It's scary watching this and coming to the realisation that this version of Martial was better than any attacker we have at the club right now. And I don't mean form wise either, 29 goals and assists in THAT Van Gaal side is frightening. The fact that Greenwood & Sancho in terms of market value are worth around £80m today has me in deep thought. As much as Martial's application and attitude can be questions, from a business point of view we did an awful job of protecting his value as an asset, we're talking about a potential £130m+ player (please consider Lukaku went for £100m in this market) who is going to leave on loan.
Anthony Martial is genuinely the indictment of the club - piss poor nutrition/fitness regimes which have left Martial and alot of our other attackers too bulky and stiff, no sports psychologists to help the players mentally in tough situations where they may be benched, instead of showing our most talented players that we want them to stay by bringing in coach(es) that complement the players skillsets and building teams around them we throw hundreds of thousands of pounds at them a week out of desperation.
Look at how Real Madrid have handled Vinicius Jr's development. Nowhere near the player Martial was at 19 but they saw talent there and persisted with him. Let him play throughout the ages of 19-21 despite being extremely raw and frustrating. They trusted the talent and also respected their own investment by persisting with him and now they have a seriously good player on their hands. Compare that to how we've been pushing Martial (and Rashford) aside for players like Zlatan, Sanchez, Ronaldo & Cavani and it's damning. We are a footballing institution worth $4 billion who for the last 5-6 years have had no plan of action for our young talents, we dont coach them to master a specific position or role, we dont take care of their careers and we hardly ever make decisions with the medium to long term in mind. I really fear for our young players and it's sad to say but if I was a football agent who had my players' best interests at heart I'd keep my players as far away from here as possible