Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho ready to fork out £98m to match Mauro Icardi’s release clause
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JOSE MOURINHO is ready to fork out £98million to land Inter Milan captain Mauro Icardi, according to reports.
The Argentina strike sensation has scored 53 goals in Serie A over the last two seasons.
And now the Portuguese boss wants to take the prolific forward to Old Trafford in the January transfer window, claim Ole.
Mourinho is trying to convince the United hierarchy to stump up the figure that would activate the release clause in his contract.
But they would need to convince Icardi that his future belongs in the Premier League as Inter prepare to offer him a bumper new deal.
His current contract expires in the summer of 2021 but the Italian side want to increase his release fee to ward off the likes of United and Real Madrid.
The futures of a number of United players, including manager Mourinho, have been called into question.
Paul Pogba could be a goner with Barcelona and former side Juventus interested in launching bids for his services.
But Mourinho will need to consider the futures of the likes of Romelu Lukaku and Marcus Rashford if he is to spend big on another striker.
The gaffer sensationally burst into a five minute rant defending his management of striker Rashford in his press conference yesterday.
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Mourinho blasted "obsessed" pundits before pulling out a piece of paper and reading out a list of statistics regarding Rashford's minutes of the field.
He said: “In season 2016-17 Marcus Rashford played 32 Premier League matches, 11 Europa League matches, including the final, three FA Cup matches, six League Cup matches and the Community Shield.
“He had 53 appearances but if you want to take to the mins of play, he played 3068 and if you want to divide that by 90 min matches, he played 34.2 matches of 90 min matches in 16-17.
“In 17-18, 35 Premier League matches, eight in Champion League, five in the FA Cup, three League Cup matches and the European Super Cup final.
“He played a total of 52 matches with 2,676 mins, if you divide that by 90, it gives you 29.7 matches, so with me, in two seasons, he had 105 appearances, 5744 mins, 63.7 matches of 90 mins, including five finals, so the people that is speaking about these minutes, I think they are a bit confused."