Manchester United endured a horrific summer transfer window, really.
The club spent the entirety of the market attempting to sign Jadon Sancho from Borussia Dortmund but they were unable to get a deal over the line.
As a result, they spent the final days of the transfer window scrambling around for new acquisitions.
The signing of Donny van de Beek came early in the window, but after that, it was something of a trolley dash, a nightmarish one that brought in inexperienced youngsters such as Amad Diallo and Facundo Pellistri, and an outright panic buy in Edinson Cavani.
The signing of Alex Telles looks good on paper but he remains an unproven asset in the Premier League and one has to wonder whether he can adapt to the top-flight.
Having failed to sign Sancho, it seems they also faced genuine disappointment with their second-best target.
The Daily Mail carries a report from Bild claiming that United had tried to sign Moussa Diaby from Bayer Leverkusen, but couldn’t get that done either.
They were willing to pay £45m to secure his signature and went for Diallo instead.
Leverkusen lost another key star in Kai Havertz in the summer, as he moved to Chelsea, and they were reticent to let another first-team player depart.
Diaby has made 48 appearances for Leverksuen, scoring 10 goals, and is valued at £28.8m by Transfermarkt.
GIVEMESPORT’S Harry Sherlock says…
This shows just how awful United are at transfers.
They were surely aware that Havertz moved to Chelsea and that the German club will have been reticent to part with another key member of the squad.
Diaby isn’t even the same kind of profile as Sancho; he doesn’t offer the same level of goal threat, nor the same tally of assists.
Instead, he’s just a young winger with a bit of pace.
That United were keen to sign him shows that, for one, their talent identification needs serious work, and secondly, that they simply don’t have the know-how to get deals over the line.
They were forced to settle for an inexperienced teenager instead who could really be anything.
It’s a damning indictment of the way they operate in the market.