Jose Mourinho shortlists 4 January targets  

According to reports in Daily Mail, Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho has identified four players for the United board to target this January. Mourinho and United’s Chief Executive Ed Woodward have not seen eye to eye with regards to possible signings in the past, with the Portuguese claiming in the summer that Woodward had failed to even approach any of the targets he had identified.

However, after a rather lacklustre start to the new Premier League campaign, it is painfully apparent that United need reinforcements in almost all departments. Mourinho has set his sights on Croatian duo Ivan Perisic and Ante Rebic, who are currently part of Inter and Frankfurt respectively.

Mourinho was keen on signing Perisic this past summer as well, but a deal never came to fruition mainly due to the lack of ambition on the part of Woodward.

Also on Mourinho’s radar is highly-rated Lazio midfielder Sergej Milinkovic-Savic, whose startling rise has caught the attention of other European giants including Real Madrid. While Milinkovic-Savic recently expressed his willingness to stay in Italy and keep developing as a player, a move to Manchester United would be extremely hard to turn down.

Mourinho, meanwhile, was recently spotted in the stands watching the clash between Serbia and Montenegro this past week and rumours suggest he was keeping tabs on Serbian defender Nikola Milenkovic, who starred for the nation at the World Cup in Russia.

United are in desperate need of a robust centre-half after the less-than-stellar performances of Eric Bailly and Victor Lindelof, and Milenkovic could be the answer to all their defensive woes. So impressed are the United board with the 21-year-old that they are apparently lining up a £52.8m bid for the Fiorentina centre-half.

In order to generate the required funds, United are also set to offload as many as 10 players from the squad in what could be quite an action-packed January window for the Red Devils.