Real Madrid 'speaking with Erling Haaland's entourage'

Stuart Telford

• Updated: 18 Jan 2024 14:09 GMT
• 3 min read

Real Madrid are trying to attract Erling Haaland to their project without paying the €200 million release clause in his Manchester City contract.

That's according to Cadena SER, who report that Real are using the same tactics as they did to sign Haaland's former Borussia Dortmund teammate Jude Bellingham last summer - ergo: a charm offensive in the background.

Haaland has re-emerged as a top target for Madrid in recent weeks with Kylian Mbappe reportedly willing to ignore the two-week deadline they had given him to accept their offer while his Paris Saint-Germain contract runs down.

Real would ideally unite all three - who are the top three most valuable players in the world per FootballTransfers' in-house algorithm - but funding deals for the next two after paying Dortmund €103m for Bellingham in July could prove difficult.

Two-pronged attack

"Real Madrid are speaking to Haaland's entourage and leaving dialogue with Manchester City to third parties," reports Francisco Jose Delgado for the aforementioned outlet. "That is the same way they deal with Bellingham's signing last season."

The report goes on to outline how Real had "more than a dozen" contacts with Bellingham and his family, even showing them their training facilities, but with the clear intention of not disrupting his progress with his current employer, at the time BVB.

The end goal for Real is that Haaland will decide his future lies with them, at which point they can agree a fee with City that isn't the fixed amount in his contract, which would also depend on the exchange rate between the pound and the euro.

It is also understood that Bellingham is in regular contact with Haaland, telling him positive things about both playing for Madrid and living in the Spanish capital.

Whether it will work or not is another matter, although Haaland did come close to joining Real before, the record European champions only second in a matrix dreamed up by the player and his father Alfie with Karim Benzema blocking his path at No.9 at the time.