Man Utd ‘willing to bid’ £8.4m for Depay despite ‘ripped up contract’ deal
Manchester United are reportedly ‘willing to bid’ £8.4m for Memphis Depay, despite the Barcelona forward being close to agreeing a free transfer to Juventus.
Depay, who has already had one less than successful spell with United, is yet to feature for Barcelona this term and has been told by the Catalans to find a new club.
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The Netherlands international has been in talks with Juventus this month, but the Serie A side were put off by the forward’s salary demands and are now instead closing in on the loan capture of Arkadiusz Milik from Marseille.
According to Metro, Depay and Barcelona were set to agree to a termination of his contract, which has a year remaining, meaning Juventus would not have to pay a transfer fee as they were willing to waive bonus payments owed to the them by the Spanish giants as part of the deal for Miralem Pjanic.
Depay has also been linked with a move to Tottenham and West Ham this summer, though those rumours have died down, and Marca (via Sport Witness) now claim that United could now make a late bid to sign him.
The 28-year-old played for United for 18 months having signed for £30m from PSV Eindhoven in 2015, and got seven goals and six assists in 53 appearances for the Red Devils.
It was a less than successful spell but Depay has impressed since then, thriving for Lyon before moving to Barcelona a year ago.
The report claims United are ‘willing to bid’ €10m (£8.4m) for Depay, who was, let’s remember, close to ripping up his contract and joining Juventus for free.
But anyway, £8.4m is not a lot of money for a forward who’s got 42 goals and 30 assists in 80 games for the Netherlands.
And had he not already played for United, this would seem like a very sensible move, and probably is despite himhaving already played for United.
More sensible perhaps than spending over £80m on Ajax star Antony, who reportedly remains their top target with Erik ten Hag desperate to bolster his forward options.
PSV Eindhoven’s Cody Gakpo is another player the Old Trafford chiefs are said to be considering and would likely cost around half of what Ajax want for Antony.
Both Antony and Gakpo are thought to be keen to leave their respective Eredivisie clubs to join Ten Hag at United, with movement expected on either or both in the coming days.
