De Bruyne in Germany having his medical today. You'd have to think De Bruyne out, Matic in can only make us stronger given De Bruyne pretty much never plays and Matic should be a regular. Not a bad bit of January business.
You have to laugh at certain rival fans (no names) lamasting our business here. Apparently we have that kind of money to just throw at clubs in order to bring back failed players, **** all to do with the De Bruyne sale, not taken into account at all!
http://www1.skysports.com/football/...have-contacted-st-etienne-defender-kurt-zouma Would be a great buy, only seen good things from the kid.
What the **** is all this renewed Mata talk?!?! Surely having let KDB go we're not going to sell another attacking mid, especially to United. Unless Rooney is involved we can not do this deal. With Torres injured, letting Mata go could really leave us short for attacking options in the run in; which would be ****ing stupid given we are actually in a title race for the first time in 3 years.
The only way Mata will go to them is if we get Rooney in return. Mourinho isn't a dunce and they played hard ball with Rooney in the summer, we'll do it now. It will all be paper bollocks anyway.
Do you think you'd settle for a first option deal? I guess the problem with taht would be if Moyes convinces Rooney to stay on... But if we agree to sell him to another club (say PSG), you'd have no problem matching the transfer fee and offering competitive wages. And obviously having Mourinho and remaining in England would be big positives...
I'd say no. It still leaves United with too much power over whether they sell, for how much etc. Rooney is 29 and in the last year of his contract in the summer which makes him a 20 million pound player like RVP but United would probably try and get more like 30-40 million. Obviously I don't run the club but if it was me, any deal for Mata would have to be either silly money (50 million plus) or involve Rooney - whether that is now or the summer.
This did cross my mind, especially given the strained relations with the clubs over the Rooney deal (including that Mata or Luiz alleged deal United leaked). Give United enough of a sniff to weaken their chances of getting someone else. Personally though, I don't like the idea of using Mata as some sort of pawn in this kind of game.
Whether we get Rooney or not is irrelevant, there is absolutely no way we should be selling Mata to a PL rival. We shouldn't be selling him at all. Hopefully it is just paper talk but i do expect him to go in the summer, preferably abroad. PSG or Madrid IMO.
If the only way to get Rooney is to sell Mata than I could live with it. If Jose wants Rooney that much then I trust his judgement. United will spend big regardless so even if we don't sell Mata to them they will just buy another 40 odd million pound player like Fabregas etc. No Rooney, no Mata though definitely. However Mata should be getting more game time and I hope he stays even beyond the summer. It only takes an injury, suspension or loss of form to one of the others and he'll be back in the team anyway.
Being the devil's advocate here but if we sold Mata to Utd now he could help us take points off our rivals. In a tight year Utd still have to go to the Arsenal, City and Liverpool. Who knows he could still be our ace in the hole?
How the f**k does Guillem Balague seem to know everything regarding Mata? I know he's Spanish but it's between two English sides. I thought he was stuck up Barcelonas arse.
