Kalidou Koulibaly ‘wants to sign for Man Utd’ and Solskjaer has already made up his mind

Man Utd: Pundit discusses possiblity of signing Kalidou Koulibaly

Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly is reportedly keen on a move to Manchester United, with the 29-year-old said to be the player that manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has been coveting ‘for a long time’. The centre-back has long been linked with a move away from Napoli but he remained at the Stadio San Paolo this summer despite links with the likes of United, Manchester City and Liverpool.

Now, according to Spanish outlet Marca, Koulibaly could finally be on the move, with United said to be his potential destination.

The outlet claims that Koulibaly wants to make the move to Old Trafford and that Solskjaer is a fan of the player.

Koulibaly’s current deal with Napoli runs until 2023 and a summer move could be on the cards.

Napoli’s owner Aurelio De Laurentiis recently slapped a £100m asking price on Koulibaly and insisted he would not be leaving the club this month.

JUST IN: Man Utd have secret weapon in Premier League title race on Liverpool

Speaking on talkSPORT, Jim White revealed he had spoken to De Laurentiis and asked him if there had been any approaches for Koulibaly.

“There isn’t a window in the last two, three or four that we don’t see big mentions of the Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly,” White said.

“This morning, I spoke to Aurelio De Laurentiis, the Napoli owner, and said what about your player, are there bids in for him?

DON’T MISS
Solskjaer has already tried twice to get Man Utd to sign Haaland
Liverpool can’t think about title admits Klopp after Burnley loss
Man Utd backed by Wayne Rooney to beat Liverpool and Man City to title

“He stays and that was as recent as this morning. Anyone going in with anything other than £100million for Koulibaly can forget it.

“He’s absolutely not for sale unless one of the big clubs in England come up with £100million.”

Koulibaly was most heavily linked with City last summer but the Blues ended up bringing in Nathan Ake and Ruben Dias to strengthen their backline instead.

Speaking to the Athletic, City’s chief football operations officer Omar Berrada revealed that Koulibaly was not top of their list of defensive targets.

“The truth is, we never were in negotiations with his club at all about him,” Berrada said.

“It was very interesting to see the amount of noise that was coming out from certain media outlets and social media.

“I smiled because there were certain instances where people were reporting that the deal was agreed, done, about to happen, he was going to be announced in a few days, when we were never in touch at all with Napoli about him.

“He’s definitely a top, top player, so some consideration was given to him, but really within some parameters that were very clear to us — and those parameters never came into play, so he was never really considered in that sense.”

Source: Read Full Article