Welcome to Back Pages, bringing you everything you need to know about the biggest sports stories making the headlines in the morning's newspapers. I'm Teddy Draper and joining me are John Cross of The Mirror and Martin Hardy from The Times. Welcome to you both.
Okay, let's start with the transfer window. Day two of this mini window that runs until June the 10th for clubs to get early business done. Manchester United, John, not in the Club World Cup. Let's come to your paper. Here we mow United target £50m B-star after De Lappe KO. How close does this deal feel for you, John? Does it feel like it might happen?
Yeah, it does really. I do think, Teddy, sometimes we forget just how powerful players are in the dynamics of a transfer. And Mbremu, reading lots of the coverage, has made it absolutely crystal clear that he wants to go to Manchester United's.
Now, listen, you know, over the last few weeks, we've probably taken pot shots and sort of kind of, you know, painted Man United and Old Trafford to be the kind of the crisis club. But they still hold that amazing gravitas. They still have that amazing pull as one of the great clubs.
And clearly it's appealed to Brian and Bruno, who I must say, I think is a spectacular player. I was actually talking to a former Premier League manager not so long back, and he was saying, do you know what? This guy's got a great eye for a player as well, a great scout, and
and basically saying this guy could play at the very highest level for any of the top clubs in the Premier League because he's got everything. He's got dynamic sort of ability, pace, power. He's got fantastic ability in goal scoring situations and indeed assists.
And I tell you what, we are kind of feeding into a little bit of potentially Brian and Bruno in and, you know, Kunja as well. So you could have Kunja on one side, Brian and Bruno on the other. And I have to say, all of a sudden, United begin to take shape. We've been looking for a shape and direction under Ruben Amorim, haven't we? Really, to be honest.
And it feels like if they could get these couple of bits of business done, and I tell you what, what a lift it will be for the club if they could get it done in this early part of the 10-day window before the Club World Cup. I think a lot of fans will be looking at that and saying, that's a Man United statement, that is, if they can get those done. So I actually think United fans...
For the first time in a while, Teddy, I think they've got reason to smile and be a little bit optimistic on this. You've got them smiling watching this programme, John, that's for sure. The summer of hope at Old Trafford. Martin, what's your take? How big a statement would it be to get Mbomo over the line, given the season he's just had, the age he is, 25? I think it speaks to the necessity for Manchester United right now that they can't...
go and find 22 or 23 year olds from Dutch football which they have tried and it has clearly failed they need finished articles that you know for Ameren there's a lot of questions coming in the next six months as John says if you had Kuna and Buemo and you're talking 15 Premier League goals for Kuna last season after 12 and 12 so he's a player on the rise and Buemo 20 Premier League goals last season after 9 and 9 a player that I think just about makes every Premier League team better the
So, yes, I think it makes obvious sense. He's 26 in August. It's a statement. You'd want the players to be ready right from the start. You're shopping in the store here rather than going online and waiting for the delivery. You know they can play in English football. It's whether or not they can adjust to the challenge of joining Manchester United, which John has touched upon there.
This is still, for all this terrible demise in the last few seasons, this is still potentially, what, the third biggest club in the world? Footballers want to play for Manchester United still, and this will be statement science, but it's not easy for players to fit in, and it's definitely not easy for players to fit in at the minute. The big conundrum is whether you say, do you sacrifice Bruno Fernandes to bring these two in? I think if Manchester United are serious, and we are aware they have financial problems, but if they are serious, can they...
get the three of them together next season. You could have Cunha playing up front with Mbwemo and Bruno Fernandes behind them. Bruno Fernandes' stats are still exceptional last season, the most chances created in the Premier League, 19 goals in all competitions for Manchester United, 17 assists and a terrible team. He was always the player that, when they made late comebacks, it sometimes felt like they were going against the manager's tactical instruction, it was his drive.
He's got a huge decision to make if the figures we see are correct in terms of, was it £700,000 a week? And for Manchester United, £100 million is not something to be sniffed at. By the same token, this is a club that spent a quarter of a billion pounds on Hoyle and Sancho and Anthony. So they've thrown a lot of money away. This is a big statement. If they sell their captain, if it's possible, I always think you should try and hang on to your best players and
Bruno Fernandes has been the guiding light in a poor team for three or four years. If you get them three together next year, the whole impetus of Manchester United changes. What's your take, John, on what it means for Bruno Fernandes and Manchester United? You had that enticing prospect of a front three. I'm presuming that if Bruno Fernandes stays, it will be deployed in a more deep-lying central midfield role, as we saw in the Europa League final, would he, with Kunio and Mbomo possibly either side of Hoyland or whoever is the striker?
