Manchester United expect David de Gea to stay at Old Trafford for the whole of the season and do not envisage Real Madrid’s interest being rekindled in January.
The goalkeeper is likely to have played Champions League games for United by then in any case, and it would make little sense for Real to pay money for a player they could pick up for nothing at the end of the season.
United insiders insist Louis van Gaal is happy with the business conducted during the transfer window, and part of that is the prospect of a full season from a committed De Gea. United trust De Gea’s “unbelievable professionalism” will come to the fore after the international break, when he is expected to get his head down and perform at his best.
Should it turn out that way United are likely to take a financial hit, receiving no fee for a player variously valued at up to £40m and suggested in part exchange for improbable targets such as Gareth Bale and Sergio Ramos – though both club and supporters would consider that preferable to negotiating the season with the underwhelming goalkeeping options otherwise available. Neither Sergio Romero nor Víctor Valdés have played enough club football in recent seasons to convince. Romero looked uncomfortable in United’s defeat at Swansea a week ago, while Valdés has fallen out with Van Gaal, been omitted from the Champions League squad and would have been permitted to leave for Turkey this summer had a proposed deal with Besiktas reached fruition.
United officials are being branded as inexperienced in Spain for the way in which the De Gea transfer fell apart, a charge the chief executive, Ed Woodward, has heard on occasion before, though despite the club’s insistence that everything was done properly one can readily give credence to suggestions that annoyance over the way Real blocked Ramos led to last-minute sabotage at this end.
United did not bother to bring in any credible goalkeeping alternatives to De Gea for a start, and if claims of Van Gaal being delighted with the way the window went are correct it is hard to believe keeping hold of his No1 goalkeeper was a complete accident. Rumour already has it that De Gea may be offered a new contract. All that remains to be seen is whether De Gea himself is delighted to spend another year in Manchester. It may be part of his original deal, but his Madrid-based girlfriend probably still thinks the place is uglier than the back of a fridge.
In broader terms, what the summer transfer window proved is that Manchester is where the money is. In point of fact, the entire Premier League is awash with money and the new television deal has not kicked in yet, but Manchester was where the most eye-watering sums changed hands. City spending almost £50m on Raheem Sterling was par for the course after being freed from financial fair play restraints – and within the insane bubble that is Premier League economics the former Liverpool player may even be worth that amount – yet despite a near faultless start to the season Manuel Pellegrini was not finished. Kevin De Bruyne and Nicolás Otamendi were also brought in at a combined cost of almost £90m. Those two alone, neither filling particularly obvious gaps in the City starting line-up, cost not far short of the £100m Joachim Löw has claimed Germany invested in youth development in recent years, guaranteeing future success at international level. “It makes sense to raise your own young players,” the Germany coach said, stating the obvious yet expressing a truth which the Premier League finds unpalatable.
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