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FOR IGHALO’S SAKE, OSIMHEN TURNED DOWN MANCHESTER UNITED

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Nigeria’s in-form striker Victor Osimhen would have been in Manchester United and not at the Italian Serie A side, Napoli if he had not turned down the Premiership side’

According to Daily Mail of UK, Osimhen turned down a potential move to Manchester United before joining Napoli for £54million, his brother has revealed. 

The 21-year-old moved to the Italian club from Lille in a big money deal earlier this summer but Andrew Osimhen has explained to Daily Mail.  that United were also in for him. 

But the fact that fellow Nigerian Odion Ighalo already played at Old Trafford meant Victor did not contemplate the move out of respect. 


‘It is very true that Manchester United wanted Victor but he told me something like he had too much respect for Odion Ighalo to be competing for shirts with his senior colleague,’ Andrew told Complete Sports.

‘My brother holds Ighalo in high esteem and he just didn’t see himself going to Old Trafford to battle for a striking role with the highest goalscorer at the 2019 AFCON in Egypt.’

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Both forwards have played in the Nigerian national side together. Osimhen has made nine appearances and scored four goals since his debut in 2017.

Ighalo joined United on loan from Shanghai Shenhua in January and his switch has been extended until the same month next year, though he is not Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s automatic first choice. 

Osimhen was linked with a number of Premier League sides including Liverpool and Tottenham. 

But Napoli fought hard to sign the promising striker and clinched a deal.  

And having seen what he’s capable of during pre-season, they will be glad they did.

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Osimhen scored an eight-minute hat-trick in their pre-season friendly against L’Aquila and continued his fine start with another strong display against Teramo. 

Kunle Solaja is the author of landmark books on sports and journalism as well as being a multiple award-winning journalist and editor of long standing. He is easily Nigeria’s foremost soccer diarist and Africa's most capped FIFA World Cup journalist, having attended all FIFA World Cup finals from Italia ’90 to Qatar 2022. He was honoured at the Qatar 2022 World Cup by FIFA and AIPS.

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