Sky Sports Reporter Names The Midfielder Who Man Utd Want To Sign “Before The World Cup” Starts On June 11th

BACK David Tully May 13th 2026 Man Utd could try and sign Brighton midfielder Carlos Baleba “before the World Cup”, according to Sky Sports journalist Lyall Thomas. The Cameroon international is a long-term target for the Red Devils, having tried to secure his services last summer. Thomas claims that Baleba remains high up the list of targets with one source telling him that the Red Devils are “keen” to do a deal ahead of the World Cup’s opening game on June 11th. Formal talks with Brighton have yet to take place, but with less than a month to go until the tournament kicks off in North America, there would not be much time to do a deal. The fact that Cameroon didn’t qualify, though, means that there will not be a hard deadline to seal an agreement for Baleba by then. Man Utd will need to pay a sizeable fee Speaking about Brighton’s valuation of Baleba last month, another journalist, Ben Jacobs, has said that offers below £70m are “not going to be engaged with” and a fee close to £90m may be required. Whether that will put off United from stepping up their pursuit in the 22-year-old, we shall have to wait and see. There are alternatives to Baleba Thomas has confirmed that Atalanta’s Ederson and West Ham’s Mateus Fernandes are both high up the list of options if the decision is made not to pursue Baleba, while Real Madrid’s Aurelien Tchouameni and Wolves’ Joao Gomes are also on the club’s radar. Nottingham Forest’s Elliot Anderson is still seen as the top target by Director of Football Jason Wilcox and the recruitment team, but there is a feeling that Manchester City are the favourites to secure the 23-year-old’s signature. Want more news on Man Utd? Add Man U News as a preferred source on Google David Tully David has worked as a football reporter for the last fifteen years. Having started as an intern at Snack Media, he then went on to become a freelancer, working on various different sites. At the start of 2023, he took up his current role as content writer for the Football News Network.