Rashford not for sale: Erik ten Hag

Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag insists that Marcus Rashford will not leave this summer.

The United manager said that Rashford is key to his plans and would block any bid from Paris Saint-Germain.

It emerged on Thursday night that PSG had met with Rashford’s agent to gauge whether the 24-year-old England international would be willing to move to the French champions.

“He’s really important [to United],” Ten Hag said when asked about Rashford being linked with PSG. “You have seen from the first day I’ve been here, that I’m really happy with him. I don’t want to lose him, he’s definitely in our plans at Manchester United.”

Ten Hag’s views are shared by the club’s board, who are adamant that Rashford will not be leaving. The academy graduate has one year left on his contract although United can extend it by a further year.

Ten Hag ruled Anthony Martial out of Saturday’s Premier League match against Brentford because of the hamstring injury that prevented him from playing in last weekend’s embarrassing 2-1 defeat by Brighton & Hove Albion.

The Dutchman refused to say whether that meant Cristiano Ronaldo would be handed his first start of the season, however. Ronaldo made a 37-minute substitute appearance against Brighton because Ten Hag felt the Portuguese was lacking match fitness after playing just 45 minutes in pre-season.

“He had a good training week,” Ten Hag said. “He played a little bit longer than half an hour [against Brighton] so he’s had two half games and for the starting XI we will see tomorrow. I have made my decision but I will keep it [private].”

Victor Lindelof, the Sweden centre-back, will also miss the match due to injury.

It has been a chaotic week for United. After the loss to Brighton, they launched a controversial bid to sign Marko Arnautovic but then pulled the plug on their pursuit of the 33-year-old Austrian.

They also agreed a £15 million fee with Juventus for Adrien Rabiot, the France midfielder, but are yet to get the transfer over the line as talks are continuing regarding personal terms. John Murtough, the football director, has flown to Turin to hold talks with the player’s agent and mother Veronique.

Ten Hag insisted that he was on the same page as the club’s board regarding signings. When asked whether he was convinced he would have new faces in his squad by the time that the transfer window closes on September 1, Ten Hag said: “We have to. I am convinced we will have.

“I’m happy. I think we [Ten Hag and the board] are co-operating really well, I cannot talk about any [names]. I cannot talk about players under contract at other clubs.”