'I wish United had signed them' XI

Hazard is the big one for me - mainly because he was more than rumour and word of mouth than most. He was so close, everything was agreed for the signing before fergie refused to pay the agent fee. Although not quite as bad as Mikel who had actually signed for us and then we sold him to chelsea before he'd played a game.
 
With regards to Shearer it's hard to see where we win more domestically because let's be honest we won damn near everything domestically anyway during his career but he absolutely makes a difference in Europe. Between 95-03 we get at least 1 additional cl potentially more with him in the team

Shame for him that he didn't have the stomach to join a big club I suppose
 
Gabriel Djemba-Bebe said:
I never even contemplated the notion that we could have gone from Schmeichel straight to Van Der Sar in 99. Imagine :drool:
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he had eyesight problems and refused to admit it. You don't have to imagine it, you had Taibi and Barthez
 
giorno said:
he had eyesight problems and refused to admit it. You don't have to imagine it, you had Taibi and Barthez
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I'm aware of that. We won the league with Barthez so it wasn't all bad, but we probably could've won more if we had signed Van Der Sar earlier.
 
Gabriel Djemba-Bebe said:
I'm aware of that. We won the league with Barthez so it wasn't all bad, but we probably could've won more if we had signed Van Der Sar earlier.
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More likely he would have cost you the league a couple times, you would have gotten rid and not signed him later from Fulham, after he fixed the eyesight problem
 
Big ones I remember that we were heavily linked with but never got over the line, for various reasons.

Kluivert
Batistuta
Marcelo Salas
Shearer
Ronaldinho
Hazard
Bale
Kroos
Fabregas
 
We were always linked with the best players, but some where at pivotal times.

I think Zlatan when he went to PSG would have been great for us. RVP was great and won us a title, but I think Zlatan would have lasted longer.
Fabregas instead of Felliani
Kroos not joining

In the post Fergie era or towards the end of it these players would have given us the quality to succeed.

During the Fergie era, missing out on Hazard and Ronaldinho.
 
Of ones I remember us being linked with heavily.

Bale
Hazard
Ronaldinho
Joaquin
Sneijder
 
PvsNP said:
Bellingham was at Carrington before moving to Dortmund. If Murtough didn't interrupt SAF's sales pitch, I thnk things could have turned out differently. We'd probably still lose him to Madrid though.
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Yh, Bellingham has his head screwed on. I would not have gone to United either. I think we definitely could have convinced Rice. We really chose to spend £70m on 1 year of Casemiro as opposed to £100m on 7/8 years of Rice. Rice's profile is one of the rarest in the world - we really missed out there.
 
SalfordRed18 said:
There needs to be a case study on what happened to Torres tbh. There's purple patches, and then there's being one of the best strikers in the world to gash in a couple of months.

Would have been mint at united for those three seasons he was tearing shit up.
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It’s called injuries.
 
Most of these players were heavily linked to us at the time

Gascoigne 1988
Pearce 1990
Maldini At any point during the 90's
Ferdinand 1994
Anderton 1995
Overmars 1995
Boban 1995
Baggio 1995 if Cantona decided to leave during his 9 month ban
Davids 1996
Shearer 1996
Batistuta 1997
Ronaldo 1997
Desailly 1997 Probably no Jaap Stam the following year though
Salas 1998
Kluivert 1998 At the time I thought if he joined he would've fullfilled his potential with us
Van der Sar 1999
Rivaldo 1999
Sol Campbell 1999
Nedved 2001
Vieira 2001
Nesta 2002 We ended up with Rio so all good
Ronaldinho 2003
Bale 2012
Kane 2017
Grealish 2020
Rice 2022
 
Clough told Fergie to feck off when Fergie went sniffing around Stuart Pearce. He would have been a monstrous signing made at the right time.
 
Gattuso was heavily linked back in 2005/06 if I recall? He would have been awesome :drool:
 
SirAF said:
Gattuso was heavily linked back in 2005/06 if I recall? He would have been awesome :drool:
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He was an objectionable runtish shit. Would have created more problems than he solved and certainly wouldn't have fitted in with the team that developed over the next couple of years.
 
Needham said:
He was an objectionable runtish shit. Would have created more problems than he solved and certainly wouldn't have fitted in with the team that developed over the next couple of years.
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Probably right, but he's one of my all time favorite non-United players so would have loved to see him at OT. Him being an "objectionable runtish shit" is not a bad thing! :D
 
SirAF said:
Probably right, but he's one of my all time favorite non-United players so would have loved to see him at OT. Him being an "objectionable runtish shit" is not a bad thing! :D
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Maybe he was more lovable during his spell at rangers but here he's gone full methhead Vito Corleone.



One genuine Keane and a Scrappy Doo arsey imitation uneccesary in 1 team.
 
Needham said:
Maybe he was more lovable during his spell at rangers but here he's gone full methhead Vito Corleone.



One genuine Keane and a Scrappy Doo arsey imitation uneccesary in 1 team.
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Watching that video I’d have backed a 60 year old big Joe a younger Joe Jordan would have battered the little back to Glasgow
 
Neuer 2011

Trippier 2021
Ramos 2005
Varane 2011
Baines 2013

Essien 2005
Kroos 2014
Modric 2010

Robben 2004
Ronaldinho 2002
Benzema 2009

There are countless others which I believe were gettable that we missed out on:

Pau Torres, Ake, Verthonghen, Aldeweireld, Rice, Yaya Toure, David Silva, Aaron Ramsey, Gundogan, Sneijder, De Jong, Bellingham, Ozil, Hazard, Bale, Haaland, Torres, David Villa
 
The White Pele said:
Neuer 2011

Trippier 2021
Ramos 2005
Varane 2011
Baines 2013

Essien 2005
Kroos 2014
Modric 2010

Robben 2004
Ronaldinho 2002
Benzema 2009

There are countless others which I believe were gettable that we missed out on:

Pau Torres, Ake, Verthonghen, Aldeweireld, Rice, Yaya Toure, David Silva, Aaron Ramsey, Gundogan, Sneijder, De Jong, Bellingham, Ozil, Hazard, Bale, Haaland, Torres, David Villa
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Strong 11 and I wouldn't disagree with most of them, however I'm glad we went for De Gea over Neuer in 2011. Although Neuer would still be good enough to start for us now, I loved peak De Gea.
 
Modric
Kroos
Snjeider
Henrik Larsson, wish we got him ten years sooner than we did.
Varane 5 years younger
Casemiro 5 years younger
 
Henry would have been the one player I would have bought in. Played LW or upfront and we would have probably won more CL as well imo. On his day was unplayable and he had a shit load of days.
 
Post frergie when the opportunity was there to buy these players for good fees when they were sold to other clubs -

De bruyne as wolfsburg,
Thiago at barca,
Sanchez at barca
Pedro at barca
Kante at Leicester
Fabregas at barca
Kroos at Bayern
Thiago at psg (on a free)
Vardy - he wasn't sold but he would have been a great buy at under 50 million.
 
Wouldn't mind Harry Kane also.

SAF had shown interest on Nedved.
 
Modric - one of Fergie's big mistakes not snapping him up before Madrid came sniffing
Thiago - things might have been different for Moyes
Hazard - again a big mistake by Fergie, we prioritized the wrong player in Kagawa
Kroos - things might have been different for LVG
Haaland - the club let Ole down
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