Revealed: Man Utd broke Ed Woodward's strict Bayern Munich transfer rule to sign Matthijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui - six years after Jose Mourinho was denied top target

Former Manchester United chief executive Ed Woodward put a rule in place during his time at the club that meant no players would be purchased from Bayern Munich. This was due to the signings of Owen Hargreaves and Bastian Schweinsteiger failing to live up to expectations after the club spent hefty transfer fees on the midfielders.

It was revealed by ESPN that ex-head coach Jose Mourinho wanted to sign defender Jerome Boateng in 2018 but was denied by Woodward, who at the time played a key role in squad planning. That rule has finally been broken after Erik ten Hag finalised the signings of Mattijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui this summer.

ESPN revealed how Mourinho was denied his dream signing six years ago. They said: "In the summer of 2018, Jose was keen to sign another centre-back. There was a warm-up match against Bayern. There were only a few journalists there. Jose took a few of us aside and said he wanted to sign Jerome Boateng from Bayern. A player who was getting on in years but was still a good player.

"On deadline day that summer, there was a press conference at United. We were sitting in the small press room at Carrington and Ed Woodward came in. He told us that the club would not sign a new center back, not even the one Jose wanted. The reason he gave was that they had learned their lesson from signing players from Bayern."

It is a positive sign that Man Utd have moved away from their previous superstition surrounding Bayern Munich and will hope that both De Ligt and Mazraoui can repay their transfer fees swiftly.

Having utilised both De Ligt and Mazraoui in Man Utd's Premier League win against Fulham last week, Ten Hag will be keen to push on with his strengthened squad when they visit Brighton this weekend.