Erling Haaland / signs for Dortmund

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I don't see any problems regarding Martial. There will be plenty of games for both players and he'll also be able to cover the left if Rashford is injured or needs a rest. Signing Haaland should allow us to keep him fresh and hopefully that helps with his injuries.

I don't see him having any issues with it either. Ibra and Sanchez were established superstars brought in to take his position. Signing a youngster to compete with him is very different. He should take it as a show of faith that we're happy to go forward with him as our only experienced striker.

I really don't get this protectionism people have towards their favourite players. Martial is one of my favourites but its obvious a bit of compeition would help keep him on his toes. He has a tendency to slack off in smaller games. In a perfect world Haaland comes in a turns out good enough to take his place. If that happened we'd be in great shape.
 
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There's this weird cult around Martial on the internet which is very weird. A bit of competition is what the lad needs, He is very inconsistent and has not fulfilled his potential yet.
 
Alabaster Codify7 said:
In my head, we'd look something like this (full-strength) until the summer:

------McTominay------Fred-------
James------Martial----------Rashford
------------------Haaland---------------

I know Martial's not a #10 but i see no reason why he couldn't do better there than Mata/Lingard/Pereira. If he can't, start one of those three and Martial/James/Rashford/Haaaland rotate based on fitness and form.


From the summer onwards, if we sign who we should sign, I'd hope:


---------McTominay-------CDM--------------------
-----------------------CAM/#10------------------------
James/Martial------Haaland---------Rashford


I think a big but technically decent CAF coul cause HAVOC bringing our fast wide forwards into play and knocking the ball onto them etc.
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Haaland is not as good playing with his back to goal and bringing teammates into play though, so that really wouldn’t be a reason for displacing Martial with him. He offers a threat running in behind, is a big bundle of energy and is a predator in the box - something totally different.

Keep Martial away from the right wing.
 
Is he good aerially? Would be brilliant if he was, because it would give us a threat from crosses.
 
RedSky said:
We've also seen in games that an injury to Martial and our attacking play relies purely on Rashford. Vital we get another player in personally, if nothing else to reduce the pressure on our senior (crazy to think Martial and Rashford as this) attackers.
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Yeah true but at least we have some kind of depth in attack. Greenwood has shown he can play in place of Rashford or Martial and at least allow the team to function.

You also have to factor in Haaland's age and experience. Highly unlikely he'll come in and be an immediate answer to anything.

Meanwhile we are literally 1 injury from having NO ONE as half of our midfield. I'd classify that as an emergency really.

RyRy11 said:
Whilst I agree you can’t pass up an opportunity to sign a prospect like this for £20m. I don’t think midfield will be addressed until the summer so with Pogba back this month we can hopefully limp to the end of the season.
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I think midfield is in a situation where waiting to sort it out just isn't an option. If you can't get a player in permanently in January, then you have to look for a temporary fix.

If we can do that and get this kid I wouldn't be complaining
 
Only thing I'm concerned about is shoving Greenwood out on the right. He's been much better playing up top, and I don't see Martial or Haaland on the right either.

Depth wise with players in positions they have looked at the level we need, it'd end up like this...

LW - Rashford/Martial/James
ST - Martial/Haaland/Greenwood
RW - James

It would end up with Greenwood only getting minutes out on the right, which whilst he can play there, he hasn't looked half the player he has up top.
 
noodlehair said:
Yeah true but at least we have some kind of depth in attack. Greenwood has shown he can play in place of Rashford or Martial and at least allow the team to function.

You also have to factor in Haaland's age and experience. Highly unlikely he'll come in and be an immediate answer to anything.

Meanwhile we are literally 1 injury from having NO ONE as half of our midfield. I'd classify that as an emergency really.



I think midfield is in a situation where waiting to sort it out just isn't an option. If you can't get a player in permanently in January, then you have to look for a temporary fix.

If we can do that and get this kid I wouldn't be complaining
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Midfield is definitely the more urgent signing. As you correctly point out we continue to be an injury from disaster as proved in the SU and Villa games without Scotty. Every time Fred or Scott go into a challenge I flinch these days.

It's not a choice between signing a striker or a midfielder in January though. They will likely have a list of targets they believe they can get over the next two windows including 2 midfielders. If any of those players are available in January I'd expect they will go for them. They'd probably sign all 3 in January if it was possible. But clubs are reluctant to sell mid season so unfortunately it might just be Haaland that's available.

I can't see Ole signing someone he's not sure about just to boost the numbers either. We've signed way too many problems over the last 7 years to sign another on a several year contract just to cover a few months. You'd hope there must be someone out there though who could come in on a loan or short contract though. All they have to do is be a better holding midfielder than Andreas and Matic. That's not exactly a lot to ask.
 
