Daily Mail Manchester United follows reporter Chris Wheeler and team to write an exclusive weekly report, dated May 6, from Hupu.
Rashford key to Leo transfer
This summer, Manchester United attaches great importance to the introduction of a left winger, but the club plans to intensify its pursuit of targets such as AC Milan's Rafael Leao after clarifying the future of Marcus Rashford.
Manchester United is still negotiating with Barcelona on Rashford's transfer. Barcelona, which is about to step up its contract extension, hopes to renegotiate his 26 million pound buyout clause, or loan him to the Camp Nou Stadium for another year. Even if Barcelona ultimately fail to sign Rashford permanently, his future at Old Trafford does not seem very clear given his salary of up to £315,000 a week. It is understood that Arsenal and Bayern Munich are closely monitoring the development of the matter.
Despite this, with Rashford's future up in the air, United are unable to commit to signing another left winger, although they have evaluated a number of options, including Leao. The 25-year-old Portugal international is worth between 50 million and 60 million pounds. AC Milan is preparing to sell him this summer, and both Liverpool and Arsenal are interested in him.
Other key positions United are looking to strengthen include left-back, centre-back and back-up goalkeeper.
Manchester City has the final say
We are disappointed that the FA Youth Cup final between Manchester United's U18s will be held at the Manchester City Academy Stadium.
It was a long negotiation between the two clubs. It was too long to complete the game before the May 9th deadline set by the Football Association. It was finally determined that the game could not be held at the Etihad Stadium.
Under normal circumstances, the final of the Youth Cup (the most prestigious competition in youth football) is held at the home of the first team, and Manchester City is the only club this century to use its youth training base to host such an event.
In 2022, Manchester United last reached the Youth Cup final. At that time, more than 67,000 fans flooded into the Old Trafford Stadium. In the end, the team led by Kobe Menu and Alejandro Garnacho won the championship.
There have been rumors for weeks that there were discussions about scheduling the game after the end of the Premier League season. The proposal to change the venue to Old Trafford was not proposed by Manchester United, but by the Football Association. Ultimately, the game will be held at Manchester City's youth training ground on May 14.
Sources from Manchester United's U18 youth team expressed their disappointment to the Daily Mail. They declared that it was a pity that the first Manchester Derby Youth Cup final since 1986 could not be held at the Etihad Stadium. However, they were unwilling to conflict with city rivals Manchester City because of this change.
At the same time, Manchester City insisted that they did not want to give up their home advantage, and said that the main reason why the Etihad Stadium could not host the game was that the North Stand was under construction in preparation for the test match on May 20.