The Man Utd Thread

[SeanR]

1 minute ago, spork said:

This is the week we actually but someone. I can feel it in my bones 

get McGuire to do it!

[ckny]

Nah.

[Rockboy]

The way things are going I wouldn't be surprised if we fail to sign any players before pre-season starts, and Ten Hag walks away before we've even kicked a ball. 😬

[fatbob]

Might be worth it for the United Twitter alone tbh! 😅

I expect there will be a few rapid fire deals done when the De Jong deal completes or falls through. For whatever reason (probably budgetary) that seems to be the blockage.

[fatbob]

Looks like Henderson is set to join Forest on loan. Which means at least Garner can't also go on loan back to Forest. Might be a good sign for him staying at United this season. He could of course still be sold to Forest, which I think is unlikely? Or go on loan to another club.

 

Given how thin the midfield is, I think he's got a great shot at playing a lot next season assuming Ten Hag feels he can fin into his system. To me he seems like a good option for a deep lying playmaker in a midfield two alongside De Jong, or even as a ball progressor to deputise for De Jong.

[Rockboy]

Sounds like the Antony deal is getting closer (£40m, club officials in Amsterdam today to finalize deal) and the De Jong deal is stumbling, Man City are apparently interested and rumours the player is interested.

[spork]

Man City have said they are not interested in De Jong, pretty sure they reiterated this over the last day or two.

[feltmonkey]

Antony would be a good signing. He looks a terrific player, very creative and intelligent in the final third. He's left footed, which these days means he plays on the right wing.  We need someone there having lost Greenwood.  

 

Central midfield is still the worry though. We were thin before, and now with Pogba and Matic leaving we're getting worryingly close to having to play Andreas Pereira again.  I think we need at least two midfielders, a centre-back and a striker just to limp through the season with a still quite thin squad.  It shows what a shambles we are, really.  

[ckny]

The writing was on the wall in the first press conference when Ten Hag was talking up finishing 2nd last season. It’s clear there’s no money and he’s been told he’ll have to make do with what he’s got. So yeah, expect Pereira, Jones and the rest to get plenty of games. Strap in, it’s going to be another long season.

[feltmonkey]

Our board never back a manager in their first transfer window.  It's very odd.  Why appoint the guy if the first thing they're going to do is undermine him?

 

I think my main reason behind hoping we buy Antony is so we can at some point next season play a front three of Antony, Anthony Martial, and Anthony Elanga.

[Loik V credern]

Never seen Anthony, what an unbelievably confident, entertaining player he is. Neymar levels of showmanship. Not that players from the Eredivisie generally do well in the premier league. 

 

 

Apparently, latest news is he's determined to join, price is €69m. Like the Raphinha price, it's a lot, but they're really impressive individual talents. 

[Loik V credern]

Mark Goldbridge goes in to De Jong as not much of a cdm here

 

 

It's not too bad considering that type of channel he's churning out videos every day, I've not seen much of it.

 

I think Modric is one of the best midfielders ever so the comparison isn't fair, but no one would describe him as a defensive midfielder but he can do that as part of his game, the tracking, chasing, tackles, breaking up play (I'd like to see comparisons with De Jong on that per game) and as we saw in the champions league comebacks, surging runs despite his age are still an asset he has. Modric got better every year from 28 onwards so maybe De Jong has the same trajectory. Just an all round quality midfielder.

 

I'd still like to retract all my optimism for the upcoming season if no signings are made, Conte after two weeks at Spurs said 'I'm not a wizard' and I don't think Ten Hag is. 

 

Something not often mentioned when it should be is Martial earns more a week than Salah. He arrived in 2015 on £110,000 a week, from 2019 it's been £250,000 a week. Just...when the club is haggling over £20-30m in transfers, they're wasting that in unnecessarily high wages in unnecessarily long contracts (a 6 year contract in 2019, why? Why not 3 or 4?).

 

All the players are imo £50,000 a week overpaid at least. Pogba it's different as his wage is from coming in as a huge expensive signing, but like Sancho it's still ridiculously high given neither had done anything in the premier league yet.

 

According to spotrac, De Bruyne arrived at City with an offer that I always thought was 'too good to refuse', but apparently it was £150,000 a week. Not excessive at all in 2015 for a player as good as him. Obviously it went up after 3 years but by that point he was becoming an all time premier league great, was Martial a world beater in 2018 to be given such a new long contract at that high a wage? £7m more a year? So that was in January 2019. How does anyone with about 44 goals in 150 games at that point, so 1 in 3, which for an attacking forward isn't special, get a £140,000 a week pay rise? Not even double, but more. 

 

To me things like this, mainly long contracts for managers who are then inevitably sacked before finishing their time is like a favour from the chief exec as an acknowledgement the manager is of their status, no one is performing too well at a big club they're going to be poached. They're not even giving a 'living wage' to their lowest earners who keep the club functioning yet gladly, pointlessly hand Martial an excessive contract.

 

Financial problems at clubs always come down to the wage bill, doesn't it? One big contract after another, 4 years later when half of those players are unsurprisingly washed up, providing nothing, and can't be moved on cos no other club will buy them. I mean I'm a nobody, and simple, but does it require that much foresight to avoid this amount of money wasting?

