Mamelodi Sundowns almost signed Liverpool’s Diaz and Real Madrid’s Vinicius – Mngqithi

Mamelodi Sundowns co-coach Manqoba Mngqithi has surprisingly revealed how the club was close to acquiring the services of Liverpool's Luis Diaz and Real Madrid's Junior Vinicius.

According to Mngqithi, the South American stars are part of many players the Premier Soccer League champions wanted to sign but those deals never materialised.

Mngqithi further revealed they were close to signing Colombian Diaz before he moved to Porto because they delayed on sealing the deal. He added that Vinicius was their target after impressing at the Brazilian Cup.

Diaz recently signed for Liverpool from Porto while Vinicius is playing for Real Madrid.

“We’ve lost the chance to sign many other players, one of them signed for Liverpool now, can you believe it? We should have signed him before he joined Porto,” Mngqithi told reporters as quoted by The South African.

“We were on top of Diaz. Unfortunately, we delayed one or two days, and he signed for Porto. We’ve looked at a lot of players. I don’t want to lie to you. Even Vinicius was on our list of players that we should have signed, and he was not even at Real Madrid.

“We saw him in the Brazilian Cup, and we were trying to chase him. We slacked a little, and the following day he was signed by Real Madrid.”

Sundowns have players from South America in their squad including Erwin Saavedra who was signed in January, as well as Pavol Safranko.

Two days ago, Diaz completed his transfer to Liverpool after signing a five-and-a-half-year deal having undergone a medical in Argentina on Saturday. He will wear the No.23 shirt at Anfield.

On Tuesday, Mngqithi confirmed the club had signed Bolivia international Saavedra.