Manchester United are to promote Hannibal Mejbri to the first-team squad on a regular basis as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer continues to reward his promising youngsters.
United promoted 17-year-old attacker Shola Shoretire last week and Mejbri, 18, is set to follow and they will both train with the senior set-up regularly, dropping back down to Neil Wood's Under-23 side to play games.
They will join £37million teenager Amad in training with Solskjaer's first-team but playing games with Wood's development side. While that will mean they have to travel to those fixtures on their own Solskjaer believes it will benefit them in the long-term to be exposed to first-team training.
United signed Mejbri from Monaco for an initial fee of €5million, potentially rising to €10million, 18 months ago and he has produced some standout performances for the Under-23s in his time at the club.
"The young kids, we’ve moved Shola up with us, Hannibal will join us and we’ll keep them with us for a while," said Solskjaer. "It’s the next step in their development, we’ve got to take the hit that when they play for the reserves they have to travel by themselves. It’s a nice step for them, they’ve done really well."
