Former Manchester United midfielder Paul Pogba, has reached full agreement to return to Juventus after he refused to renew his contract with Manchester United.
Paul Pogba, who joined Manchester United for club record fee €105m in 2016, declined the opportunity to extend his contract with the Red Devils. United offered him a contract renewal under former manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in 2019, but Pogba’s agent then, Mino Raiola (deceased) turned down the renewal as he felt his client could get better clubs when his contract comes to an end.
After Ole was sacked from the club, United never approached Pogba with any new offer, with the acceptance that the player had decided to move on. In June 2022, Manchester United announced that the midfielder who they paid €105m for will be left to leave the club for free.
In 2012, Paul Pogba left Manchester United for free and joined Juventus. Sir Alex Ferguson then, thought Pogba was not good enough to be a starter at United. Fast forward, Mino Raiola presented him to Juventus where he performed very well. He went ahead to win the U20 World Cup with France in 2013 and several trophies with Juventus, including Champions league finals.
When José Mourinho signed for Manchester United in 2016, the Portuguese insisted on the club to bring back Pogba. Pogba was then one of the best performing midfielders in the world, and most teams were interested in signing him, but United broke the world transfer record to sign Pogba for €105m.
The club and its supporters were having very high expectations of the player but they were left disappointed. Even though Pogba did quite well in his first season at the club, the club could not win the Premier league. In his second season they placed second to city rivals, Manchester City. This raised lots of eyebrows, looking at the kind of money the club paid for the player.
Mourinho further fell out with Pogba as he felt Pogba was being a negative influence in the dressing room, and sabotaging his work at the club. The manager even described him as a ‘virus’.
The criticisms became quite unbearable as club legends such as Gary Neville, Paul Scholes and Roy Keane became more critical of his performance. They felt Pogba was paying more attention to his off the field lifestyle rather than the team’s success.
Other pundits also believed that United did not have a good transfer policy. This is because, after Pogba was signed, the club did not sign any better players to partner him in midfield. Pogba was regularly rotated in the midfield due to mediocre players he had to partner them in the midfield. This had a greater impact on his performance as he felt uncomfortable with some of the positions he had to adopt.
Juventus were always interested in bringing Pogba back to their club but they were not having enough money to buy him out of contract while in United. As soon as he became free, the Italian club began negotiations with his agent. His monthly wages were a bit of a problem to Juventus and he had to reduce it before a deal could be agreed.
Pogba’s love for Juventus, and his passion to return to the club made negotiations even easier as he agreed to a pay cut so he can join Juventus. He is likely to sign a three-year contract with the Italians. He will travel to Turin in two weeks time to undergo his medicals, and have all paperworks signed and sealed.