ROFLUTION said:
I mostly think they come to him because he gets big moves with big wages done to be honest. You can just as well be sharp and bullish to achieve that as being nice. He's probably nice to the buying/interested clubs and as rough as possible with the selling ones
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He more likely rough with those who try to screw his clients
 
P-Nut said:
Only thing I'm concerned about is shoving Greenwood out on the right. He's been much better playing up top, and I don't see Martial or Haaland on the right either.

Depth wise with players in positions they have looked at the level we need, it'd end up like this...

LW - Rashford/Martial/James
ST - Martial/Haaland/Greenwood
RW - James

It would end up with Greenwood only getting minutes out on the right, which whilst he can play there, he hasn't looked half the player he has up top.
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Dont think that's an issue. He's played almost exclusively on the right. Only times he does up top is in the dead rubber games (and vs spurs where he didnt make much of an impact). On the right is perfect for his development and he's impressed. Long term I expect to see him up top, and realistically if we sign haaland itll be a trio of those 2 and Rashford imo. Not a problem having depth till all are ready though, and someone like haaland is necessary so we can change games and rotate more. Would give a nice balance to the attack.
 
SteveW said:
Midfield is definitely the more urgent signing. As you correctly point out we continue to be an injury from disaster as proved in the SU and Villa games without Scotty. Every time Fred or Scott go into a challenge I flinch these days.

It's not a choice between signing a striker or a midfielder in January though. They will likely have a list of targets they believe they can get over the next two windows including 2 midfielders. If any of those players are available in January I'd expect they will go for them. They'd probably sign all 3 in January if it was possible. But clubs are reluctant to sell mid season so unfortunately it might just be Haaland that's available.

I can't see Ole signing someone he's not sure about just to boost the numbers either. We've signed way too many problems over the last 7 years to sign another on a several year contract just to cover a few months. You'd hope there must be someone out there though who could come in on a loan or short contract though. All they have to do is be a better holding midfielder than Andreas and Matic. That's not exactly a lot to ask.
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You'd like to think that's how it works and we cn work on more than one target at a time, but when you listen to Woodward evidently this isn't the case.

If it was we'd have got it sorted in the summer as it was already beyond obvious then. It's not even like Herrera leaving happened suddenly. They literally knew months in advance.
 
crossy1686 said:
So if the rumours are true and Solskjaer did fly out to speak to him and his family this Friday, we've definitely had a bid accepted, which means this is much further along than most of the transfer rumours we hear about.
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Well he could have just flown out to visit Mozart’s birthplace
 
noodlehair said:
You'd like to think that's how it works and we cn work on more than one target at a time, but when you listen to Woodward evidently this isn't the case.

If it was we'd have got it sorted in the summer as it was already beyond obvious then. It's not even like Herrera leaving happened suddenly. They literally knew months in advance.
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So you think Ole's choice of midfielder is available this January but we're not going to sign him because Ed is only capable of doing one deal in the space of a month and has chose Haaland?

Come on. Be serious.
 
crossy1686 said:
So if the rumours are true and Solskjaer did fly out to speak to him and his family this Friday, we've definitely had a bid accepted, which means this is much further along than most of the transfer rumours we hear about.
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Or else it might be a last ditch attempt after the player chose to play elsewhere
 
bosnian_red said:
Dont think that's an issue. He's played almost exclusively on the right. Only times he does up top is in the dead rubber games (and vs spurs where he didnt make much of an impact). On the right is perfect for his development and he's impressed. Long term I expect to see him up top, and realistically if we sign haaland itll be a trio of those 2 and Rashford imo. Not a problem having depth till all are ready though, and someone like haaland is necessary so we can change games and rotate more. Would give a nice balance to the attack.
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My problem with it comes from a fear of the same happening to Greenwood, as has happened with Martial.

When Martial came he was an ice cold finisher, and then got stuck out wide. He's not developed as we'd all have hoped, and I feel that's partly due to shifting position a lot in his time with us.

This year its not much of a problem, but long term Greenwood needs to play up top when he gets his minutes rather than shunting him wide. (We also still need to add to our RW in the summer) which would eat even further into his playing time.

We'll see how it plays out anyways, as this is a signing I expect us to make
 
Ramshock said:
Theres this new thing called injuries and squad depth
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Haha I get that. But Haaland together with Rashford and Martial could lock Greenwood out of the team for years. Would we not be better getting someone towards the end of their career whilst Greenwood matures?
 
bosnian_red said:
Dont think that's an issue. He's played almost exclusively on the right. Only times he does up top is in the dead rubber games (and vs spurs where he didnt make much of an impact). On the right is perfect for his development and he's impressed. Long term I expect to see him up top, and realistically if we sign haaland itll be a trio of those 2 and Rashford imo. Not a problem having depth till all are ready though, and someone like haaland is necessary so we can change games and rotate more. Would give a nice balance to the attack.
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P-Nut said:
My problem with it comes from a fear of the same happening to Greenwood, as has happened with Martial.

