Signing Matheus Cunha and Bryan Mbeumo are leaps of faith, as is hoping Ruben Amorim can solve all the problems
I
n publicly rejecting the overtures of the Saudi Pro League, Bruno Fernandes has made it clear he wants to continue playing football at the highest level. That he wants to challenge for trophies. That he has no interest in wasting what remains of his peak years jogging around aimlessly in the service of a vast public relations project, providing lucrative content for a cruel and heartless regime. Despite all this, he’s more than happy to remain at Manchester United for now.
There were other angles to this decision. In a sense, Al-Hilal’s courtship of Fernandes represented a kind of catch-22 for United, desperate to reinforce their underperforming squad while remaining compliant with profitability and sustainability rules. Only a player who truly loved United could contemplate leaving in order to help balance the books. But in signalling his willingness to leave, Fernandes merely demonstrated why United could not possibly let him go.
Here, after all, is a player who has firmly established himself as one of the best midfielders in the world while playing for a team that has just finished 15th in the league, who so clearly adores this club and its people more than its parasitic owners ever will. But in this market everything has its price and for Al-Hilal – under the new management of Simone Inzaghi – that price was reported to be £100m in fees and around £50m a year in wages.