Well, there are two schools of thought here, Teddy, aren't there, basically? Because there's no doubt about it that Bruno Fernandes is a terrific player. But I do think if you speak to Man United fans and if you speak to journalists who report on Man United week in, week out, they will say, well, Bruno Fernandes should have been considered actually as Footballer of the Year because he has such an impact, a positive impact as a single individual on a failing team.
Whereas someone like me, I have to say, look, while I think he's a terrific player and he's brilliant for Man United, is he getting into your Real Madrid team? I'm sorry, but no, he's not really. I think he's terrific. Please don't get me wrong. But Bruno Fernandes plays in a particular way and...
I think he probably needs freedom. You're speaking in contradictory terms here, really, aren't you? Because Amarim definitely got the best out of him statistically-wise, but was it always a balanced team with Fernandes in it? Because Amarim is so regimented that I do think it's a big weakness in his make-up. I've said it many times before. I think it's the biggest weakness that Amarim has, that he's so wedded to a system that...
that is clearly not suited to the players that he has.
So is this Amarim actually being completely revolutionary and saying, we're going to lose Fernandes here for astonishing money because the offer is amazing to Saudi Pro League. We're going to sacrifice that and basically maybe lose one of the best players in the Premier League and then bring in a raft of players who is going to make us overall stronger. Listen, clubs have tried it before. It's not worked. But I do feel at the moment...
I'm not sure that that team is completely balanced. And if you are going to completely buy into and give your manager the best chance of success, which I have to say, I think United are intent on doing, then you absolutely have to indulge in what he wants to do. Of course, Amarim is going to say that basically he doesn't want to lose Fernandes. He's his captain, his talisman, his brilliant player. But,
At some stage, you're thinking, is it going to work? And is it going to set up? Because I'll be honest, Teddy, the way you set that up, that team up for me, it sounds enticing. Is it going to work on a practical level? Because you've got two exhilarating wide players or wide creators, if you like. You've got to have your centre forward. How do you set that up?
How does the rest of the midfield and set up work with, with Bruno in there? I'm not, I'm not completely convinced it does at the moment. And it, and it will, because what you're doing is you're putting, funding everything towards Bruno and maybe detracting from other players. And,
I think it's a real conundrum and it wouldn't surprise me to see this business done early that it's maybe an indicator and a worry for United fans. Please don't get me wrong because Martin's absolutely right. Of course you don't want to lose your best players. And what's the answer? You adapt and get all your best players in. That's the point. A skilful coach can do that and I think Amarillo has been far too rigid. Yes, definitely.
Yep, indeed. Maybe the 3-4-3 is a bit of a rigid formation. Let's talk about Chelsea now in the transfer window. Martin continuing seemingly to stockpile wide players. I'm not sure what they're planning, how many competitions they want to play in eventually. But they've got Jamie Gittins in their line. The son has this. Go in and get him, Martin.
Blues eye, £50 million Dortmund star Jamie. It's also reflected in the Guardian. I think we can bring that in the sports supplement. Sancho blow, they have it, because they say that Chelsea favour £50 million Gittins over United outcast, that outcast being Jadon Sancho. This continued connection with Borussia Dortmund and young English players as well. Martin, what's your take on this? The Chelsea knee Gittins?
Well, they're certainly sticking to their philosophy of signing anybody around the world that's young and talented. And this is somebody who maybe a lot of English fans don't know too much about, but there's 11 England and 21 caps.
for the best part of three seasons and he's only 20 he's been a regular at bruxia dortmund in the bundesliga um so this is a player with incredible promise uh they've already signed liam de la um this sounds like somebody they've seen the weaknesses this season they need more up front they need more direct players they need better wide players if they're going to stick with maresca which after that you know european uh
winning in the Conference League and that Champions League qualification they are going to do. And yes, this is where they are going. Stop piling is probably the phrase for it because they are amassing so many of these players. But Gittins looks like somebody who is talented, will push them further on and give them something that maybe at times they felt they didn't have this season. The only thing is when they are looking for these wide players with such pace, the possession game that Maresca plays that
dominating the opposition and playing very high doesn't necessarily suit them so it'll be interesting to see how he does fit in but it's a sign there's a really good piece by Johnny Northcroft in the Sunday Times about all football fans and especially social media want let's go big this summer let's buy loads and loads of players and he's gone through a book that was done in
Less than 50% of signings play the majority of games in their first two seasons. So you're talking about the impact of players. It's very interesting now, but the impact is not that great. The teams that do well, look at Liverpool last season and Newcastle as well in the...
