Manchester United are reportedly eyeing a potential move for Douglas Costa, with the Brazilian winger thought to be a stop-gap measure as the English side’s efforts to sign Borussia Dortmund’s Jadon Sancho continue to hit a brick wall.
It is thought that Juventus value Costa at £30m, and with Dortmund insisting that Sancho’s £108m is met before he moves, the 30-year-old looks like an increasing pleasing, albeit temporary, prospect.
United were also linked with Welshman Gareth Bale but he seems to be inching closer to a move to his former club, Tottenham.
European football expert Julien Laurens has said that the Manchester side will look to make a “creative signing” instead of breaking bank for Sancho.
Ivan Perisic, Douglas Costa or Gareth Bale are thought to all fall in that bracket. This, he said, would not necessarily be a good move and it would be unlikely to placate United fans that have seen rivals strengthen their ranks significantly during the transfer window.
“No one, leave me alone. Be creative United please, be creative. Don’t go and get the veteran that is passed from one club to another club, from Bayern Munich or Juventus.
‘Douglas Costa, do you want to go to United?’. Please, please, please. Yeah okay [Perisic played okay last season], maybe he would be the only one. But please, why don’t you just look at your stats, the network your scouts have built, your scout reports, have a look at what’s been done in other countries, in other clubs? But please come up with someone else than those three.”
During the 2019-20 campaign, Costa managed 29 outings for Juve and impressed when he was available, scoring three goals in all competitions while laying on a further seven assists.
However, last season he was plagued with injury issues, missing 21 fixtures in total, and it was only after the suspension of play because of the coronavirus pandemic that he was able to put together a lengthy series of appearances, and even then these typically came from the bench.