Centre Back... Who do we go for?

Colombian Mancunian said:
Toby at a discount on January.

Not to Mina. We already have Lindelof as a youth with potential.

Not to Maguire. He is overrated due to him being English
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Lindelof is not a youth by any means (nor is Bailly - Smalling and Jones were though, despite being signings), and you have Tuanzebe and TFM as youths with more potential, and they're from your youth team, not Benfica.

Sir Alex didn't even try to buy Panucci, Zanetti or Thuram, all of whom were infinitely better (or at least infinitely more proven) than either Lindelof or Bailly, preferring to trust G Neville, who is not as talented as Tuanzebe (not saying Axel will be as good as Gary became).

To add to that, Zanetti and Thuram were far better than G Nev, and Panucci had a much higher peak, and not for a short time (at least until he joined Inter in the early 00s).
 
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Hopefully we move on Jones, Rojo, Darmian and one of Valencia/Young. That would leave plenty of room for Alderweireld, Tuanzebe, TFM and maybe Mitchell.
 
reddaz71 said:
Surely Alderweireld in January for £25m
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Not available at that price until the end of the season. At that point Spurs have the option to either let him go for free (obviously not) or activate an extra one year clause in his contract, however that clause also puts in a £25m release clause. Spurs will do that, then hope that by that stage the likes of ourselves or the other handful of clubs who can offer him more won't want him anymore.
 
In the summer I wanted Alderweireld over Maguire but I seem to have changed my mind since... With him being so much younger than Alderweireld we are definitely better off going for him instead. In terms of footballing ability alone and not including age, I still feel Maguire can offer a lot and potentially more than Alderweireld can. I guarantee that if Maguire played for Spurs not Leicester and was Belgian rather than English, our fan base would be creaming for him.

He's an absolute no nonsense CB and is comfortable on the ball too. Never mind his presence alone in being an utter monster. We need someone who has an aura about them that they wont take any sh*t and is also comfortable playing out from the back when necessary.

Bring Slabhead in January Woody, do us proud.
 
Marquinhos? Quick, aggressive and assertive tackler. But not the tallest at 6ft.
 
De Ligt looks the real deal. Seems to have the mentality as well. He doesnt fit in with the age structure of our defence though. Or thats at least what I imagine Mourinho thinks and that he wants to go with more experience at the back.
It would be a shame to let De Ligt go elsewhere though. It might even be worth to sacrifice Lindelöf or Bailly to bring him in, even if I dont like letting players go that early in their United careers.
 
Maguire and Toby with smalling and Bailey as back up. Sell Jones , Rojo and Lindeloff
 
One out of the three: Škriniar, Toby, Maguire, preferably Škriniar.
 
Johan07 said:
De Ligt looks the real deal. Seems to have the mentality as well. He doesnt fit in with the age structure of our defence though. Or thats at least what I imagine Mourinho thinks and that he wants to go with more experience at the back.
It would be a shame to let De Ligt go elsewhere though. It might even be worth to sacrifice Lindelöf or Bailly to bring him in, even if I dont like letting players go that early in their United careers.
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I agree - I would sacrifice Lindelof

Bailly is good and as shown what he can do. Lindelof not so much.
 
IrishRedDevil said:
Maguire just signed a new 5 year contract.
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Perhaps he will have learned how to defend by the time that contract is up.

Good, but nowhere near as good as he is hyped to be, on the ball, a mediocre defender who has not shown the ability to improve any team he is in defensively. Hull, Leicester and England have all been shite at the back with Maguire. You can't put that all on him of course, but when it keeps happening it might not just be a coincidence.
 
Thank God, Maguire renewed with Leicester. That’s his level. He is not good enough for us, specially for the money being quoted. We need a real upgrade on what we got and neither Maguire nor Mina are. Toby on the other hand is a big upgrade, and what Bailly and Lindelof need: an experienced composed defender to learn from! They have raw talent, but lack discipline and tactical awareness.
 
Colombian Mancunian said:
Thank God, Maguire renewed with Leicester. That’s his level. He is not good enough for us, specially for the money being quoted. We need a real upgrade on what we got and neither Maguire nor Mina are. Toby on the other hand is a big upgrade, and what Bailly and Lindelof need: an experienced composed defender to learn from! They have raw talent, but lack discipline and tactical awareness.
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Spot on. Can’t believe some people genuinely thought Maguire was an improvement on Smalling and Jones. He had a decent World Cup but never a £75 million player. That is jokes.
 
