Bayern to restart Sane chase in January

Bayern have been working on bringing in Leroy Sane from Manchester City since April this year, and though the move hasn’t happened this summer, they plan to revisit the situation in January, claims the respected German journalist Raphael Honigstein.

Though he was absolutely vital to City’s 100-point march to the Premier League title in 2017/18, Sane’s influence in the team diminished significantly last summer with the arrivals of Bernardo Silva and Riyad Mahrez. Injuries weren’t very kind on him either, and he was being left out of the starting XI by manager Pep Guardiola increasingly often throughout last season. In April, Bayern got a wind of him being open to a return to Germany.

Ahead of the Community Shield in which City faced Liverpool in early August, a breakthrough in the negotiations had been apparently reached. Nonetheless, Guardiola decided to start Sane against the Champions League winners, which resulted in his withdrawal from the game after only a few minutes with an anterior cruciate ligament injury in his right knee, and the deal fell through. Bayern signed Philippe Coutinho from Barcelona and Ivan Perišić from Inter Milan on loan, but they are expected to return for Sane in January.