Dortmund chief reveals stance on Jadon Sancho transfer as Man Utd options emerge

Manchester United will sanction a permanent exit for Jadon Sancho this summer after Chelsea failed to sign the winger for £25m and a return to Borussia Dortmund has now been mooted

Sebastian Kehl, the Borussia Dortmund sporting director, has played down talk of a third move for Jadon Sancho after the Manchester United forward was linked with a shock return to the Bundesliga club.

Sancho, 25, is out of favour at Old Trafford and spent the 2024-25 season on loan at Chelsea. He is at a career crossroads, though, with the Blues set to pay a £5million penalty fee rather than completing a £25m permanent transfer for the star.

Despite originally being frozen out by Erik ten Hag, its understood Sancho has no future at United under the Dutchman's successor, Ruben Amorim.

And with United desperate to offload several players who have been deemed surplus to requirements in order to raise transfer funds, talk of a return to Dortmund has materialised ahead of the 2025-26 campaign.

The Athletic revealed Sancho's representatives had been informed of Dortmund's interest - but Kehl has said a deal for the forward is currently 'not a priority'.

“Of course, contact with Jadon is always there, in some way, because we have a very long history,” Kehl ahead of the FIFA Club World Cup on Thursday.

“But it’s not an issue for us right now. We have other priorities at the moment and that’s why the Sancho issue was probably played up more in the media than discussed internally.”

Sancho established himself as one of Europe's brightest stars at Dortmund across a four-year spell before joining United in a £73m deal in the summer of 2021.

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And with his career at a standstill it was Dortmund who gave him a platform to play again during the second half of the 2023-24 campaign, where he helped his old club reach the final of the Champions League.

Dortmund's reported interest in Sancho comes amid claims that a trio of Premier League clubs are interested in offering the winger a chance to kickstart his career.

Aston Villa, Tottenham and Newcastle are all said to be keeping an eye on Sancho's situation with a permanent exit from Old Trafford likely in the coming weeks. Villa took Sancho's United team-mate, Marcus Rashford, on loan for the second half of last season but a permanent deal does not appear to be on the cards, hence their interest in Sancho.