I'm not comparing them stylistically. Herrera was more a front foot player. But his 'poor range of passing' is still miles ahead of what Rice has demonstrated.
Conversely, Rice is not in the same mold as Carrick. Carrick didn't rely on physical attributes; he wasn't putting in crunching tackles. His biggest asset was his ability to control a game, to use the ball wisely and to link the defense with the midfield/attack. Again, Rice hasn't show anything close to that level of sophistication on the ball. He plays simple passes. If Rice was to join those same criticisms of Herrera would be levelled at Rice. At United, having the ability to pass in midfield isn't desired, it's essential, especially if you're paying north of 60m. I wouldn't use the Euros as a point of reference, because Rice was utterly outclassed by his midfield counterpart, both off and on the ball.
I feel the same. The more I watch Rice the more I believe he doesn't have what it takes to make it at a club like United. His skill set excels at a team like West Ham. When he's asked to do more, which he will at a club like ours, yes found wanting.
I remember when United signed Michael Carrick. We paid something like £18.6m which was a hell of a lot of money at the time. I believe it was also our only major signing that Summer, which caused a certain disgruntlement amongst the fans. I just checked Wikipedia and Carrick was 25 when we signed him, having had two seasons at Spurs in the PL. Before that, he was playing in the Championship with West Ham.
So what's my point? Well, first and foremost, all of the same criticisms you have levelled at Rice were used as a stick to beat Carrick with. He was labelled slow, overly cautious in his passing, passive in games, not creative enough, didn't get enough goals, didn't get enough assists, didn't make enough tackles etc...If we look at the player Carrick became, none of those fears became reality and he became one of our best ever CMs.
Secondly, as I mentioned, Carrick was 25 at the point we signed him. Declan Rice has just turned 22. I feel like Rice at 22 is ALREADY ahead of Carrick at 25, and there's still plenty of room for improvement.
Third, I had a ST that year and I watched virtually every game we played at home live. Carrick struggled big time. We all wanted him to do well, but you could tell he wasn't sure of his role, playing alongside Scholes, who obviously most of our players viewed as the 'go-to' pass. For a player who did eventually end up showing his huge quality on the ball, Carrick was suddenly playing second-fiddle to someone who was better than him at moving the ball and had a better range of passing. Quite often, you would come away from a game thinking Carrick had literally existed to roll 5-yard passes to Paul Scholes or the CBs. It wasn't until his 2nd or even 3rd season that we started to see the 'real' Michael Carrick (imo), by which time he would have been 27/28.
So the fact that certain fans and pundits crib Rice for being limited or conservative doesn't worry me. Personally, I don't see that when I watch him play. I see a dynamic CM, capable of travelling with the ball and also picking out forward passes. The fact that he is doing this at 22 in the PL and has been a regular in the CM for England since he was 20 is mind-blowing to me. Again, if you look at someone like Carrick or Jordan Henderson for comparison (both of whom I rate very highly), they were performing nowhere near to the level of Rice at a similar age. There have been very few CMs I can think of that have been definite starters for their club and country since the age of 20/21 in the CM role, and the players that did play centrally at that sort of age tended to turn out superstars.