Carabao Cup are not necessarily the teams that go huge in the summer. I think the skill here is to gently improve your squad each season. Chelsea still seem in a hurry to get this massive squad and sometimes it does feel like that squad's a bit big.
perhaps singles the end for Jadon Sancho as part of this conundrum. We'll see where he goes from there as well. But yeah, another very talented young player at Stamford Bridge. 12 goals and five assists. Jack Rosser and his colleague making that point in the sun. Going on to that point around Sancho, John in the Guardian, they have it Sancho below Jacob Steinberg with the story. Chelsea favour £50m Gittins'
over United outcast. Do you think it's necessarily the end for Jadon Sancho, John? Given Maresca's style, isn't that kind of dribbling creativity what they need? He doesn't seem to use Pedro Neto particularly. No, I...
I was in Poland last week, Teddy, and Sancho obviously scores a spectacular goal and you see flashes for Chelsea. He's obviously helped them to success, European silverware and into the Champions League. I like Sancho just because he's a bit different and he's a bit skillful. He's got a trick, he dribbles. I love to see different entertaining players. It's great. It's what we enjoy football for, really. But I
I don't know that he's really set the world alight at Chelsea. They've got to pay a penalty fee, haven't they? I think about the Guardians saying they're £5 million to return him, not to take up the option, which I have to say they've probably factored into their loan costing, so it's not going to be that much of a blow. But I do think it would be a blow for Sancho because I can't really see him get back in
at United really and so it kind of you know you'd have to be on the move again he seemed happiest and most sort of kind of you know flourishing when he went back to Dortmund on loan so who knows maybe that could be you know something to consider again but I still maintain that there's a good player in Sancho and it just needs someone to unlock that potential and maybe that determination and desire to
I've seen bits of Gittins, you know, and he does look at, you know, a player for the future. And so what surprises me slightly just with Chelsea is that, you know, they're boasting that they are so young and their Premier League squad is so young. It's the youngest in sort of kind of in the Premier League recent times, certainly the season just gone.
don't they need a little bit of experience to push them on to the next level? That's what strikes me. And basically, I think they need to do that as well as Gittins, to be honest. Yeah, particularly with a minimum eight games in the Champions League, it'll be a different challenge altogether than the Conference League, isn't it? The Times with this piece here. England feel the heat. Tuchel uses special tents to prepare for World Cup. It sounds a bit foreboding, doesn't it, John? What can you tell us about this story?
Well, it's quite interesting, actually. Tom Stuchel spoke about this extensively, about sort of kind of heat conditioning and why he's going to Girona this week. Because if people are not familiar, England obviously play a doubleheader. They've got Andorra in Barcelona on Saturday night. And then Senegal, as a friendly...
at Nottingham Forest next Tuesday. But they're actually using this space. You might have seen some of the England players at the F1 yesterday. And they're using the rest of this week in the build-up to Friday when they're heading for Barcelona in Girona as a sort of a warm-weather training camp. So he's really focusing Thomas Tuchel. And he spoke about this extensively a couple of weeks ago at the squad meeting.
announcement just about trying to get the players right in their mindset, their fitness right, and getting everything sort of conditioned and ready for the real heat pressures and the kind of the atmosphere and the humidity challenges that await in the summer of 2026 in the United States World Cup. Matt Lawton's done a nice job on this, basically, he's kind of pushed this on just to sort of explain that England's sort of using some
um you know matt's obsessed by sports science really and fitness and and all these sort of levels massive runner and biker himself so he loves this sort of stuff and it's an interesting read just about kind of um that the players being really put through their paces and making sure they're not sort of kind of you know caught out by the temperatures and they are put in these special heat conditioned tents and arenas
at the training base to make sure that they are ready. You've probably seen the, you know, the chiro chambers and the ice baths and everything. It's about getting physical conditioning absolutely right. And Tushar was incredibly complimentary actually about the FA and the England medical staff saying he's got no doubts about it, that they'll be in peak condition come the sort of kind of World Cup next summer.
Good read, a bit of nostalgia for those of us who remember as boys, the World Cup of 94 references 100 degrees Fahrenheit in that one, which is 37.7 degrees Celsius. An interesting piece, isn't it? Thomas Tuchel going out apparently to the States next week or so to plot
plot how he's going to handle it. I'm sure we'll both be available as media consultants for that one. But in terms of logistics, this is going to be a massive challenge, isn't it? I'm not quite sure how you host or hold a World Cup across Mexico, Canada and the various time zones. It's going to be important to get this right where they base themselves.
