DONE DEAL: United sign young rightback from Salford City

Apologies, first of all. This happened a few days ago, but your super soaraway tBB somehow managed to miss it. Heads will roll, we can promise you that.

But anyway! A signing! A defender! And quite an interesting story. United's latest player -- who will go into the reserves -- is 20-year old Libyan-born rightback Sadiq El Fitouri, who apparently impressed while trial. But not on trial with United.

A former kid from City's academy, El Fitouri was released after failing to impress City's coaches. The Daily Mail says that City "remembered him as someone who could cope physically but wasn't the greatest with other aspects of the game. A late developer, he spent around a year with the club before he was released more than a year ago and never got anywhere near the first-team squad."

After being released by City, he was picked up by Salford City, the club owned by a fistful of former United players. Part of their business model is to target players who have (for whatever reason) failed to make the grade at the highest level but still might have a career. The story then goes that El Fitouri impressed in a game against United's U21s, and was promptly offered an 18-month contract, which he was delighted to accept:

This is honestly a dream come true for me.

Is he any good? We don't know. Will he make it at United? We have our doubts. But presumably there's something work taking a punt on. And if United do manage to find a diamond in City's discards, it'll certainly be very funny.