133: Mbeumo DEAL DAY! Muani or Sesko BID!

0:01Hello everybody, good morning and welcome to the United Stands. I'm Mark Goldbridge and this is your latest Manchester United transfer news as United move closer to deal day for Mbormo. We'll probably get it today. Also, Mwani, what a price he could be available for. I'm starting to warm up to this deal. Obviously, we were linked to him last night. We'll talk about Mwani. Would you go Mwani or Sesko? We've got a bit of a live chat going on there. Sancho is expected to be the next person out of Manchester United. That could happen today. if not in the next few days. I also want to talk about Barada.

0:33Is he a bit understood, misunderstood as our CEO? Is he really to blame or is he in a situation that would be very difficult where he's come from? We'll talk about that as well. But early show this morning because it's wet and mild. It's wet and humid in the UK today. And I've got brain freeze because I'm drinking this because I'm rushing because I'm not doing a 10 o 'clock show because Seb's got a football match. I'm trying to eat toast, have my smoothie, which I'll tell you what's in it. It looks disgusting, but it tastes nice. But I'm drinking it quickly, so I've got a bit of brain freeze. But let's get straight into the show.

1:09So Brian Embermo, Fabrizio Romano reporting this morning in the last few minutes, actually, that he's completed both parts of his medical. And today he will be doing media duties and official sign off of his deal. It's just going to be up to Manchester United, whether they want to announce it on a Sunday or whether they want to announce it first thing on a Monday. We will see when that comes out. I mean, look, Brian Imbermo is a Man United player. The official part is always a little bit boring, but it's not boring if they do it quickly after Here We Go. And we only had a Here We Go on Friday, so if we get official today or tomorrow, it still will be really interesting to get that one done.

1:44So that will happen very quickly. Jadon Sancho, lots of Italian reports again that that deal is basically done and it's just about signing it off now. It wouldn't surprise me if Sancho left quick on the heels after Rashford. They're good friends after all. They both be singing Freedom now. And well, certainly Sancho will. And it's sort of fitting that Sancho will be out of the club quick. And I was thinking about this this morning, actually. I suppose if you are part of that five, Malassia, Rashford, Sancho, we know they get on really well. Garnaccio wants to be part of that group because he's wearing the Villa shirt with Rashford on it.

2:19Anthony, I don't really know. But if you are part of that group, you don't want to be the last one, do you? You don't want to be the last man standing you don't want to be the last one turning up at Carrington to train and that's why I think Sancho will happen very very quickly because his mate Rashford's gone now and you know we're still waiting on Ganacho that's the big one really and I'm hoping that this week we start to get some progress on that because United players aren't touching Carrington now they've been in Stockholm they're flying out to the States on Tuesday and they're going to be back for about two and a half weeks so you know it gets it'll get quite lonely won't it when And Rashford's training in Barcelona.

2:53Sancho's gone to Juventus. And you're just walking around in your villatop with Rashford on the back. And there's no one there. So as we know, Amirim did say, I pray you can find a club. Well, let's see if we can get it. Let's see if we can get it done. There just seemed to be some movement around Manchester United at the moment. And that leads me on to Mawani. Now, I have a live chat going on at the moment, Sesco or Mawani. 83 % of you have gone with Sesco and I do completely agree. However, looking at Mawani, and we have looked at him a couple of times over the last few years, he's been linked to Manchester United now by French reports, Santee, and he's not too bad when it comes to certainly French-sourced news.

3:40And he's saying that Manchester United and Newcastle have entered the race. Well, I think straight away you can say Manchester United have entered the race then, because if you're in a transfer race with Newcastle at the moment, you basically win, don't you? Even James Trafford's going to go to Man City now. So I wouldn't be worried about Newcastle. It's more about whether he's the right fit for Manchester United. 26 years of age, went on loan to Juventus in January, and it was potentially a player that we could have looked at that we didn't. In that time in Juventus on loan, he scored eight goals in 16 games.

