Manchester United fans can start to get excited, as Fabrizio Romano says Antony can be considered a Man Utd player at long last.
This saga has dominated headlines for the last few weeks, and now it looks like it won’t be long before Antony is officially announced as the Red Devils’ latest signing.
Writing in his exclusive CaughtOffside column, Romano has explained precisely how United finally agreed this transfer, which will cost an initial €95million, plus potentially €5m more in add-ons, making it the biggest ever Eredivisie sale.
It seems John Murtough and Edwin van der Sar were key in this deal, while Romano has also detailed how much Antony himself pushed to get the move to Old Trafford.
Discussing all the details of the signing, Romano said: “The announcement will be later this week, could be today or Tuesday but for sure the deal is agreed and done.
“The fee will be €95m guaranteed plus €5m add-ons, easy to reach – Man Utd will also cover part of solidarity payment to Sao Paulo. Payment terms have been agreed on Sunday late afternoon, with final check to contracts by Antony’s camp and lawyers.
“It must be said that John Murtough did a great job on this deal, and also Edin van der Sar at Ajax, he helped a lot to find a solution, and also worked hard to protect his club.
“He said to Ajax many times in the last 20 days that he wanted to join Man United. He was pushing a lot, no longer training with the team, and wasn’t in the squad for the game against Sparta Rotterdam. He wanted to follow his dream, he was planning for a big transfer.
“For Ten Hag, Antony was always considered a top priority target. Alfred Schreuder was very keen to keep the player, and even a few days ago they were rejecting big money from United. In the last three or four days they didn’t even want to negotiate with United, but eventually they found the best solution for this difficult deal.”
United fans will be excited about the potential Antony brings to their side, with the club having been in need of more quality in attack after some inconsistent form from the likes of Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial and Jadon Sancho for some time now.
Antony lit up the Dutch top flight and if he can continue along this trajectory in the Premier League he’ll surely be a huge asset for United.