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Haaland will be a Dortmund player next season, says club chief Watzke

  /  autty

Borussia Dortmund chief executive Hans-Joachim Watzke is optimistic in-demand striker Erling Haaland will still be at the club next season.

The prolific Norwegian striker, 20, has been linked with a number of prominent European clubs including Real Madrid, Barcelona and Manchester City.

Watzke's remarks come as incoming Bayern Munich chief Oliver Kahn ruled out a summer swoop to sign Haaland from their rivals.

Haaland is contracted to Dortmund through until 2024 but has a clause in his deal that will allow him to be signed for about £70million in the summer of 2022.

Given that Dortmund are demanding pretty much double that to sell Haaland this summer, Watzke is confident he will stay a little longer.

'I have the clear expectation that Erling Haaland will play for us next year,' he told Sport Bild. 'And I don't waste any thoughts on anything else.'

Asked if Dortmund would consider an approach from Barcelona or Real Madrid, he replied: 'I think they know about the contract situation and our stance there as well.

'I am just totally relaxed. Nobody believed us with Jadon Sancho last summer until deadline day, and he's still with us today.'

Haaland's agent Mino Raiola and his father Alf-Inge visited Barcelona and Real for transfer talks last month but Watzke described it as a 'self-marketing' trip.

He said: 'Firstly, he had informed us in advance. Secondly, it's clear that Erling will leave us at some point, just not so quickly.

'We also know that such trips are always a matter of self-marketing with Mino Raiola.

'You could of course start a game of ping pong and attack each other in public every second game.

'You either have a model where you sign a player and then let him go again or you don't have it. We can live with it and feel well because we know the contract situation, which helps us a lot.'

Haaland has scored 37 goals and set up a further 11 in 38 matches across all competitions for Dortmund this season so far.

It came as Khan poured cold water on any prospect of Bayern signing Haaland.

Kahn claimed that those who speak about the Bundesliga giants' interest in Haaland 'don't understand the situation'.

The Germany legend, who is currently a director at the Allianz Arena told Bild: 'Sorry, whoever spoke about that didn't understand the situation.

'A package that costs - as we heard - over €100million (£86m) is unimaginable for FC Bayern at the moment.'