Manchester United have been warned they will be expected to exceed Manchester City’s previous offer of €50 million if they are to sign Fred from Shakhtar Donetsk.
And while United are now the club leading the charge for the Brazil international, Shakhtar president Rinat Akhmetov insists that he is expecting offers this summer to be no lower than the one which City submitted in January.
“You know that we had negotiations with Manchester City this winter, and there was an official offer - a very big figure,” Akhmetov told Futbol 1. “They offered us around €50m for Fred. And we had enough strength to reject it, because we were playing in the Champions League, we were finishing the Ukrainian League campaign.
“We won the championship and the cup - in principle, our decision was correct. And I am convinced that we will receive and are receiving no less interesting proposals than that from Manchester City.”
There have been reports that Shakhtar could hold on until Fred’s alleged release clause of €60m is met, but Akhmetov admits that the club cannot insist on a particular fee if the market does not allow it.
“We'll get exactly the amount he costs,” he added. “We can’t get a dollar if the player costs 50 cents. We don’t want to sell him for 50 cents if the football player costs a dollar.
“This will be a market price, the fair price, and it will be beneficial both for the club inviting Fred and for us. That is, I can somewhat feel that Fred will be more expensive than Fernandinho and [Alex] Teixeira.”
Fernandinho left Shakhtar for Manchester City in 2013 for €40m while Alex Teixeira joined Jiangsu Suning three years later for €50m, and a deal worth more than that for Fred would break the Donetsk outfit’s record for transfer fee received.
United appear to be the runaway favourites to land the central midfielder’s signature at this point, with the Red Devils hoping to try to push a deal through before the start of the World Cup on June 14.
Manager Jose Mourinho has spoken previously of his desire to build his squad for next season during the early weeks of the summer transfer market, while the Premier League deadline for incoming deals has also been brought forward this year to August 9.