Manchester United Transfer News: Radamel Falcao Exit Starting to Look Inevitable

Rumours regarding Radamel Falcao's future with Manchester United have been swirling for some time now, and following the club's loss against Southampton, it's starting to look as if this marriage won't have a happy ending in the summer transfer window.

The Colombia international didn't even make the bench for the Red Devils' pivotal match against the Saints, and after the 1-0 loss, agent Jorge Mendes told reporters he's unsure whether his client will be plying his trade at Old Trafford next season. As reported by The Guardian, he said:

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I don’t know. He is a fantastic player, and I think it’s very difficult for Manchester United fans. They have an absolutely brilliant player, one of the very best in the world, who would without any doubt play 90 minutes of the match, every time, with any other club.

The truth is, right now we don’t know what will happen. What we do know is that he will play in one of the very best clubs in the world next season, whether that is Manchester United or not.

I am 100% sure of that. But you know how football works, we need to wait a little. We’ll see what happens.

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Falcao's lack of consistent minutes right after completing a loan move to United was understandable. The 28-year-old was still finding his form after a lengthy spell on the sidelines with a knee injury.

Further knocks set him back in the first couple of months, but all signs point to the star striker being healthy now. He's ready to contribute and earn the £40 million price tag it will cost the club to bring him in on a permanent basis in the summer, via The Guardian.

Falcao may be ready, but manager Louis van Gaal is not. And that's a big problem.

The Dutch manager, who holds his "philosophy" above all else, has already given a hint the current crop of strikers don't fit his system the way he would like, via FourFourTwo's Sam Pilger:

I'll usually be the first to say a player deserves more time after not being able to hit his form due to injury for the better part of his first six months at the club, but in this instance, Falcao's battle already feels like it's over.

Van Gaal simply isn't convinced he's the man for the job, and £40 million is a lot of money to spend on a striker approaching 30 who may not be exactly who you want to field.

The Guardian's Daniel Taylor notes questions regarding Falcao's recovery from the injury that kept him out of the 2014 World Cup are starting to resurface to the point many wonder whether he'll ever return to the player he was before:

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Would Falcao’s involvement have made a huge difference? Possibly not given there have been only scraps so far to authenticate his status as one of football’s superstars (a wonderfully delivered nutmeg a couple of weekends back barely counts when the opponent is the Yeovil midfielder Joe Edwards) and the Colombian is straying dangerously close to the point where we are entitled to wonder if he will ever be the player he was before his knee ligaments snapped, or the player United hoped he would be.

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But there's more to this than form or injury. As shared by Sky Sports News HQ, it's not as if Falcao is stinking up the joint compared to his teammates:

The Colombian has six months to justify a permanent transfer, a feat that looks almost impossible. Van Gaal trusts compatriot Robin van Persie more and wants to see what talented youngster James Wilson can bring to the squad.

When even super agent Mendes is openly talking about Falcao's future potentially playing out somewhere else, you know things are not looking up. It's simply not working out, and midway through the January transfer window, it's hard to see any way the Colombian hitman can come back from this.

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