Manchester United continue to be linked with Mario Mandzukic in the January transfer window, but reports claim they may have to pay a significant fee for the veteran.
The 33-year-old has effectively been frozen out by Juventus boss Maurizio Sarri so far this season, as he has yet to feature in Serie A and was left out of their Champions League squad.
Having fallen way down the pecking order given the number of options in attack that Sarri has at his disposal, Mandzukic has often been left out of the squad altogether.
In turn, an exit in January is seemingly the best solution for both parties, but as noted by Calciomercato, while Man Utd are specifically named as a possible option in the New Year, there could now be a problematic condition involved in any possible departure.
The report adds that Juventus want at least €10m to sell Mandzukic, and considering his lack of playing time this season, his age and contract, which expires in 2021, it has to be questioned whether or not that would be smart business from the Red Devils.
With that in mind, Juve may well have to lower their demands or risk seeing United look elsewhere, as Solskjaer certainly needs reinforcements in attack in January but there may be better value-for-money options out there.
The Red Devils have picked up just nine points from their opening eight Premier League games of the season, and in that time, they’ve managed to score just nine goals.
That’s the second worst scoring tally of the top 12 sides in the standings, and four of those goals came in the same game against Chelsea on the opening weekend of the campaign.
In turn, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has a problem that needs to be solved in January and while Mandzukic could offer experience, leadership, quality and a different dynamic in the final third, €10m is a lot of money for a player at this stage in their career off the back of not having played a great deal of football for months now.
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