Chelsea transfer news: N'Golo Kante rejected Jose Mourinho's 'amazing' Manchester United offer because of 'good feeling' with Antonio Conte

Kante has quickly become a key player at Stamford Bridge.
Getty Images
Tom Doyle2 September 2016

N'Golo Kante has revealed that he turned down advances to join Jose Mourinho at Manchester United this summer because he had already decided to work with Antonio Conte at Chelsea.

Kante has impressed for Chelsea since a £32million transfer from Premier League champions Leicester, with the midfielder's new team-mates nicknaming him 'The Rat' for his defensive work rate and levels of endurance.

However, the France international suggests it could have been a very different transfer window for Chelsea had he decided to take up the option of joining former Blues boss Mourinho at Old Trafford.

Kante started alongside United's record signing Paul Pogba during France's 3-1 victory against Italy on Thursday night, but the 25-year-old says he could not turn down the chance to work with former Azzurri boss Conte at Stamford Bridge.

The Mirror quotes Kante as saying: "It was amazing to have Mourinho call me, even though I'd been warned before how he would appeal to me.

"I listened to his arguments about why I should move to United.

"But at that time I was hesitant between staying at Leicester or leaving for Chelsea.

"My discussions with them were already well underway.

"But when I spoke, I had a good feeling with Conte."

David Luiz's best Chelsea goals

1/5

Chelsea have won their opening three Premier League games of the season under Conte, with Kante quickly becoming an integral player in west London.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Sign up you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy notice .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in