Benfica's president Luis Filipe Vieira is now reportedly open to the idea of Victor Lindelof becoming a Manchester United player in January after himself and superagent Jorge Mendes travelled to London for talks with United officials last week.

According to Sky Sports, the Old Trafford club have held initial talks with Benfica in relation to a possible move for a believed fee of £38 million for 22-year-old Lindelof as the January transfer window edges closer.

Mourinho wants to bolster his options in defence

It is understood that Jose Mourinho is interested in broadening his defensive options seen as though Phil Jones and Chris Smalling haven't been fit for long, therefore vulnerable to injury, while Eric Bailly will soon fly out to Gabon before representing Ivory Coast in the 2017 African Cup of Nations at the start of the new year and could miss up to nine games. Swedish international Lindelof has reportedly been on the top of Mourinho's transfer target wishlist for at least a month now and scouts from the Premier League giants have been spotted watching him on numerous occasions in Portugal this season.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic approves of a possible move

The young Swede has been touted as one of the most promising breakout stars in European football since entering the Benfica first team set-up at the start of 2016 and helping them to a 35th Primeira Liga title in the 2015/2016 season. The highly-rated defender was also given his Swedish national team debut by manager Janne Andersson in March of this year and he's now made a total of 11 appearances and started in all three of their EURO 2016 group stage matches.

Even new Manchester United star and veteran striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic has been talking him up, stating that Lindelof is "good enough" for the bigger teams because he's doing "great things" so far in his career and Jorge Mendes, the agent of Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho and goalkeeper David De Gea, seems to be working hard to ensure a move happens soon.

VAVEL Logo
About the author
Alex Turk
Probably writing something somewhere.