With the exception of Belarus, South Korea and now, Germany, global football is currently suspended. The Premier League has been given the all clear by the government to restart in June, behind closed doors, and today brought news that training, in small groups, can now resume.
However, there are still plenty of questions to be answered when it comes to Project Restart, and we’ll learn more as the days and weeks go by. Until football actually returns, we still have plenty of news items to cover. So let’s take a spin through the United community in cyberspace.
Go here for today’s MUFC news and notes round-up. We begin with the latest on United’s top transfer target of this summer, Jadon Sancho. Chelsea are rivaling United in the race to acquire his signature, and it is thought that current Chelsea man and former Borussia Dortmund teammate Christian Pulisic could help their recruiting efforts.
Pulisic, who grew up a United supporter, extensively praised Sancho in an interview with Sky Sports.
Will Sancho follow in his footsteps and move from the Signal Iduna Park to Stamford Bridge? The BVB star has been strongly linked in transfer rumors all spring, with several teams, beyond just Chelsea and United, thought to be keen.
Pulisic discussed how great BVB is at developing talent.
“It’s one of the big reasons why I was really drawn there when I was very young. I think they (Dortmund) give younger players opportunities and it’s a great club to go and develop,” Pulisic told Sky Sports News.
“He (Sancho) was given an opportunity, just like I was, at a very high level, and they show you right away that they trust you and they’re going to give an equal opportunity to all the players.”
Any team that does acquire Sancho will likely have to pay Dortmund 100 million pounds for him. The development of Sancho sort of led to Pulisic seeing less playing time in the Bundesliga, and eventually, the time came for him to move on.
If Sancho does come to Chelsea, it will be interesting to see how Frank Lampard manages having him on the pitch along with Pulisic. Maybe that’s an advantage to United? Hard to say, it’s all speculative.
Elsewhere, as training restarts, it’s going to be a really interesting and special period for one specific player- striker Odion Ighalo.
He was signed on deadline day in the January transfer window, in a loan deal from Chinese Super League Shanghai Shenhua. Coming to United was a dream move for Ighalo, and obviously he wants to stay beyond this season/the end of his loan deal.
Shanghai reportedly wants him back while United are open to the idea of keeping him around next season and even longer. His future remains uncertain, and the Manchester Evening News has more on that here.
Finally, there are reports in Spain claiming an agreement has been reached in the effort to procure Atletico Madrid midfielder Saul Niguez. He’s a long time target, and reportedly the financial hardships of the coronavirus pandemic has meant that Atleti were willing to finally and drastically slash their price.
The People’s Person, citing a report in Todofichajes.com, claims that their original asking price of €150M/£131m to €80M/£70m.
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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