Atletico Madrid have landed Mario Mandzukic for €22 million according to Bild's Mattias Muller. Mandzukic, who will move from German champions Bayern Munich, scored 18 times last season and is replacing Diego Costa at the Vicente Calderon stadium in Madrid.
Mandzukic has just returned from international duty with Croatia had said all along that he would leave Bayern after the World Cup having been frozen out of the first team by Pep Guardiola. Prior to the end of the season, he had been phased out of the starting eleven with Guardiola preferring a mixture of Thomas Muller and Mario Gotze as his striker and false nine resepectively. The target man had announced "'I met (Bayern chairman) Karl Heinz Rummenigge before the cup final and told him I wanted to leave the club." and had several clubs on high alert following his message. Manchester United, Arsenal, Atletico Madrid and Chelsea were all said to be interested but Atletico won out in the end, getting a similar player to the outgoing Diego Costa.
The 28-year-old striker spent four years in the Bundesliga having previously played for Wolfsburg and amassed 110 appearances and 53 goals during his spell in Germany.
It will be the Madrid sides' fourth signing of the summer with striker Angel Correa, goalkeeper Miguel Angel Moya and left-back Guilherme Siqueira having joined the Spanish champions at the end of the season.