Yeah, the whole thing is a logistical nightmare. And just to finish on the heat element, in Matt's story, 14 of the 16 stadiums being used are expected to exceed, to reach potentially dangerous levels.
John and I, even though we don't look at it, are probably old enough to remember Jack Charlton growling at referees and fourth officials. I don't think they were called fourth officials back then. Growling at them. And he was a bit nastier and more physical than Thomas Tuchel, I think. And scaring the life out of these people because they wouldn't give water bottles. I think, was it John Aldridge was trying to get on the pitch and players were trying to get water bottles?
I kind of bang on about this whenever I'm on, sports getting faster and more physical. And the one thing nobody ever seems too bothered about is the health of the people that are doing it, the participants. So you're going to have these footballers absolutely drained with the game getting faster and everybody was expected to increase their mileage.
What's interesting within Thomas Tuchel's discussions is can you play a high-pressing game within these conditions? And I would imagine the answer in certain occasions would be you're going to have to alter the style of play or kind of play in bursts and then give the opposition the ball and try and get players to recover. Inside of that, as you just touched upon there, the amount of different time zones they're going to be flying around and the fact that in Matt's piece...
each country is now trying to get ahead of each other to make sure they get the best hotels and the best facilities. So there's a real backroom battle on. Thomas Tuchel has said, I've got full faith in the people that are working for me at the FA, but it does give an insight into how much detail is going into this preparation. You know, Thomas Tuchel has come in and said, I'm going to try and win the World Cup. And to that end, he has to explore every single minutiae of detail to try and do that. And he seems to be doing that so far.
Interesting how he gets on. Some brilliant stories, weren't they, back from USA 94 and that Ireland squad certainly kept hydrated at times, I think, John. Let's get to the independent here with Serena Wiegmann and the England women with a big challenge coming up in the Euros. Got Spain in the Nations League on Tuesday night and she's pretty close.
to knowing Euro 2025 squad as Lioness' selection looms. John, do you feel that she's been thrown off guard a little bit lately with obviously Herb's retirement and then what's happened with Millie Bright declining to join up just yet? I don't know.
I do, Teddy, and I do think it's the first time that we've sort of kind of almost seen the trouble in paradise, really. You know, Serena's seen sort of changes to her backroom staff as well. I do think the Mary Earp thing has really caught people off guard and basically the squad and disrupted things. I mean, Lucy Bronze was really interesting talking about that today, saying that she had to sort of kind of the phone call
and got heads up. But we shouldn't underestimate just how important, you know, Mary Epps has been in recent times, particularly in tournaments, big game player. And all of a sudden, I don't know, I feel it's played out badly for her because it looked to me as if she wasn't sort of kind of guaranteed number one. So she stepped down. I mean, you know, that's me reading the coverage of it without knowing the inner sort of detail of it. And I just feel as if,
when that happens, that sort of plays into a squad which is not completely at one and harmonious. And I'm not saying that that will be the case, but Serena Vigman now has obviously got this challenge ahead, you know, tomorrow on the back of a really good win, you know, just before the weekend and names her squad on Thursday. So I do really feel as if this is now an opportunity in the next couple of weeks to Serena Vigman really to kind of get everyone back together and
and really stamp her authority and say, this squad is unified. It's always been unified. That's been the strength of it in the past. It's now vital that we come together and there's no kind of cliques or kind of, you know, separate groups that have, you know, maybe seen Mary Earps take
decision that she did really. So a really important two or three days, I think, for Serena. Yeah, look forward to watching that and seeing how they get on against Spain as well. Surely they're going to be the biggest opposition in the Euros too. Martin, we've got about 50 seconds. Just give us the lowdown on your colleague Martin Ziegler's piece in The Times. Top flight in bid to close PSR loophole move after Chelsea sold assets to sister company.
Yeah, well, Martin's story does reveal that the Premier League are considering ending this loophole of being able to transfer, you know, your sister companies. So there's the hotels, there's the women's team, of which a percentage was sold. So there could be a vote on this on Tuesday or Wednesday at the Premier League level. What's interesting in this level of...
The fee they think Chelsea women could be worth is £245 million and you think Nicasia United were sold four years ago for £305 million. That seems rather excessive. Not only can you do this at UEFA, I think the Premier League may shoot this loophole. OK, interesting to see how that develops within the Premier League. John and Martin, thank you very much for your time on Back Pages tonight. I hope to see you again soon. Enjoy the action this week and the transfer news.