Real Madrid are reported to be the ‘favourite’ to sign Borussia Dortmund starlet Erling Haaland, after rivals Barcelona pulled out of the race.
A month on from the closing of the transfer window, speculation is still rife about the future of the prolific Norwegian, with a whole host of top European sides believed to be interested in securing his signature in the near future.
That fact is no surprise considering the 21-year-old’s stellar form over the last 18 months or so, in which he has scored 68 goals in just 67 games for the Bundesliga side since his arrival from Red Bull Salzburg in January 2020, having registered an equally as impressive return of 29 goals in just 27 games for the Austrian club.
With the player having a reported €75m (£68m) release clause in his contract that comes into effect next summer, the expectation is that it will be his final season in Dortmund, with clubs ready to do battle at the end of the campaign to secure his signing.
While there is Premier League interest from the likes of Manchester United and Manchester City, according to German outlet Bild, it is Real Madrid who are now the frontrunners for his signature.
The report suggests that having failed with a substantial bid to sign Kylian Mbappe over the summer – with a reported offer of €220m rebuffed on deadline day by Paris Saint-Germain – Los Blancos will now move to sign the Frenchman on a free next summer, and use the money saved to fund a move for Haaland to form what could be a mouthwatering forward line.
While Madrid are in the running to sign two of the most highly-coveted forwards in world football, their cash-strapped rivals, Barcelona, appear to have backed out of the running to sign for the former Molde man, with the Catalan giants’ vice-president Rafael Yuste seemingly shutting down any hope of the signing happening.
“Between now and next year we will see what the situation is and what we can count on for signings,” he told Mundo Deportivo. “First you have to put the partitions to a house that we have found in ruins, so let’s focus first on fortifying it, first feed the house and then we will see what we can do, without losing sight of the fact that we always want to have the best, and Haaland It is one of the best in the world.”
Amid a financial crisis that lead to the departure of former talisman Lionel Messi, it would appear that the club simply cannot afford make such a signing.
“No. The president and the CEO said it, that in the previous term, which I also reiterate that it has been disastrous, they bought players without knowing if they could pay and that all they did was increase the debt, in addition to finding us the mass salary that we have encountered.”
