Man Utd loanee given ‘space to understand where he is’ as boss makes him unavailable for selection

Jason Soutar
Man Utd youngster Hannibal Mejbri during a pre-match warm-up.
Man Utd youngster Hannibal Mejbri during a pre-match warm-up.

Sevilla are not considering Manchester United loanee Hannibal Mejbri for selection after less than two weeks in Spain, the club’s manager has confirmed.

The Red Devils let Mejbri join Sevilla on loan with a €20million option to buy included in the deal.

Erik ten Hag’s side paid €10m to land the Tunisian midfielder from AS Monaco in 2019.

He has only made 13 first-team appearances for United and made his debut for Sevilla in the 5-1 La Liga defeat to Girona last weekend.

The 21-year-old came off the bench in the 62nd minute and was booked in the 63rd, which pretty much sums up his senior career so far.

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His cameo against the La Liga leaders did not impress Sevilla manager Quique Sanchez Flores.

The former Watford boss says Hannibal needs “the necessary space to understand” what it means to play for Sevilla.

“After being with him, talking to him and having seen his first minutes in Girona, we are going to give him the necessary space to understand where he is, that he is at Sevilla and what it means,” he said.

“He has to know where he is and we want to see him. We have spoken with him and we believe that he has to have some time to learn, we wanted to give him space, time for him to see things from the outside and then he will return to the squad.

“In the end they are kids who have come and suddenly land in a huge club like Sevilla in circumstances of maximum demand. And they need a bit of location. And that location may be seen better from the outside than from the inside. You should take a step to understand what we want.

“Let’s see if the boy applies himself and I think that in the end he will understand perfectly what we want.”

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