4:10Now, he's never really been ridiculously prolific in his career. Eight goals in 36 for PSG, 16 in 34 for Eintracht Frankfurt. So I think if he's in the right environment, he's a goal every other game striker. I can't believe we'd go, not enough. I can't believe we'd go, that's not good enough. I mean, if we had a goal every other game striker, whoosh, we're going up that league. So that interests me. What I do know about Mawani is that he is incredibly quick. He can dribble. He can link up the play. And he's hardworking. So those sort of things are interesting. The price tag could be as low as 35 million quid.

4:57He's 26.

5:01I'm sort of like going, well, I definitely take him over. I'll take him over Vardy. I'll take him over Calvert-Lewin. I'll take him over Nicholas Jackson. For me now, Mawani is there in the Watkins, Mateta and Sesco group. If it's one of those four, I can deal with it. I can't deal with Nicholas Jackson. I can't deal with Calvert-Lewin. So I would say this morning officially, the Goldbridge seal of approval, Mawani can join the group. I'm not saying he's the one I want, but I'm not going to go, don't go and get him like Nicholas Jackson. I would say with Mawani at that price, around£35 million.

5:39There might even be a loan deal there as well. There might be. It's PSG. At this stage of the window, it might not be a bad idea. The downside of it is, is he going to be prolific enough in the Premier League? Is he going to be physical enough in the Premier League? And also, if you buy him and the contract is over four years, which it will be, and it goes wrong, in a year's time, you're stuck with a 27-year-old on a decent wage and a long contract and you can't recoup it. So there's ups and downs, isn't there? But with Watkins, in a year's time, he's going to be 30. There's no resale value there.

6:18With Mateta, he's the same as Mwani. If it doesn't work out, you've got him on a long contract. There's no resale value there. Sesco is going to be more expensive than all of them, but he's got the higher ceiling because he's young and he's still got development in him whilst also being ready so I do agree with 80 % of you I would go for Sesco out of all the options simply because whether he's better than Watkins or Mawani or Mateta is up for debate whether he will be better than those players in three years time I don't think it is up to up for debate so Sesco has always been considered to be one of the next phase of top class strikers in world football by the time he's 25 and he ain't there yet so I I think Sesco is the one that you would want to go for.

6:59There is a lot of noise around it. I don't know whether there's any substance. And can I just remind you about Sesco? He was only 22 in May. So he's actually, yeah, only 22 in May. So there is that sort of feeling to it. But I'm not going to sit here this morning and lie. I quite like Mwani as an option. But I would definitely put him into the phase of this is the last month of the transfer. window and we've sort of messed this up. That's where I would put it. It might be salvageable, but I'm looking at it now. I don't know about you. I'm looking at the striker situation now. And remember, Fabrizio on set on Friday, straight after Invermo, Man United are now going to go for a striker.

7:43I would go from one of these. Mateta, Mawani, Watkins, Sesko. I don't think we can go outside those four. I really don't. King Walker says he can't handle the pressure, Mark. I mean, look he did miss that big chance in the World Cup final but the chances of having a chance like that for Manchester United in the next four years are quite slim I don't think we're going to be in any Champions League finals or Premier League title races anytime soon I think this is a very long job at Manchester United and I'm I'm wide awake to that I mean I saw some reaction to the game yesterday and people were going Celtic beat Newcastle 4-0 Villa lost to somebody Man United a draw nil nil and everyone's going over the top and I'm like look I know this is going to happen it's so funny we predicted this a couple of weeks ago we were saying that the Amrim out crowd is going to come back they never went anywhere they just couldn't you can't be screaming Amrim out in the middle of June when people are trying to get the Embermo deal done there is no no one's going to listen to you so they have to be quiet for two months but the minute you get a game back you can be Amrim out and they are back but on the other side of the fence there's the toxic positivity people who just want to go it's not that bad it's only pre-season look at Newcastle they lost 4-0 this is all coming back and I think we're all mature enough to know that this is all going to come back but I don't really care whether Celtic beat Newcastle 4-0 and I don't really care whether Villa lost because Newcastle have got Eddie Howe and they play a system and they'll play the same system they played last season next season and Aston Villa have got Unai Emery and they're going to do the same.

