With 28 days of the transfer market remaining, it seems that Real Madrid’s plan for their midfield is to sign Donny van de Beek and leave Paul Pogba at Manchester United.
This is a disappointment for the French player and for Zinedine Zidane, who was very keen to bring his countryman to the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu.
Nothing is certain in football, but it does appear that Van de Beek is hours away from joining Los Blancos and that Pogba is an impossible mission.
The fact that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer said he has “no doubt” that Pogba will stay at Old Trafford and the fact that the Premier League market closes on August 8 makes it complicated for Real Madrid, as Manchester United wouldn’t have time to reinvest any transfer fee received for the player.
Pogba didn’t travel to Cardiff for his side’s most recent match, due to a back injury that many in England were suspicious about.
It was even reported by The Daily Mail that Pogba was rebelling in order to try to force an exit, but Solksjaer insisted that the player was injured and also that he’d be staying and would probably be available to take on Chelsea at the start of the Premier League season.
Manchester United haven’t wanted to sell Pogba and, even if they were willing to negotiate, the starting point would have likely been around 180 million euros.
Pogba, then, is set to stay in England, but Real Madrid will reinforce their midfield with Van de Beek.
As was reported by MARCA on Friday, there is a deal between the Spanish club and the player and now an agreement just needs to be reached with Ajax.
Although these negotiations haven’t yet reached a conclusion, Real Madrid are hopeful of closing a deal for 50m euros plus a small number of potential add-ons.
The midfielder played in Ajax’s 2-2 draw with Vitesse on Saturday, scoring once and assisting another, and his team’s fans could be heard chanting for him to stay.
“I heard that, yes,” he said afterwards.
However, it seems that the 22-year-old Dutchman will be coming to the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu and his transfer could even be completed in the coming week.
