Moukoko linked with Bundesliga return | OneFootball

Youssoufa Moukoko hit the ground running after joining OGC Nice on loan from Borussia Dortmund, scoring a brace in his second game for the French Ligue 1 side.

However, the striker's playing time in France has significantly dwindled as the season has progressed.

With Nice now looking extremely unlikely to activate a €17 million clause to make the loan permanent, Bild is now speculating that Moukoko could return to Germany to get his career back on track.

Union Berlin are looking to strengthen up front, and their new head coach, Steffen Baumgart, spoke highly of the striker in the past when he was in charge of Hamburger SV.

"Give me the phone number. Give me the opportunity to bring him here. I'll pick him up personally," Baumgart told Bild in April 2024.

“It's no secret that I've thought about him and I can say that I think about him every year. If I had the opportunity to talk to him, I would be very happy.”

For Moukoko to join Union, his loan spell with Nice would have to be cut short by Borussia Dortmund, who have him under contract until 2026.

Moukoko hit the headlines in December when ProSieben released a documentary that made a number of claims about the Germany international, most notably that he is actually 24 years old and not 20.

The allegations were made by Joseph Moukoko, who had previously claimed to be the player's father.

However, the player's club, Borussia Dortmund, quickly denied the claims via Sky Germany:

“In the case of Youssoufa Moukoko, the biological parents and the date of birth are derived from official identification documents and birth certificates issued by a German authority. These documents are still valid today and are the basis for playing authorizations and permits for clubs, regardless of whether they are domestic or foreign, and of course also for association teams such as the German U21 national team,” the Bundesliga club stated.

"Please also note that both the player and the biological parents identified in the above-mentioned documents have declared to us and, in the case of the parents, even to third parties through affidavits in the context of legal proceedings that the information contained in the aforementioned official documents is correct. This factual status is of course decisive for us, the DFB, and the player's current club."