9:21Somebody else's pre-season is not relevant to Manchester United. If Arsenal get beat or Liverpool get beat, I don't care. Our pre-season is our pre-season because it's important. It doesn't matter if Newcastle lose. They have a style of play and a manager and they know what they're doing. We don't have a style of play. We don't have a system that works and we haven't had a good transfer window yet. So when I'm watching Man United yesterday and I'm seeing very similar patterns to what I saw last year, I am going to say, I don't care whether we lost 4-0. I don't care whether we won 2-0. We could have scored at the end.

9:56We are visibly, it's not about the results. It's about the performance. And the performance yesterday was one of concern. We mentioned the Bruno midfield last night. We mentioned Casemiro midfield. Amren mentioned it as well. We've mentioned the back five again. We've mentioned the gap between the defence and the attack again. We've mentioned the inability to move the ball coherently. I mean, Leeds moved the ball from back to front better than we did numerous times. Those are all valid points. It's not about the result. I don't know why we have people in the fan base who are going out going, well, look at Ten Hag, he lost his first game.

10:32Look at Newcastle, they've lost. No, don't look at Newcastle and Ten Hag. Look at Manchester United. This is a really important pre-season. And against West Ham next week, we do need to see better. I'm just going to have a sip of this. Do you want to know what's in it? because it looks horrible.

10:50A secret to my success.

10:57That's why I look 22 instead of 62 because I have one of them every morning. Anyway, yeah, so look, I think that, yeah, I would add Mawani in. I would. Good morning, treated to an early show, says Henry. Yeah, we have Mbumo. hopefully we'll make the game in Chicago a little more exciting than yesterday's game oh 100 % Jeremy he'll be he'll be involved and Jeremy says get Mouane or Sesco um I wouldn't say I'd be happy with either of those by the way I just want to reiterate I'm not happy with Mouane or Sesco or Watkins or Mateta these are not the strikers we should have been going for but I'm also realistic that we're not where we should be and you have to grab the situation and get the best out of it let's get Mouane and say Martinez saved it and not he missed it since we might get him as well says Trishan uh yeah they could recreate it with Mouane we could possibly get a goalkeeper too well that's the most important thing I was looking at the price of Mouane and at 26 for 35 million would you take him over Watkins who's 29 for 50 would you take him over Mateta who they're going to probably push you to 45 i probably might do that would i take him over sesco who's going to go for about 70 i don't know i mean i think there's an upside to sesco more than the others really because of his potential um i just don't know whether we've got the money um beep says i'm more concerned with the midfield uh should have sold bruno and caleb says i'm happy with the incomings obviously and some of these outgoings are positive too but the values are so low how will it affect sell to buys is caleb well look let's talk about this um it's a decent deal this trademark um let's talk about this for a moment because i think it's really interesting we might bring it more into an eight o 'clock show um i'm probably going to do a two o 'clock show today because this is early and not as long as i'd like it to be but i think when you look at what we're trying to do with rashford going i think we've done the best deal we can do It's not a good deal.

13:01I think we've done the best deal we can do. And it's going to save us about 12 to 15 million pounds a year in wages. That's pure profit. If we'd sold Rashford for 30 million, plus the wages we would have saved, it would have been about 45 million. So it could have been better, but we couldn't do it. So we've saved about 12 million, 15 million from wages for Rashford. The same thing happens with Sancho when he goes because his wages are gone. so there's there's money there that is that that is absolute money like what we do with that 12 15 20 25 30 million pounds of wages saved from sancho and rashford which could be this week is on the club because we pay that in interest on on the debt so it could go there it could go towards the transfers that we already own money on but it also could go towards the budget so So there are ways to get creative.

13:54And then you add in what Ganacho is going to bring in. And you start to, you know, and Anthony's wage is 200 grand a week as well. So you start to build up 40, 50, 60, 70 million. What we do with that, we don't know. But it can feed other deals. So I'm not necessarily worried that we can't do other deals. Let's get Mouane and I've done that one. Thoughts on Liverpool getting Ekite, says Rajaf. Well, it's a good signing. We're not in that world, are we? We're not in the world where you get Jocharez. We're not in the world where you get Ekotike. We're not in the world where you can bid for Izak.

