One thing was certain at the end of this season of the Premier League – Declan Rice will not be a member of West Ham come September. The emotions were mixed after the Hammers won the Conference League finals, but the reality is that West Ham won’t make it into the top 6 for some time, and Rice wants trophies and Champions League football. So, he decided to reject a new deal which effectively ’persuaded’ the club to sell him while they still had the upper hand. During the season, it was widely believed that Rice would end up in his first club, Chelsea, but after the Blues began their wild buying spree, they ended up paying big bucks for Enzo Hernandez, thus ending interest in their former player. So, after the season was over, Arsenal was confident that they were the best suitor for Rice, but soon faced competition from German giants Bayern Munich, and now, another big club just stepped in – Manchester United. 🚨🔴TRANSFERS NEWS:West Ham are very interested in Scott McTominay, and see him as a replacement for Declan Rice.#mufc values the player at around £40m and the clubs are in talks about an exchange of players. – McTominay + 💰 for Declan Rice. pic.twitter.com/dhznLlX74K— Manchester United Forever (@UnitedLatesNews) June 21, 2023 Arsenal did their homework, analyzed the player, and was given the ’green light’ by the player’s entourage, but then West Ham swiftly rejected 90 million pounds offer. When Bayern heard the sum, they swiftly turned their way toward a much cheaper ’African Rice’ – Sofyan Amrabat, Morocco international from Fiorentina. And then Manchester United decided to step in, knowing that the Gunners would need time to negotiate the price. According to The Athletic, coach Erik ten Hag decided to step in and offer cash plus player deal. Manchester cannot ’stretch’ enough in this transfer window since they still don’t know who will be their next owner, and also they need to avoid any FFP rules issues, so they have come up with this plan. The idea is to avoid giving 90 million for one player, but rather less, and get rid of one of the unwanted players in the process. That’s rivalry, Marcus: Half of Manchester is annoyed while the other keeps partyingSo, the players in question are Scott McTominay and Harry Maguire. The Scotsman is actually an ideal candidate to replace Rice, since he plays in the same position, plays regularly for Scotland and has 144 games in the Premier League. On the other side, Maguire is not so much a position in need for the Hammers and has a big wage, which means he would have to accept the decrease. Also, Maguire has so far insisted on staying at Old Trafford for another season, so it’s not perfectly clear how Ten Hag meant to do the deal involving his defender anyway. ##NAJAVA_MECA_7331236##