 

Heh, Martial, new contract, so..£110,000, you're not that great, but still we're bumping you up to...£150,000 a week, how does that sound? And a 3 year deal. You're employed by us, not impressing any other club, so...yeah. There we go, 15.6m saved in 3 years. I'm not going through all the players to see how in line £150,000 would be, but they're all over paid.

 

It's not like being given a big contract has enthused Martial, energised him to perform at new levels. It's a modern phenomenon that players when out of contract play out of their skin then when they get the big wage, they do nothing.

 

Time is all messed up for me, and I have no memory, but I guess Martial was excellent in 2020 after the lockdown break, but that's a year after his new contract and I can't recall how he was immediately past January 2019. Regardless, he's disappeared since the start of the 2020 season and no one has any faith he'll come good again, like years of loans now then offloaded for £25m in 2024 to a mid table Serie A club probably. 

 

Mourinho was given a £19.6m pay off, he was paid £15m a year. Apparently, Guardiola is on £19m and Klopp £16m but that is now after 3/4 years of sustained success reaching peaks never before seen at their clubs. 

 

Can anyone believe the Sancho wage, there's some on reddit who swear it's misleading because a lot of it is add ons, but spotrac seems legit with its detail and they have his base wage at £350,000 a week. Again I'm simple, but given the excess of football, don't wages usually go up? If you start high, where do you go? A at the time 21 year old who has not proved himself in the premier league, with no other clubs interested in him, handed that. Record breaking Bundesliga stats, but so what.

 

De Bruyne was a one man force for Wolfsburg. Did that much change in general in players wages from 2015 to 2021 that there'd be £200,000 difference in their first wage? Regardless of the transfer fee, cos City's owners have money to burn too, not even mentioned that. 

[JPL]

Another week’s rolled by then and still no signings. What the fuck are they playing at? It doesn’t instil much confidence, does it?

[spork]

Lots of reports coming out this morning that the De Jong transfer is close to being agreed. 
 

[teddymeow]

I can't help but think that, to the tune of Seven Nation Army...

 

🎶We're gonna sign no one!!🎶

 

 

 

[spork]

This is the week we actually buy someone. I can feel it in my bones 

[Loik V credern]

 

[feltmonkey]

That story came from The Sun, so I would advise skepticism.

[Sexton Hardcastle]

[spork]

Looks like Pereira is off to Fulham for 8 million or so. Better than nothing!

[feltmonkey]

Are we paying them?

[fatbob]

6 hours ago, Loik V credern said:

 

 

Bizarrely, this is not the first time this link has cropped up in the past couple of seasons! 

 

 

[spork]

Frenkie reportedly to be pretty much done. We’ve now pretty much signed a left back who was about to sign for Lyon. Guess that’s Telles heading off.

 

 

[feltmonkey]

I read that we were after him a while ago and were told the price was double that.  Is that right?

 

If so, surely this is the way to avoid the Man Utd tax - wait until our targets are about to sign for someone else and come in offering the same amount plus a cake.

 

edit - By the way, I have no idea why we're going for a left back when we've got such a limited budget.  The other side of the defence is surely more of a priority, isn't it?

[spork]

I think with Shaw being injured as much as he is and Telles being the back up we could do with decent players coming in on both sides.

[Loik V credern]

Why are United always buying fullbacks? 6 since 14/15 is it? Few seem to get a long run, or have what is required. Like being able to cross.

 

I think nearly one every season is overkill when the team has desperately needed more ball playing midfielders. Tbh for me centrebacks too, always buying them. Or young wingers who get sent on loan for 4 years then disappear. I like going on transfer history of clubs on transfermarkt, the amount of players United have churned through and got so little out of..does anyone even recall Schneiderlin played for United? Or was that season too much of a bore for anyone to bother remembering any of it? Arrived for £31m, stayed for 1 season, left for £20m. One of many 11m amounts wasted.

 

 

[Gabzy]

Because all the current ones are shit and can’t contribute in any attacking way. If we had anyone who could effectively pop crosses into Ronaldo… 💦

Apart from Shaw sometimes.

[Loik V credern]

Yeah but it's like they don't check if the incoming fullback can cross the ball so churn through loads. I mean..just buy 2-3 genuinely good ones, not 6. Both Wan Bissaka and Dalot are so bad at it I'm not sure it's worth persevering with them if they can't do such a basic football skill. 

 

I like Shaw's dinks but you see how Reece James has improved at Chelsea, getting attention for his shooting ability but then he's whipping in hard fast crosses, those low dangerous ones defenders hate, I can't remember the last time a United fullback did that. I guess he's not come from nowhere if you follow England u19s and the Chelsea academy, but he still sort of has asserted himself as one of the best around. 

[fatbob]

United in general have bought extremely poorly in all positions since Fergie left. 

 

Full back and midfield are very weak positions at United and probably the most important to how Ten Hag's systems that he's played in the past. 

 

Telles and Dalot don't seem that great to me, but I could see Dalot improving under the right coach. Shaw is flaky and injury prone and AWB just won't fit in the system I don't think. There's a decent argument that United need four new full backs! 😅

Saying that, Laird had a decent loan at Bournemouth before he got injured in the second half of the season, would love to see how Ten Hag rates him. Might be a bit early for Alvaro Fernandez to break through, but would like to see him play in pre-season and then potentially get a good loan.

[Rockboy]

I'll admit I saw very little of Brandon Williams at Norwich last season, but it sounds like he did pretty well. I like his attitude, I wonder if Ten Hag might give him a chance?