14:24We're not in the world where you can get Zubamendi. We're not in that world. I'd like us to be. We're not. I'm very happy with Mbimo and Kunia, but we're not in that world and we need to get in that world. I still think fifth place is up for grabs. The thing about me is, and I think a lot of you are like this, I can be negative, I can be realistic, but I can also be ambitious and challenge. And I think fifth place is up for grabs. I'm not saying we're going to get it, but I think it's up for grabs. Chelsea, Liverpool, Man City, Arsenal, they should get top four. Absolutely. They've spent the money.

14:55They've got the better squads. But fifth place is up for grabs and it could get you into Europe. It could get you into the Champions League, sorry. So that's up for grabs. You've got to try and be the best of the rest. I want to see Man United have a go at doing that. And a striker is going to be key to that. I still think a goalkeeper is going to be key to that. And I think a midfielder is going to be key to that. We've got time. We've got time. We need to react. We need to do it. Or if we're not going to buy a midfielder, someone like Agate, Maynou, has to be in the midfield too. You can't put Bruno in there.

15:23But these are all conversations to come. What we need to do over the next however many weeks is save as much money as we can from moving players on and spend as much money as we can on getting better players in. Because it's pitiful that Amorim's pre-season at the moment is one player in and Bumo, obviously, in a minute, and no players out. I don't count Rashford as a player out Because he wasn't here for the last six months of the season anyway So there's no difference It just helps us on the bank balance And this is where I was thinking about this And I wanted to throw it in And it's quite interesting for the last few minutes of the show Just to leave you to think about I think Jason Wilcox doesn't get cast as the villain very often And I think that's quite fair And I don't think Favell does as well Because they're young in post They're ambitious and they are going to have to learn on the job.

16:17But I think Omar Barada does get quite a lot of stick. And I was thinking about it and I'm not sure it's 100 % fair just because the ownership is concerning and the ownership is concerning. The Glazers are very concerning and they own most of the football club. And so Jim hasn't delivered. I don't know that we all automatically need to move down the pile and go, Barada's just a Glazer. Wilcox is useless. And I was thinking about Omar Barada and I thought you know what his job compared to what he was doing at Man City is completely different now I'm not here to say let's all say Omar Barada's good at his job but I'm also not going to say I'm not here to sit and say he's the worst CEO in the world I think I think Woodward was a joke he had no football experience at all I think Richard Arnold was a nice guy out of his depth another banker but I think with Barada he has a lot of experience at Man City of how to run a football club he was the guy that pushed for Amorim and I think where Barada's going wrong is a lot of his decisions have looked bad but when I analyse them is he really at fault so quick summary of Omar Barada's 12 months because officially it's 12 months Comes into the football club Splashes£300m on Agathe, De Ligt, Masraoui, Yoro and Xerxi Two months later sacks Ten Hag That looks bad But in fairness, the decision was to keep Ten Hag And that came from the top He would have had an opinion But it came from the top Rumoured to Jim Omar Barada didn't make the decision to keep Ten Hag It came from the top He then backs that manager to the tune of£300 million.

18:09Three months later, they're sacking that manager, again, on a board decision. He has an input, but he doesn't make the final decision. He then says and pushes for Amrim, even though there is a director of football pushing for somebody else, Ashworth. Berada wins that battle, gets Amrim in, Ashworth gets booted out, and Reuben Amrim's at the club. We then go into the summer transfer window again Where De Lapp's the priority Jokeres is a priority They go to other football clubs We didn't win the Europa League final And we're now doing deals That when he was at Man City They might have walked away from For example, with Kunia We paid£62m release clause You can't really argue with that With Mbemo we negotiate for seven weeks and pay the 70 million pounds that Brentford wanted on day one I'll not say we should have walked away but at Manchester City they walked away for in Barada's time where he was chief operating officer they walked away from Pogba, Alexi Sanchez, Harry Maguire Fred all players we bought because they didn't want to pay silly prices and when you're at Man City you can do what Arsenal have done with Jokeres and Sesko.

19:31You can line up a couple of deals and go, we're not going to have the piss. We have got money, but we're not going to have the piss taken out of us. So you line up two or three deals and you go, although we really want that player, although we really want Alexi Sanchez, let's pivot to this player because we're not going to have the piss taken out of us. And that's very different, very, very different at Man United because we're not in a position to do that and we've never been in a position where we pivot to a better player or another option. So that's very, very different as well. And I also think with the sales, when you look at the sales, it's not an easy job to sell players when it's very obvious to the whole world that they're up for sale.