When Martial came he was an ice cold finisher, and then got stuck out wide. He's not developed as we'd all have hoped, and I feel that's partly due to shifting position a lot in his time with us.

This year its not much of a problem, but long term Greenwood needs to play up top when he gets his minutes rather than shunting him wide. (We also still need to add to our RW in the summer) which would eat even further into his playing time.

We'll see how it plays out anyways, as this is a signing I expect us to make
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Screw it play him anywhere and he'll succeed
 
P-Nut said:
Screw it play him anywhere and he'll succeed
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Should be integrated into the first team next season. Imo he will end up the better footballer than Håaland too.
 
2mufc0 said:
Should be integrated into the first team next season. Imo he will end up the better footballer than Håaland too.
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He's unreal, saved us several times already this season.
 
I don’t know anything about this lad, I’m sure he’s good and all, but striker is not the position we should be focusing on right now.
 
Godfather said:
It absolutely is. Paired with a proper midfielder or two.
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Yup, Haaland or someone else, a striker should clearly be a priority. No doubt we need midfielders as well, but someone with a real striker’s instinct is exactly what we’ve missed in games like today.
 
Rado_N said:
I don’t know anything about this lad, I’m sure he’s good and all, but striker is not the position we should be focusing on right now.
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Sure, but it's a position we broadly need to recruit in. And he's available for a good fee. It's sort of a no brainer.
 
Without signing some better midfielders and full backs a striker won't resolve our problems.
 
Ok, forget everything I’ve said. Get this lad in. We need all the firepower we can get.
 
Adam-Utd said:
I don’t think anybody is expecting Haaland to immediately walk into the team and that’s the end of martial.

we will bed him in slowly and let him adjust properly I’m sure. Anyway we play like 60 games a season, martial cannot play them all.

eventually it’ll drive up the competition and they won’t be able to have a few poor matches or they’ll get dropped. Look at aguero/Jesus, one of them gets injured or bad form and the other takes their chance.
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Haaland will demand the starting spot. If Ole won't give him that, he'll go to Dortmund or whatever team can guarantee him. It's just common sense.
 
Isotope said:
Haaland will demand the starting spot. If not, he'll go to Dortmund or whatever team can guarantee him. It's just common sense.
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Well the way Rashford/Martial played today he would walk straight in.

I don't think any club will be taking those sort of demands from a 19 year old anyway, they'll tell him to prove his worth like any team.

Paco Alcacer is a good striker at Dortmund, he won't just walk in easy there either.
 
Adam-Utd said:
Well the way Rashford/Martial played today he would walk straight in.

I don't think any club will be taking those sort of demands from a 19 year old anyway, they'll tell him to prove his worth like any team.

Paco Alcacer is a good striker at Dortmund, he won't just walk in easy there either.
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That's fair point about Alcacer. I'm not sure on your claim about no club would be taking that demand. Let's see.
 
Isotope said:
That's fair point about Alcacer. I'm not sure on your claim about no club would be taking that demand. Let's see.
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We might give him a minimum of 20 starts a season of something like that, but no way would a club be held to "you'll start every game" especially being inexperienced. He might not settle or take a while to get going.

Anyway I have a feeling he'll soon be in our starting line up especially in home games like that. Our current forwards suck when there's no space.
 
Adam-Utd said:
We might give him a minimum of 20 starts a season of something like that, but no way would a club be held to "you'll start every game" especially being inexperienced. He might not settle or take a while to get going.

Anyway I have a feeling he'll soon be in our starting line up especially in home games like that. Our current forwards suck when there's no space.
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Just to give any chance he'll sign for United, I just think that Ole needs to give him that assurance. Otherwise Dortmund is a more attractive destination. Lower pressure League, attacking team style, and better suppliers from midfield; thus better chance on scoring more goals.
 
One of the reason why we should be signing him. Instead of Mata, we can bring proper attacker and then move either Rashford or Martial to #10 position.
 
roonster09 said:
One of the reason why we should be signing him. Instead of Mata, we can bring proper attacker and then move either Rashford or Martial to #10 position.
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None of those two can play 10. I'm the opposite. We don't need to sign him this January. We can do it in the summer.

This January, we need a #10 or someone creative to be in the front four.
 
NinjaZombie said:
None of those two can play 10. I'm the opposite. We don't need to sign him this January. We can do it in the summer.

This January, we need a #10 or someone creative to be in the front four.
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He might not be available till summer. His release clause is 20-25 million, shouldn't stop us from addressing other positions.
 
My heart will bleed for Martial if we sign Haaland. Poor lad, what did he ever do to deserve this? :(
 
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