JADON’S OFF
Sancho will be costly but he’s so good he can win Ballon d’or. His impact has been quite astonishing He does things off the cuff like Neymar. He finds space when there’s no space.. that’s priceless Things go in cycles and United will be back. Dortmund sta
OWEN HARGREAVES
EXCLUSIVE
Borussia Dortmund’s England winger is now one of the most coveted footballers in the world.
And United believe they are in pole position to complete a £100million-plus transfer later this summer – despite interest from Liverpool, Chelsea and Real Madrid.
Hargreaves quit Bayern Munich in the summer of 2007 to join a United team that had just won the Premier League and would defend their title and lift the Champions League a year later.
And he understands that Sancho has a tough decision to make, with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s top-four ambitions currently in the balance.
But he believes Sancho, 20, would be a perfect fit at Old Trafford and reckons the Reds should break the bank to land a player good enough to succeed Lionel Messi and
Cristiano Ronaldo as the best footballer on the planet.
Hargreaves said: “Jadon will know his own game and has to find what’s best for him.
“But United have an exceptionally good group of young players coming through – and any top young player would want to be part of that.
“Obviously, Liverpool and Manchester City have moved away from everyone else in the Premier League, but United would still be a team to join.
“Things go in cycles. Man United will be back and the recruitment of a player like Jadon would help.
“He knows Manchester well because he was at City, but whoever gets him will be very fortunate.
“I know Sancho is going to cost a lot of money, but you have a player who, potentially for the next decade, is going to be a unique player to watch.
“Can he become a Ballon d’or winner? Yes, because potentially he is off the charts.
“The impact he has had already has been quite astonishing.”
Canada-born Hargreaves, 39, joined Bayern Munich as a 16-year-old and won four Bundesliga titles, the Champions League and three German Cups before Sir Alex Ferguson lured him to United in a £17m deal.
The Reds had just reclaimed the title from Chelsea and had strikers Ronaldo, Carlos Tevez and Wayne Rooney terrorising defences.
Hargreaves believes Sancho has shown during his three years with Dortmund that he can become Old Trafford’s next superstar.
BT Sports Bundesliga pundit Hargreaves said: “A lot of people feel that young players will take time to develop.
“But if you look at players like Wayne Rooney and Jadon now, the great ones, the exceptional ones, figure it out.
“The game of football has become so structured and technical that a kid like him can bring his own style into the game and play with such creativity.
“It’s so hard to anticipate just what he’s going to do.
“Normally when you watch games of football, you know what is going to happen, whereas, with Jadon, he does things off the cuff almost like Neymar.
“That’s priceless because he can make things happen when teams sit deep. When there’s no space, Jadon finds space. “I think that, like Wayne, put Jadon in the middle of whatever the league is in any country and he would thrive.
“I covered Dortmund’s game against Paris Saint-germain in the Champions League and
Sancho was better than anyone on that pitch – even Kylian Mbappe and Neymar.
“His level is exceptional. He just thrives on creating and scoring goals.”
Hargreaves recalled: “The reason I decided to join United was because I had been in Germany for 10 years, I was 26 and I just wanted a new sporting challenge.
“It was hard to leave Bayern, we had unbelievable success.
“But when you win the title three, four, five or six times, at some point you want to test yourself in another league to see if you can do it there.
“Jadon will have a lot of options, but Virgil van Dijk told me he picked Liverpool because he had done his homework.
“He checked on the squad, the players and manager to see if he would fit in with his style – look at him now!”