Manchester United and Manchester City are reportedly at the centre
of a tug-of-a-war for highly-rated Ajax frontman Klaas Jan
Huntelaar.
The 24-year-old Holland international smashed 36 goals in 51 games
for the Amsterdam giants last term and Ajax's failure to reach the
Champions League group stages this season could force them to
offload their prize asset.
After selling Ryan Babel to Liverpool and Wesley Sneijder to Real
Madrid in the summer it was expected that Ajax boss Henk ten Cate
would be able to keep hold of Huntelaar until at least the end of
the season. However the 3-1 aggregate defeat to Slavia Prague in
the Champions League qualifying tie has placed a huge financial
burden on the club and a bid in the region of £18million would be
hard to ignore in January.
Sir Alex Ferguson sees Huntelaar as the ideal man to replace the
goals of Ruud van Nistelrooy, who left for Real Madrid in the
summer of 2006.
While Sven-Goran Eriksson is also a known admirer of the former
Heerenveen star and with the cash backing of Thaksin Shinawatra,
City are more than capable of matching United's financial
muscle.
