Manchester United have a substantial list of players who are up for sale this summer, with Antony among them.
Back in the summer of 2022, Manchester United paid £84m to sign Antony, which was immediately a deal which raised eyebrows.
The price paid was substantially more than the £58m United wanted to pay for Antony when negotiations began for the Brazilian in July of the summer, while a deal wasn’t agreed until August.
Antony was one of several former Ajax players Ten Hag signed after he became the boss, which turned out to be a pretty disastrous recruitment plan for United.
After signing his one dimensional winger, Ten Hag actually backed Antony to succeed, which never came to fruition, despite scoring on his debut against Arsenal at Old Trafford.
Now, this summer has seen rumours of the pair reuniting.
Erik ten Hag reacts to Bayer Leverkusen’s Antony interest
When Antony graced Carrington on September 1st 2022, it was the second time that Ten Hag oversaw the acquisItion of the Brazilian winger.
Now, this summer has seen Bayer Leverkusen show an interest in signing Antony, with the Bundesliga side managed by Ten Hag.
This opens up the chance of a third time for the duo who have a father and son-like relationship, with Ten Hag now speaking out over the chances of this happening in an interview with BILD, as quoted by Fabrizio Romano.
“He has great quality. I signed him twice. He was like a son to me, he still is a son to me”.
“We’re not interested in him at the moment, but we’ll see what happens in the future.”
Ten Hag’s stance over the deal is very coy, and suggests that he would be open to the deal if the terms were right. At the moment, it has been reported that United are asking for £50m to sell Antony, which is a lofty target.
This asking price is unlikely to be met and maybe Leverkusen have been put off.
Antony wants to join Real Betis
While reuniting with Ten Hag would surely be appealing to Antony, it is not seen to be his first choice destination.
Instead, Antony’s head remains set on joining Real Betis on a permanent basis this summer after he reignited his career there last season on loan.
Antony was an instant sensation for Betis, however, his performances almost played himself out of being affordable for the Spanish side.
So Betis have been offering a shared ownership deal for Antony, which United are open to at the right amount and structured favourably.
Antony is probably the easiest of the five exiled players to sell for United this summer and there should be an acceleration in the coming weeks.
from United In Focus https://ift.tt/GrUMf0m