United Lacked experience in De Gea transfer

Real Madrid President Florentino Perez has again pointed the finger at Manchester United chief executive Ed Woodward for his handling of the David De Gea transfer. This despite the Manchester side insisting they did everything they could to get the deal over the line before the midnight deadline on Monday.

United in their statement claim to have offered Madrid a chance to appeal the failed transfer, but Perez does not believe this was genuine, calling United’s handling of the situation a disgrace.

“They said that just to get in good (with the fans). It is just to say we offered them that but Real Madrid rejected it,” Perez said.

“But the paperwork arrived later. It was out of time. We sent to La Liga anyway, we spoke with the president and with a chief from UEFA but we saw it was impossible. Their offer (to try to help us to get the deal done) was from someone without experience.

“I think they didn’t have bad intentions. I think they just lacked experience. It already happened to us (in the summer of 2013) with Fabio Coentrao and also happened to Athletic Bilbao with Ander Herrera (12 months before he completed his transfer to Old Trafford).”

“When this happens more than once and you see that all the operations that, according to the media, they have tried to do during the summer (which failed to go through), one believes that this happened because it is a new team with no experience.”

It was the critical delays from United over crucial documentation that really anger the Spanish clubs president:

“It was a disgrace. I do not want to blame anyone, but we do not understand why they took eight hours to check the contracts or that they didn’t open negotiations until 12 hours before the deadline.”