OSLO – Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag is yet to make a decision on whether to keep forward Amad Diallo at the club next season, as Sunderland, Leeds, Southampton and a smattering of Premier League sides wait in the wings.
Under inky grey skies in Oslo, Amad lit up a pre-season curtain raiser that represented his first chance to impress Ten Hag since returning from a stellar loan spell at Sunderland.
Everything that persuaded the club to pay £19m (rising to £37m with add-ons) to sign the Ivorian from Atalanta remains – his quick feet, elastic control and offensive intent still set him apart, especially in gentle pre-season workouts like Wednesday’s.
But whether all of that will be enough to meet Ten Hag’s exacting standards and cement his place in the club’s long-term plans is another matter.
No matter how prodigious your attacking ability the Manchester United manager demands dynamism be matched by defensive nous. It’s why he waxes so lyrical about new signing Mason Mount. So Amad will need to show that his time in the Championship under the astute tutelage of Tony Mowbray has added discipline to his game.
Asked by i whether Amad will remain at Old Trafford next season, Ten Hag was curiously non-committal. “You don’t make conclusions after one week,” he said.
You can imagine the reaction at the Stadium of Light to that sort of caution. Sunderland are drawing up recruitment plans that presume Amad will be part of Manchester United’s thinking but they want to be considered if the Ivorian is made available.
Leeds, whose need for new recruits was clear in Norway, are also interested in a season-long loan while Southampton are another Championship club understood to have registered an interest.
Everton are among the Premier League clubs with Amad on their radar, although discussions with Manchester United this week have centred on the availability of long-term target Anthony Elanga – who they wanted to sign 12 months ago.
Nearly halfway through the long-term contract signed in 2021 when he made a stunning move to Old Trafford with then-boss Ole Solskjaer hailing him as the brightest young talent in the world, this is a crucial summer for Amad.
His potential is huge but he also, crucially, holds value in the transfer market for a club that must player trade efficiently this summer.
And Ten Hag clearly needs further time to decide. It was perhaps telling that he lumped the winger in with his younger players when speaking about what comes next in a pre-season that will see United play Lyon in Edinburgh next week before flying to the US for three games.
“Some of the young players impressed me, but I don’t want to single someone out,” he said.
“We are just in the first week, and I expected these levels and these performances. I will tell them during our sessions what I expect from them. How we judge the levels, the performance on Wednesday, what they have to work on. But after one week I never make conclusions.”
What may play in Amad’s favour is that Manchester United are hemmed in by financial fair play this summer, with the indecision of the Glazers extending deep into a pre-season that was meant to have seen them make a call on the future ownership of the club.
It is now five weeks since Qatari banker Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad Al-Thani’s Nine Two Foundation tabled their “final bid” for the club in an effort to force the Glazer family into a decision. Sources close to his side, and those with knowledge of Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos offer, say they are still waiting to hear what comes next.
That is clearly not helping United navigate a tricky transfer window. Pressed for fresh information on recruitment in Oslo, Ten Hag twice referred to being satisfied with what he already has in the squad.
His assertion that Dean Henderson could start as the club’s number one next season if Inter Milan continue to play hardball over Andre Onana felt genuine but would be the sort of compromise that doesn’t usually end well.
Ten Hag’s preference is clearly for Onana to join, the Cameroon international possessing far superior ability with the ball at his feet than Henderson, who wants to convert his Nottingham Forest loan into a permanent move. A failure to land him would mean a tweak to the system and when your goal is to catch a rampant Manchester City these little things matter.
“Goalkeeper is a key position,” the Manchester United manager said, with typical understatement, when asked if he wanted the Onana deal wrapped up quickly.
This is the part of the season where coaches like Ten Hag do most of their important work and having new recruits through the door to work on shape, systems and patterns of play would be the ideal. But he knows United well enough now to know things are rarely clear-cut on recruitment.
He sounded most enthused in Oslo when he talked of welcoming players granted extra time off after international commitments back to pre-season on Saturday.
“This is the moment in the season when you have time to train with your team and work on your way of playing,” he said. Ten Hag also talked of his team’s potential “progression” and hinted that having Mount on board will allow tweaks to the way they play. More midfield control is the aspiration.
Whether Amad will be part of those ambitious plans still seems open to debate.
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