The petition, signed by more than 16,000 people at the time of writing, reads: “We all want Matthijs de Ligt to stay at FC Bayern Munich! He has proven that he‘s a world class defender, probably the best in our squad. There is a reason why he was elected as our best player in the 2022-23 season. Furthermore he is only 24 years old and has a bright future ahead, which he is going to use to fulfil his huge potential.
“Despite his young age, Mattha is already very mature and has a great mentality which will definitely make him a leading figure in defence and probably a competitor for captaincy in some years. His ability to speak English, German and Dutch fluently would help him a lot for that. With 19 years he already brought Ajax Amsterdam to the UCL semi finals as captain.
“Selling Matthijs de Ligt would be an absolutely horrible decision and we would definitely regret it. That‘s why we use our voice to call attention that we will NOT make this mistake!”
WHAT NEXT FOR DE LIGT?
De Ligt is currently in Germany with the Netherlands, who progressed to the quarter-finals of the European Championship by beating Romania on Tuesday. The centre-back hasn’t played a minute of the tournament though due to Ronald Koeman’s preference to start Stefan de Vrij alongside Virgil van Dijk, and it’s unlikely we will see him with the Oranje suit up to face Turkey on Saturday.
