The Story So Far:

Over the last hours, Manchester United fans over the internet have been excited over rumours emerging about Donny Van De Beek potentially joining Manchester United after he was completely left out of their friendly match against Eintracht Frankfurt. After the match, Ajax manager, Eric Ten Hag, mentioned that there have been “developments” on that front. Since then, major outlets like Mirror, Fabrizio Romano, ESPN and a few other sources have confirmed the news that Manchester United are showing concrete interest in signing Van De Beek. Oriol Domenech, a person close to the sporting director of Ajax – Marc Overmars, has also said that Van De Beek is close to signing for Manchester United. Barcelona and United were in the running for his signature but it has been confirmed that Barcelona are “not an option” now. All in all, Donny Van De Beek is as good as confirmed so long as there isn’t a last-minute offer from Spain’s big 2.

He will be available for a price tag of around £40 million and the player would love to play for us. Manchester United have been in contact with his agents for weeks and given our good relationship with Ajax Amsterdam, the deal should go smoothly. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has spoken to Van De Beek personally and convinced him of his role in making Manchester United more competent and will conduct talks with him over the next 48 hours. All that is left is for Woodward and his merry men to do is put in the bid and sign the player. 

The flip side of the story, which has come from most English journalists is that Manchester United are only just monitoring the situation and have asked Ajax to update them if any developments occur. However, it is easy to debunk this story as a player is not dropped from the squad and the manager does not speak about it publicly until and unless the talks are at a very advanced stage. To that into perspective, Dortmund continued to play Jadon Sancho in pre-season games and the board denied any deal with United even though the clubs were in “advanced talks”. So a deal with Donny Van De Beek should be imminent.

Player Profile:

Donny Van De Beek is a 23 year old Dutch national currently playing for Ajax Amsterdam. He is a midfielder and said to excel as a number 6, 8, and 10. Van De Beek is better at offensive work than defensive work though. He will fit in along with players like Bruno Fernandes and Paul Pogba and can rotate with them during the tougher fixture schedules. He isn’t the kind of player who’s an instant fan favourite because he does a lot of the dirty work on the pitch. He is very good in a Thomas Mulleresque role wherein he creates space for either himself or the attackers around him like Anthony Martial or hopefully Jadon Sancho. He is an extremely hard-working player and is a manager’s dream signing because of his tactical flexibility. Van De Beek loves popping into the box when least expected which is why his goal contributions are quite good for a central midfielder. He had 10 goals and 11 assists in the 2019/20 season and 17 goals and 13 assists in the 2018/19 season. 

Being only 23 years of age, he is yet to hit his peak and it will be very interesting how he can fit into this team and elevate us to the next level.