Manchester City are in negotiations with AC Milan over a deal for Tijjani Reijnders.
The clubs are discussing a fee but Milan are understood to have indicated they want more than £50m (€60m) – closer to £59m (€70m).
City chairman Kaldoon Al-Mubarak said yesterday he believes they should have been more aggressive in the transfer market last summer.
City are looking to rectify that this time and build on January’s work by adding Reijnders – a No 8-type midfielder – before the Club World Cup and also want at least one new No 10.
Reijnders is a Netherlands international who had the most goals and assists of any midfielder in Serie A last season.
At 10, City wanted Florian Wirtz but pulled out due to the huge cost involved – but they also have long-term interest in Morgan Gibbs White, Dani Olmo and Rayan Cherki.
The club could also add players at full-back, centre-back and in goal this summer.
‘We should have been more aggressive last summer’
Al-Mubarak has admitted the club did not end up “anywhere near” achieving their goals in 2024/25 but said lessons have been learned as a result of their disappointing season.
Having won four of the last five Premier League titles, City were essentially out of the race by the end of November this time around and ended up without a single major trophy to their name for the first time since 2016/17, Pep Guardiola’s first season in charge.
In his annual post-season interview, he told the club website: “There’s been a lot of challenges that we’ve, I’ve never dealt with personally, professionally, over these last 17 years combined.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Manchester City chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak has revealed the club has already identified potential summer signings and vows that the club will bounce back to their normal standards next season.
“And the culmination of that is an experience that I believe will be invaluable for us going forward.
“This year is another year where I think when I look back, last summer, we probably should have been more aggressive in some of the changes we needed to do.
“We didn’t do that and that ended up costing us this year. We already started that rebuild of this team in January.
“Normally we like to do our business in the summer and only in case of emergency, a special need that comes up, do we actually go and do business in January.
“That’s been our MO at least for the last seven or eight years. But this January, we had to act.”
Follow the transfer window on Sky Sports
The first of two summer transfer windows is upon us – and there is no better place than Sky Sports to get all the latest transfer news and rumours.
Use the Sky Sports app and website for all your updates in our dedicated Transfer Centre and Premier League club blogs, plus live Q&As with our reporters throughout the summer.
The Transfer Show returns to Sky Sports News from Sunday June 1 for the start of the pre-Club World Cup window and will then be on every weeknight at 5pm and 7pm until the deadline on Tuesday June 10.
The summer transfer window will open again on Monday June 16 until Monday September 1 – with the deadline brought forward to 7pm this year.
