Paul Pogba is looking for a new challenge. No, he won't try to justify the £89million Manchester United spent on him three years ago. He wants a challenge, not mission impossible.
Pogba's challenge echoes that of many players, not least Romelu Lukaku. It is the challenge of screwing more money out of another elite club, the challenge of racking up higher wages and a sizeable signing-on fee, the challenge of a lighter workload in an easier league.
He doesn't fancy trying to restore Manchester United to the pinnacle of English football next season, or even the top four. He's not up for balancing Thursday night fixtures in Europe with domestic consistency, or helping shape a new team under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, maybe even as captain.
Paul Pogba isn't interested in trying to justify the £89million Manchester United spent on him
The draw for the first round of the Carabao Cup will take place at Morrison's supermarket in Colindale, with Ray Parlour, on Thursday. Of course it will.
These are all significant challenges, but Pogba isn't interested.
And he has already pulled off one impressive challenge. That of fooling some of the people, most of the time.
Manchester United chief executive Ed Woodward, for instance. If, as is believed, United are willing to increase Pogba's wage to close on £500,000 a week, deception is one challenge he has mastered.
United came sixth last season, won nothing again, tailed off at a crucial stage and ended in uproar, losing at home to relegated Cardiff City. How can one of the leading protagonists in an underwhelming campaign merit an annual pay rise of £10m?
If United were thinking straight, Pogba's assessment of his form would be considered delusional. They would call in the shrinks, not the accountants.
'After everything that happened, with my season being my best season as well, I think it could be a good time to have a new challenge somewhere else,' Pogba told reporters in Japan.
The 26-year-old French midfielder's problem has long been a belief in his own publicity
Best season? Well, given his form in previous campaigns, that really isn't saying much. It's like being considered the most appealing candidate in the battle for the Conservative leadership, or the most intellectually rigorous contestant on Love Island.
It's fishing in a pretty murky pool.
Pogba has been nothing like an £89m player since coming to Manchester United. And now, having at last shown glimpses of potential, he wants to leave?
Pogba's problem has long been a belief in his own publicity. His fellow professionals put him in the PFA team of the season last year, but that was as much an accident of timing as an endorsement. The votes are cast early, at a stage in the season coinciding with Pogba's peak during Solskjaer's honeymoon period.
Had the voting taken place after the campaign ended, it is unlikely he would have made the starting XI. He certainly wouldn't have featured strongly in the two proper teams of the English season — Manchester City and Liverpool.
Pogba was inside the Premier League's top 10 for goals (13) and assists (nine) — yet more than half of his goals were penalties and his passing success rate did not place him among the Premier League's top 80, which is unhelpful for the creative midfield force at one of the best clubs in the country. So numbers do not tell the whole story.
Pogba played the most wonderful long pass to set up the goal that beat Tottenham at Wembley — yet in too many of United's other matches against elite opposition he was ineffectual and his work rate was often poor. Pogba wants to be made a special case, but then he needs to be special.
More than half of Pogba's goals this season were penalties - numbers don't tell the whole story
All that makes him stand out in the wider context is his ability to create trouble for Manchester United. This latest controversy has blown up on a personal promotional trip east for adidas. United may well ask what's in it for them.
If reports of the asking price are accurate, £133m. Yet there is little chance Real Madrid will pay that, or much like it. More plausible is that Pogba will become a gigantic pest this summer, in an attempt to try United's patience and leave at a reduced rate.
This is a familiar strategy, one that often works. If United put an improved offer before Pogba and he turns them down, they will know what the closed season holds. The challenge will be all theirs, preventing Pogba capping his 'best' campaign by utterly derailing theirs.
FURY'S CIRCUS DID NOT RING TRUE
In the bubble that exists around major sports, it is possible to imagine you are invested in something huge. Boxing, in particular, is brilliant at that. The hoopla around Tyson Fury's fight in Las Vegas was captivating and promoters are masters at making their event seem like the centre of the universe. Yet in Monterey — which can be reached from Vegas in little more time than it takes to fly London to Manchester — we couldn't find it anywhere.
Even the sports bar voted the city's best 16 years in a row offered nothing. So, reduced to viewing on a mobile phone, perhaps some of the nuances of Fury's performance passed us by. Yet, these eyes, and those of the others watching, saw a boxer who moved very well and did his job swiftly and efficiently and an opponent who was out of his class and at times little more than a straight man.
And while Fury's showmanship is not in doubt, any show worth seeing — certainly any show worth paying for — usually lasts longer than five minutes, unless Usain Bolt is involved. If he fights Deontay Wilder, it's interesting. Until then, there's better on the other channels.
The hoopla around Tyson Fury's fight against Tom Schwarz in Las Vegas was captivating
DUMB AND DUMBER FROM UEFA
Not long ago, the lunacy of a third-place play-off at the UEFA Nations League finals was highlighted in this column. Not everyone felt negatively about it. The players earn lots of money, they can be worked until they keel from exhaustion, argued some.
Had they not qualified, England would still be playing two matches at this stage of the season in European Championship qualifiers, argued others — ignoring that a qualifier is a necessary game and a third-place play off is not.
Anyway, having watched a tired, goalless
