap go from that amount to Sancho’s asking price.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly contributes to WGN TV, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Now and SB Nation.
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