After a few years of underwhelming (and late) transfer activity, Manchester United are getting good deals done quickly this summer.
The club today confirmed the £26m signing of Armenian international Henrikh Mkhitaryan, following the earlier arrivals of Eric Bailly and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
In yesterday’s press conference, José Mourinho revealed that they had targeted a nucleus of four signings – and with three of them completed, all roads now apparently lead to Paul Pogba.
Manchester United would have two major hurdles to overcome in pursuing this deal – beating off competition from rival clubs, and convincing the player to return to a club that he did not leave on the best of terms and can’t offer Champions League football next season.
However, a report on the website of transfer guru Gianluca Di Marzio tonight has claimed that they are one step closer to overcoming the latter issue by coming to a salary agreement with the 23 year old and his agent, Mino Raiola.
The report states that the parties have come to an understanding (in principle) on a salary of €13m per year, though there has been no mention of how long the contract would be for.
Though Pogba was reportedly looking for £250,000 per week to re-sign for the Old Trafford club, if the report is accurate then he has reached a compromise of just over £210,000 – less than Zlatan and Wayne Rooney but more than Mkhitaryan, David de Gea and Bastian Schweinsteiger.
Manchester United will have been hoping to do a deal for around €100m (£84m), but multiple reports have suggested that interest from clubs such as Real Madrid, plus Juve’s deep reluctance to sell, means that they might have to go as high as a world-record €120m (just over £100m) to land the French international.
That being said, this deal is still some way from being completed. Manchester United are still not Pogba’s first choice – his agreement on joining them will depend on Real Madrid’s next move. Agreeing terms with the Premier League side could simply be a contingency plan.
Should Real drop out of the race, then that will leave Man United in pole position to get the deal done. If, however, Real boss Zinedine Zidane convinces Florentino Pérez to match Man United’s offer, then Pogba will almost certainly end up at the Bernabéu.
In the meantime, Pogba is set to start for France tomorrow evening as they take on Germany in the second Euro 2016 semi final, the winners of which will face Portugal in Sunday’s final.
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