Swansea City complete loan deal for Bayern’s Renato Sanches

The Portugal midfielder Renato Sanches has joined Swansea on a season-long loan from Bayern Munich, the German club have announced.

“We’re delighted we’ve been able to conclude the loan deal with Swansea City. Our goal was for Renato to gain regular match practice at club level in a strong league such as the Premier League,” Bayern’s chairman, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, told the club’s website. “We remain convinced he has the potential to become an important player for FC Bayern in the future. For this reason the agreement states that the player will return to FC Bayern on 1 July 2018 with no option to make the transfer permanent.”

The prodigiously talented Portugal international cost Bayern €35m from Benfica last summer and the move is testament to Paul Clement’s contacts at Bayern, where he worked as Carlo Ancelotti’s No2 before taking over at the Liberty Stadium in January. Clement knows Sanches from that period, having coached him for six months, and he encouraged Swansea to explore the possibility of signing the midfielder once it became clear that there could be an opportunity.