Manchester United’s summer of reconstruction seemed to be going rather well as they made a cluster of new signings just before heading on tour to America.
But two and a half weeks on, and with eight days to United’s opening league game against Spurs, boss Louis van Gaal has some issues . . .
Distracted goalkeeper
United have been playing hardball with David de Gea over his desire to move to Real Madrid and at the moment it would appear to have backfired.
With the season upon us, United should have either sold and replaced him or persuaded him to sign a new contract.
Instead, they find themselves with a distracted player who is short of match practice after beginning this tour with a mystery back ‘injury’ and two back-ups in Victor Valdes and Sergio Romero who, for different reasons, are in no position to play, either.
United’s insistence that they will not accept a cash deal from Madrid for De Gea now looks rather foolish in the wake of the Spanish club’s refusal to do a swap involving central defender Sergio Ramos.
Defensive dilemma
The word from United is that they are no longer in the market for a central defender.
Only time will tell if Louis van Gaal agrees with that but, at the moment, he would appear to be heading towards the Tottenham game with a rather unconvincing looking pairing of Daley Blind and one of Phil Jones or Chris Smalling. Blind is a handy utility player and did well last season at left back and in the centre of midfield but a Premier League central defender he surely is not.
Essentially, he is filling in while the left-footed Marcos Rojo gains match fitness after missing this tour with passport problems. That in itself was a shambolic episode.Rojo has already been fined for not keeping his paperwork up to date but footballers are notoriously disorganised and the fact a Premier League football club was not aware of one of their player’s visa issues is embarrassing.
Di Maria problem
It finally appears as though United’s record signing Angel di Maria is about to join Paris Saint- Germain and United have struck a decent deal by recouping £44m of the £60m spent on him a year ago.
Di Maria’s failure to board a plane to join his team-mates last weekend, however, was allowed to become an issue that overshadowed the final leg of this tour.
For reasons known only to themselves, Van Gaal and executive vice chairman Ed Woodward refused to discuss Di Maria’s absence. The United manager declared, rather peculiarly, after Wednesday’s game against PSG that he didn’t know where the South American was.
The chances are that wasn’t true and United were keeping quiet so as not to antagonise Di Maria’s agent Jorge Mendes, who also looks after De Gea.
Whatever the case, the whole episode left United looking unable to control their own players and that is never good.
Striker light
Is it possible to win the Premier League with only one true goal-scorer in your squad? It seems that United are about to find out. This time last year, Van Gaal was packing his squad with traditional centre forwards, adding Radamel Falcao to a squad that already contained Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie.
With Falcao and Van Persie jettisoned, it seems peculiar that Van Gaal isn’t seeking to replace them with at least one world-class striker. United have bought one offensive player in Memphis Depay, although he is young and unaccustomed to the Premier League, and are still expecting to replace Di Maria with Pedro from Barcelona.
Rooney, meanwhile, remains United’s talisman and their most important player. But asking him to score 25 goals this season seems an awful lot for a player who hasn’t actually done that for some time now.
When you consider that Chelsea and Manchester City will head in to the season with players like Diego Costa and Sergio Aguero leading the line, then United’s options begin to look a little thin.
Reasons to be cheerful
All is not lost, of course. United still have a month to add to their squad and they certainly have the money to do something special in the transfer market.
Equally, Van Gaal would appear to have made some astute additions already.
The United manager believes Depay is one of the best young players in Europe and the Dutchman has certainly looked rather special on this tour of America.
Depay appears technically excellent and intelligent enough to play in different positions.
Already he looks to be forming some kind of understanding with Rooney.
The effectiveness of Bastian Schweinsteiger will depend on the German’s ability to stay fit, but the signing of Italian full back Matteo Darmian and midfielder Morgan Schneiderlin appears to have brought United quality in key positions.
The unheralded Darmian looks perfect for the Premier League in build, temperament and efficiency. He can play at left back as well, if necessary.
If only he could play in goal. – Daily Mail