We dodged a huge bullet with Maguire
 
Cassidy said:
We dodged a huge bullet with Maguire
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He's still better than Lindelof, whom you shouldn't have bought (unless you sold at least two of Blind, Darmian and A N Other at the same time), preferring to develop Tuanzebe and TFM and buying an established first-choice RB or Perisic.
 
andyjgt1 said:
He's still better than Lindelof, whom you shouldn't have bought (unless you sold at least two of Blind, Darmian and A N Other at the same time), preferring to develop Tuanzebe and TFM and buying an established first-choice RB or Perisic.
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Debatable and also irrelevant. I actually agree that we shouldn't have bought Lindelof and agree about Tuanzebe.
But the simple fact remains that Maguire isn't good enough and would have been an expensive mistake at £70m
 
we need to be buying top tier - delighted we didn't buy Maguire

I don't watch enough of players like Skriniar, Koulibaly or De Ligt to know if they are the answer but we need to be looking for the class of player who can pass and read the game like Rio or dominate and lead our defence like Vidic/Stam

they are the standard
 
We need to think of the unit when answering this question. I’ve seen people wanting Smalling sold but then advocating for defenders who are not aerially dominant.

If we buy a defender who is not great in the air he MUST partner Smalling. Some people have forgotten or ignored basics of defending in favour of contemporary stuff like ‘distribution’.
 
Macern said:
He’s actually excellent on the ball. I think he’s too good for Leicester.
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I'm not sure that Leicester would agree with that.
Maguire knows he will start every week at Leicester but who knows what to expect with JM at United. United have become a graveyard for CB's.
 
Cassidy said:
Debatable and also irrelevant. I actually agree that we shouldn't have bought Lindelof and agree about Tuanzebe.
But the simple fact remains that Maguire isn't good enough and would have been an expensive mistake at £70m
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Debatable? I mean OK Maguire isn't a world class CB, but he is better than Lindelof, and much more reliable than Jones/Rojo and even Bailly. You are right though, not for 70m.

I'd go for De Ligt personally.
 
Hopefully we move on from the current cb lot that we have and get two center backs, although I don't see this happening but two of De Ligt, Skriniar, Koulibaly would put us in a really good position.
 
Adnan said:
We should go all out for De Ligt
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Fully agree, he does lack experience, but I'd say the fans will show patience with him. Lad just looks a natural leader and has just about everything you'd want in a central defender.
 
11101 said:
Agreed. I think he's going to be brilliant. Reminds me of Jaap Stam in some of the things he does.
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He's better than Jaap. Just as good defensively but a better ball player. Hus distribution from the back is very good
 
Koulibaly just signed a new 5 year contract. He was worth 80m before and now he's just not possible. He's also 28(?) and expressed a wish to play there as long as he can. That's just not practical.
 
De Ligt is a great prospect but even at his level he makes a few blunders every once in a while. The whole idea was to get some senior presence who wouldn't take any further time to settle and grow into their potential. Vogt, Maguire, K2, Bonucci have just signed long term deals so will be impossible.

If we are looking for a player in the summer, it will mostly be Alderweireld (25m RC) and someone who's 30 and playing at the top of their game. Other options would be Romagnoli or Gimenez. Gimenez has been snubbed by Simeone time and time again now and has started the new season with Godin and Savic. Uniteds glacial speed with any deals means they signed long term contracts before the WC and so were never options. Milan still looks like a shit project and Romagnoli who's now 25 will want to start stepping up.
Skriniar is the other obvious option who unlike every other target United seemingly had with the exception of Godin, Boateng (United won't be going near these two with a barge pole after what happened in the window) and Alderweireld still hasn't signed a long term contract and as such in the summer will have 3 years left (still ridiculous but the price of dragging our feet through every single window). I don't see any target coming in Jan.

Maguire at this point would be way too expensive and would require more than the world record fee and frankly he's good but not anywhere close to that good.

Imo it'll be Alderweireld, but Romagnoli or Skriniar could happen next summer too. De Ligt is just not the profile of the CB we require.

Interestingly, Smalling and Jones have one year left on their deals, no sign of a renewal coming. Surely one of those two is on their way out, my bet being Jones. As such De Ligt would be a tremendous player to replace Jones with. Don't mind United getting Alderweireld for 25m and De Ligt for 50m next summer. Till then therest just no ball playing CBs I can think of.

Kostas Manolas is a terrific defender and maybe his ball playing attributes aren't enhanced in Roma's system but he's got a 30m RC and Monchi admitted he was one of the players who could have left in the summer which basically says there's nothing holding him there like K2 or Gimenez or Godin. Maybe a good shout to replace Smalling + Jones. United have definitely left a lot of work to be done with no targets left.
 
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Sorry my friend, but Levy isn't selling anyone he doesn't want to, definitely not to United.
 
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