Manchester City want to sign Leeds United star Kalvin Phillips before jetting out to USA in July
Manchester City want to sign Kalvin Phillips from Leeds United before they jet out on their pre-season tour of the USA, according to The Daily Mail.
The newspaper reported via their print edition on 14 June (page 76) that after signing Erling Haaland from Borussia Dortmund, the Premier League champions are also in the hunt to sign 26-year-old England midfielder Phillips.
Man City have previously confirmed they’ll play their first match in Houston, Texas on 20 July against Mexican outfit Club America but they’ll obviously be flying out to the States before that date.
Date set
Man City look as though they want a deal for Phillips wrapped up within a month.
It’s 14 June now and in a month’s time, it’s fair to assume that the Citizens will be in the USA getting ready to play Mexican giants Club America.
Phillips seems as though he’s their top target.
Fernandinho has left the Etihad at the end of his contract and it is understood that Man City are now turning towards the central midfielder market to replace him.
Phillips is reportedly Pep Guardiola’s “preferred” target.
City are going to be a hard club to turn down.
Phillips could go from playing balls forward to Daniel James and Rodrigo to combining with Kevin De Bruyne to set up goals for another Leeds-born star in Haaland.
It’ll be interesting to see whether that connection between Phillips and Haaland will prove to be vital.
Leeds will have a mammoth task on their hands to replace Phillips. If anything, it’ll be impossible to replace the Yorkshire Pirlo in the side.
Leeds can, however, use the money gained from selling him to sign a new deep-lying midfielder and strengthen other areas of the squad, like the striker position.
Rasmus Kristensen and Brenden Aaronson have already signed and Marc Roca seems to be on his way from Bayern Munich so the centre of the midfield, attacking midfield and right-back slots have been padded up nicely.
But we need more if we want to finish nowhere near the relegation zone in 2022/23.
In other Leeds United news, the Whites are said to be in hot pursuit of this English midfielder for £10million.