With rumours thickening on next year’s appointment of José Mourinho as new Manchester United’s boss, journalists and market experts have been trying to predict what his first moves to bring back to the Red Devils a winning mentality will be.

Considering how close the self-calling “Special One” is to his agent Jorge Mendes, nevertheless, these moves appear to be clearer and clearer, revealing how Manchester United is about to become just a new province in Mendes’ football empire.

The super-agent is reportedly inserting in Mourinho’s three-years deal with the club a clause that would oblige the Glazer family to bring to Manchester, as sporting director, Andrea Berta, currently at Atletico Madrid. ­The Italian manager is a close friend of Mendes’ and has been working with him in the past, for record-setting transfers as the € 43-million deal for Falcao or Diego Costa’s move to Chelsea for a fee of about € 38 million.

The clauses Mendes is inserting in both the contracts (rumours are that he is also gonna be negotiating on Berta’s behalf) will give him and his firm Gestifute an almost complete control of United’s market transfer: Mourinho and Berta will hold the decisional power at United, while he will be able to sweet-talk his players around Europe into moving at or away from Manchester.

The trio’s first targets are reported to be already set: Portuguese midfielders William Carvalho (Sporting CP) and Renato Sanches (Benfica), along with Colombian superstar James Rodriguez (Real Madrid), who could be signed for a record-setting fee of £112 million according to Spanish sources. It goes without saying, of course, that all these negotiations (and the relative percentage) will be handled by Gestifute. The Red Devils seem to have found a bigger Mephistopheles to rule on them, with the help of their new coach.

Emanuele Costa

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