Manchester City’s interest in Sporting midfielder Matheus Nunes is back being highlighted by the Portuguese media, this time in a story from newspaper A Bola.
The outlet today features a piece claiming that following Pep Guardiola’s positive comments on the 23-year-old, the Premier League side are indeed interested in the signing, and now ‘advance’ for it.
It’s said Manchester City are still to place a bid for Nunes, but an approach was already made. Now the English side are thinking of a formula to get the player signed for as little as possible.
The Brazilian, who plays internationally for Portugal, is protected by Sporting with a release clause worth €60m, and the Lions set a minimum price of €40m, something that the Citizens are already aware of.
Now due to the good relationship and partnership between the two clubs, an alternative is to include players in the deal and get that fee reduced.
The first player who could be included in a deal is obviously Pedro Porro. Sporting are about to trigger the €8.5m buying option they have over him, and Manchester City could now discount that amount from a deal for Nunes.Then there are two other footballers from the City Group who could make their way to Lisbon. One of them is Talles Magno, who now plays for New York City, and the other is Ante Palaversa, currently loaned by Manchester City to Kortrijk.
Matheus Nunes has been drawing interest from several Premier League clubs, with the likes of Everton, Newcastle United and Wolverhampton Wanderers all being recently linked to him. The exchange of players is something that could give Manchester City an advantage in this race.
