Not much has gone right for one of the most prestigious institutions in world football this season as Manchester United have just not been able to find any kind of consistency on the field.
The matters only become complicated now with an overhaul planned in the summer. Many players who are at the club at the moment might want a move away and the biggest of them all would be skipper Wayne Rooney.
Rooney, who has not been able to find the back of the net regularly is at the center of a 100 million move to China from Manchester United this summer.
According to The Mirror, United have received a £27million bid from a China Super League club – believed to be Shanghai Shenhua – to take Rooney from England at the end of the season.
They are prepared to offer him £500,000-a-week for a three-year deal, with another Chinese club ready to enter the battle for the forward.
Rooney came Manchester United from Everton for a similar fee and it is will be remarkable for the Old Trafford franchise if they are able to coup the fee they spent on him as a teenager.
The 30-year-old still has two years of his contract left after 12 years of service with Manchester United but the Chinese want to make Rooney the face of their Super League and are prepared to pay him £75 million to commit for three years.
The Chinese Superliga has already attracted top class European talent with big money moves but it is understood that Rooney is the player they want most, with his global profile and standing in world football making him the ideal player to increase the reputation of the league worldwide.
However, the biggest factor in this move for the player would be whether to take his wife Coleen and three kids away from the north-west to start life afresh in China.
The forward has been reluctant to make that move in the past, rejecting the advances of Chelsea and Paris St Germain.
Current manager of Shenhua’s rivals Shanghai SIPG, Sven-Goran said recently: “Sooner or later we are going to see names like Ronaldo, Messi and Rooney in this league, players on this level.”
China has grown out to become one of the financial superpowers in world football this season and a number of players including the likes of Ramires, Lavezzi, Teixeira and Jelavic have all made the move.
However, it will be interesting to see whether the 30-year-old will indeed leave his 12-year-old club and move to Asia.