Manchester United chose to sign Victor Lindelof over Virgil van Dijk in the summer of 2017, Charlie Austin has said. Charlie recently revealed that he could not believe MUFC would take such decision because Van Dijk’s quality in the EPL was very obvious.
According to him, the several transfer sagas that involved the Holland international at Southampton only proved that the CB felt he was ready for a step up.
He added that he also felt Van Dijk preferred a move to Liverpool even when United and City were in for him.
His words, “I remember in the back end of his Southampton career we were on the bench together at Chelsea away.”
“I sat there and was like ‘Virg lad, what’s going on? Surely Manchester United must have been in for you? Massive club in England etc’. He went ‘do you know what Chaz, in the summer it was like between me and Lindelof and they signed Lindelof’.
“I was like, ‘you are joking!’ I couldn’t believe it, I was gobsmacked. There was talk of him going there and then they have taken Lindelof instead.”
On Van Dijk’s effort to leave Southampton, “The manager was there, [Mauricio] Pellegrino at the time, and in the summer he [Van Dijk] was looking to go.”
“I remember he [Pellegrino] got everyone around at training, including Virg, and just came out and said ‘look lads, Virgil wants to go, we’re not allowing it and he’s said he’s not going to play, so he’s not going to train with us’. That was in front of everybody. There was no heads up from the manager. It was stamping his authority.”
“He didn’t move in the summer, two days later the transfer window shut and Virg was starting again on the Saturday. He apologised to the lads but we were like ‘we understand, you were linked with Liverpool and you wanted to go’.”
“I’m not sure. I think he had his heart set on going to Liverpool.”
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