Bordeaux president Jean-Louis Triaud has revealed that winger Gabriel Obertan is on the verge of signing for Manchester United.
The highly rated 20-year-old became a regular for Les Girondins at the just 17 but last season found chances hard to come by under former Red Devils defender Laurent Blanc.
The French Under-21 international was loaned out to fellow Ligue 1 side Lorient for the second half of last season where he featured 15 times scoring just the one goal.
Arsenal, Inter and AC Milan are said to have been interested in the youngster but it appears United have won the race for his signature for an undisclosed fee.
"There is a very strong likelihood that the deal will go ahead," confirmed Triaud to L'Equipe.
"Manchester United want to sign him and, for our part, we would be delighted to see Gabriel playing for such a prestigious club.
"We will make the official announcement when the time is right,"
Your Comments
passittotheleft
"Funny, all those people criticizing Arsene Wenger's policy of buying cheap foreign youngsters! Man Utd can't even seem to give money away, let alone spend millions on a proven, continental footballer! And now he's had to resort buying a cheap, young Frenchie! "
EmadManUtd
"look everyone. yes selling ronaldo at the pinacle of his career was not ideal, but now that we have we must look to the future. not the future where today we buy ribery/silva/30-40+ players who three years down move onto Real. who knew Ronaldo when Becks was sold, but Fergie made his starlet the bes in the world didn't he. no neutral expects us to win the league, so the pressure's off and that means its time for rebuilding. players who work their b*lls off to get into the team will appreciate the job better than whose who are garunteed of a place just because they cost 30-40 million quid. i myself wanted us to sign silva or ribey or even schweinsteiger but one needs to trust Fergie. he's done it 11 times for us, why would he stop now?"
WealthyB
"hoarse_trojan - "Fergie might as well hedge his bets and take on a few, at least one should work out."
If a manager of any other team did exactly that they would be castigated by all and sundry for being a fraud merely playing the numbers game; sign enough players, one of them should come good."
hoarse_trojan
"Utd can afford to buy lots of players with the money they have. Some will work out, others won't, but I for one, will not condemn any of them before they've proved themselves one way or another.
This guy is not world class yet, but who says he won't be. We're not going to get Ribery, so forget it, there aren't enough of his quality around at the right price.
By all means, watch Youtube clips, but that's not the complete picture. Watch some U21 internationals and you can see this kid rip defences apart playing for France. It's a different level to the Premier League, but he's one to watch for sure.
And by the way, don't forget that some players don't reach their potential until later in life. Ronaldo, Rooney reached it early, Berbatov not until he was 27 (and we haven't seen the best of him yet I reckon). Tosic, Ljalic, Nani and maybe Obertan, well they've got plenty of time to show us that they're Utd material.
If they're not, they will be sold, no problem. If they do, then great, we have world class wingers to parade around. Fergie might as well hedge his bets and take on a few, at least one should work out."
G7STRIKER
"No single player could replace ronaldo. Who else could score 40+ goals in one season, mainly from the wing? No-one. The goals will be replaced though, they really will. It doesn't matter if it's a big name or someone you've never heard of we will score enough goals. Now ronaldo has gone it is time for rooney to shine, Berbatov will score more this season surely (the guy is class even if his form last year wasn't the best), Owen will score quite a few, he's a proven goalscorer wherever he's played, Hargreaves could come back and be the new free kick taker and get a few. Our team is still top notch make no mistake. OR....we could sign big name players who will disrupt the squad with their selfish attitudes and over inflated ego's. We could get Samuel Eto'o and yes he would score goals but do we really want or need another tosser in the team. I for one certainly don't. Ronaldo must have rocked the boat behind closed doors last season (with the tantrums etc) and that disruptive influence has now gone. Let's keep it that way! I see what you're saying though pa___ul, if he's not good enough for them then how could he be good enough for us. But said that i have total trust in Fergie."
EoinMUFC
"indi_manc ... if you are indeed a United fan, I think Fergie might a better idea what he's doing than you... buying young talent has a success rate of about 50/50 where 50% make the grade and the other 50 move on to smaller clubs... its about 90/10 in favour of being flops at Liverpool it seems! Le Tallec the new Zizou!
If Fergie and our scouts have identified this kid as a potential star why miss out on him? Tosic Llajic etc may or may not work out... surely there is no harm in having a punt on a highly rated kid?
We all still hope for a big name signing but they have all packed off to Madrid... so we will have to make a star again!"
the_horse
"G7STRIKER couldn't agree more! Its easy to understand the problems Scolari was having at Chelsea after witnessing the antics of Drogba and Ballack in the Champions league. So many of the big names come with big egos that have to be massaged, which we don't need in our squad. Even Tevez as it turns out is one of them!"
knownspace
"Any concerns I had about who would replace Fergie when he retires have been eradicated over the past week. There are so many out there who appear to know better than he does!"
pa___ul
"G7STRIKER, I can see why you're saying that but that's really not the case, I'm just baffled at how everyone saying this kid, who's seemingly not good enough for Bordeaux, is being hailed as the replacement for Ronaldo. To replace the European player of the year, is it unfair to expect any nominees to be proven, experienced Internationals. That's my argument. By all means go round picking up good young players with potential, but just recognise it as such, potential!! From what I've seen, he's been playing at the top level in France for 3 years and has not shown enough quality to emulate the likes of Ribery and Nasri who were already recognised at the same age."
PolishJoe
"Yeah Indi-manc, how will we ever replace a 5 goal a season striker? Oh look, there's John O'Sheah, he'll do. "
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