20:13And I don't just mean Ganacho. I mean, the whole team is up for sale, isn't it? So I'm not here defending Barada, but I do think that most of my frustration goes to Joel Glazer and Sir Jim Radcliffe because they run the football club. I think there are challenges. If Omar Barada was the person who pushed for Ruben Amrim and he's been at Man City for years under Pep, I don't think he went, let's get Ruben Amrim and give him no resources. I think the plan was to give Ruben Amrim resources and that's not happened. So that leads me to think that although you can be critical of the negotiations and he is the CEO and Wilcox is the director of football, I do still feel at Manchester United, ultimately a lot of the pace and failures will still go back to the same people over the last 10 years i.e joel glazer i still think that the ceo job is a very difficult job at manchester united and why am i mentioning this because we have got an opportunity now where things are starting to happen and there's always a reason why i talk about it i haven't done three minutes on omar barada's not as bad as people think i'm just painting the picture of a lot of the things that have gone wrong are sort of out of his control but he has pushed for Amrim and I do think that this window is important to him and I do think that the next five or six weeks are going to be really key to his stewardship of Manchester United because Kunya and Mbemo are good deals no they're good signings but they're not necessarily good deals how we ended up doing it but there is five or six weeks left here I think Rashford's not a good deal but it's the best you can do.

21:50Sancho won't be a good deal, but it's the best you can do. But what can we do now in these last few weeks? Because I know for a fact that Wilcox and Amram want a goalkeeper and they want a striker and they might want a midfielder. Now, what can Barada deliver in those last few weeks? And I think he will be judged on that. There were parts of each team that was okay. Combine the two with a goalie and a striker, we'll have a first team issue, we'll be the drop-off, says Glen C. I think we've got a challenge for fifth I know that's a big big ask But people keep saying What's the aspirations for the season ahead I think we've got to go for fifth Rashid deal I don't think we'll I'm not saying we're going to get it But I think we have to Try Anup says Rashford deal is not an obligation to buy That means it's a bad negotiation At least we can have Is a 30 to 40 obligation to buy Anup I completely agree with you But how do you How If I'm Omar Barada And you say to me Oh it's a bad deal You should have had an obligation to buy and I say to you, Rashford only wanted Barcelona.

22:47Barcelona only wanted Rashford on loan. How do I get an obligation to buy in? I'm not Harry Potter. How do I do that? Rashford won't go anywhere else. So I've got no bargaining position and Barcelona will not put an obligation to buy in it. So all I can do is say, you're not going to Barcelona and then Rashford sits here for six weeks until August the 31st and goes to Barcelona anyway. And I probably have to pay half his wages. so I disagree I don't think it's a great deal I think it's the best deal we can do and I don't blame Omar Barada or Jason Wilcox or whoever's involved in that I don't because I think it's the best you're going to get basically Rashford and Barcelona are at us by the balls and they could have twisted further if they wanted to OK, I've got to go to the match considering the financial situation the usage of Xerxi I would opt for Mawani loan and look for a midfielder which is more important at this moment says Vijay I'm starting to warm towards it what I would say is I don't know whether this Mawani story is true we'll have to wait and see but Nicholas Jackson gives me nightmares Mawani gives me you know it makes sense I mean if we could do it on a loan I would do it on loan but I still think Sesko has to be the one if you're ambitious so over to you Omar let's see what we can do I'll be back with you a little bit later thanks everyone for watching I'm heading out into the rain now to watch amateur football but that's why we love it isn't it have a great day stay safe and I'll speak to you all in a bit uh take care there was something else i wanted to say and i completely forgot it hopefully it will come back to me um tillak says i don't understand one thing amrin plays wing backs with three players up front but yesterday we only managed three crosses they just run up and down i i don't like um i don't like what we do with our three four three it's a five three two at the moment well it's not even that it's a five two two one we've got to get those foot those those wing backs involved in the attack definitely take care i'll speak to you in a bit Thank you.