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Manchester United are trying to gazump Manchester City’s bid to sign Alexis Sanchez .

Jose Mourinho has entered the bidding, after learning that City are refusing to meet both Arsenal’s £35million asking price and the striker’s demand for a three-and-a-half-year contract worth £400,000-a-week.

Sanchez also wants a £15million signing-on fee.

The Premier League leaders have baulked at a deal that will cost them £124m this month for a 29-year-old.

(Image: PA)

City have deemed that simply too much for a man who'll be available on a free transfer when his contract at the Emirates expires in the summer.

They believed a £20m fee and contract worth £300,000-a-week would be enough to land Pep Guardiola’s No 1 target.

United are ready to jump ahead of their fierce rivals, after making it clear they will meet the Chile international’s financial demands.

(Image: Getty)

(Image: Getty Images Europe)

United will offer Arsenal a player-plus-cash transfer that would see £27m playmaker Henrikh Mkhitaryan move the opposite way.

A potential stumbling block to the deal being proposed is that the Armenian earns £200,000-a-week at Old Trafford and is unwilling to take a pay-cut.

United showed when they handed Zlatan Ibrahimovic a basic salary of £367,000-a-week in the summer of 2016 that they have the financial muscle to pay the best wages.

(Image: Action Images via Reuters)

And after pipping City to the signature of Robin van Persie when the Dutchman left the Gunners in 2013, they are looking to beat City to the punch again.

It would be a huge coup for Mourinho, who warned before this transfer window opened that United need to step up their spending to compete with the neighbours.

City have offered to make Sanchez their highest-paid player with a deal that would include a £300,000-a-week basic wage and the potential to bank huge bonuses.

(Image: Getty)

Fellow striker Sergio Aguero currently tops their earnings league on £250,000-a-week.

City were ready to hand Sanchez parity with the Argentinean last summer after agreeing a £60m fee with Arsenal, only for the deal to collapse on deadline day when they failed to lure Thomas Lemar from Monaco as a replacement.

Now Sanchez’s advisers want much more.

Paris Saint-Germain and Bayern Munich were put off by the Chilean’s wage demands last year – and City were led to believe that was because he wanted to link up again with his former Barcelona boss Guardiola.

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When Sanchez’s summer move to the Etihad fell through at the 11th hour, they took the decision to wait 12 months and land him on a free.

But Gabriel Jesus’ knee ligament injury that will sideline him until the end of February has left Aguero as the Blues’ only recognised striker.

With City going for an unprecedented Quadruple, Guardiola has urged sporting director Txiki Begiristain to seal a deal for the player this month.

(Image: Reuters)

City are still hoping Sanchez will put medals before money by joining a club that is 15 points clear at the top of the Premier League and through to the last 16 of the Champions League.

The Blues have been reining in their wage-bill spend in recent years by offering players incentivised deals linked to success.

Now they have to decide whether to wreck that pay structure or risk losing their top target to their biggest rivals.