I was delirious when we bought Sancho, but with good reason. What none of us on the caf could have known was his immaturity. Yes of course that season was a train wreck and he could be excused for his performances, but not his behavior.
Jadon Sancho (Out)
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To be fair, you could have easily known. He already had issues at Dortmund. The red flags were always there to see if you just bothered to look. So at least your scouts must have known there was risk involved.
Though I admit I would not have expected things to become this bad.
Retired before 26?
Great summary. This in particular tells a story it's not about 'being backed', but about investing that money intelligently. Both ETH and the club more broadly ( pre Ten Hag) are to be blame for this - ETH not just in terms of existing signings but in discarding the one opportunity the club gave him to get informed second-opinions and DOf centred input from RR and allow him to concentrate on coaching. RR signings of the kind described, would have slotted into what ETH is, by all accounts, trying to do, in ways which make more sense than most of his actual signings.
Camavinga we had a small window of opportunity for before Madrid went fully in on him, plenty of people said he was an ideal profile, and we never looked proactive. It basically mirrored the Kroos situation 9 years ago, except Moyes had at least agreed provisional deals with the player and had the club agree price with Bayern before LVG was allowed to display his deeply quixotic judgement and allow Madrid to come in.
Hindsight is 20/20 though. Cantona had his issues when we bought him (not with professionalism with regards to training and effort, but with other aspects). Sancho was young, so you would have hoped he might mature as he's got older, or risen to the occasion of joining a big club on a massive wage. A big gamble that obviously that hasn't paid off.
Maybe he turns things around but I wouldn't be surprised if he was out of Football before hitting 30.
I somewhat agree with your sentiment. But I would add that given your clubs situation, these issues should have played a bigger role during the whole process. Mostly because I feel you lack the structure in the squad and around it to help him mature in that way. If Sancho had gone to City, Bayern or Real, he would have found another environment in which the demands are completely different. At these clubs you have players who show young guys like him how it’s done and who demand more of him. Your squad, however, seems bereft of those leaders. That’s why I think it wasn’t a good move from the very beginning. You would have needed some ambitious and accepted leaders to integrate him properly and get him on the right track. But what you have is a bunch of guys who either don’t care or don’t have the leadership to provide all this. So the likelihood of failure seems to be higher at your club than at others. And not considering this weakness is an issue for me.
Yep. Massive letdown
I think the pressure at Unite is higher than anywhere else atm, due to public scrutiny and years of relative underachievement.
I’m not entirely sure about the older players bit, though. If you listen to those who know the players, I think you’ll find that role models with expectations were available for Sancho in Ronaldo, Maguire, Fernandes and Varane, and several for England as well - he just doesn’t seem to react to them in the right way.
How much would we get for him? Probably not even 50m
Another talent done by the United curse! Not many players (and I'd probably add managers to that) seem to be able to maintain the pre-transfer hype that get them to United in the first place. It really is baffling!
If I had to compare him to an other young very talented player, it would be M'Vila. It was rumoured that M'Vila had personal issues and the wrong people around(including his father) but until a certain point it wasn't visible on the field. Things went south suddenly and it took a very long time to go back to a decent level but it was too late, his career was already destroyed.
For all we know it's the same for Sancho, like M'Vila it may not be his fault but the result is the same.
There's a bunch of teams in the Middle East that will pay that to stop a rival getting him.
It's insane. People can caveat with Bundesliga tax etc. but at 20 years old he got 17 goals and 16 assists in a domestic season. The only players who've hit 15+ goals and 15+ assists in a domestic season in the top 5 leagues in the last 10 years or so are the likes of Messi, Hazard, Suarez, Mbappe...
I don't think this is just a player flopping. This guy had genuine superstar level ceiling. Such a disappointment.
True. If they can sign players like Saint maximin then surely sancho is worth a shot.
The biggest disappointment I’ve had in terms of how a signing has panned out. We didn’t facilitate his game; he didn’t show any appetite for… application whatsoever.
Should be one of the premier talents in the game, instead it looks like he’s cashed in before doing anything of note in the game. Tragic.
The overwhelming feeling is he has no love for football despite being immensely talented. There’s not much to be done with that unless the player has the fire in their belly to do everything in their power to make the best of their ability.
The obvious snake move is a couple of years in Saudi Arabia before moving on to Newcastle, if he has any desire to do so.
A killer in the modern game is that if you want to check out as a young star, you’ve made the kind of money that you never have to work again in your life whilst living out any dream or fantasy you have. Sancho will have over £100m in the bank, if not more before he’s 26. You can’t contest that; any drive to have a long and illustrious career has to come from the player. Hell, if he‘s money motivated, that’ll probably be his driver to see out his career even if he’s only phoning it in.
Should be one of the premier talents in the game, instead it looks like he’s cashed in before doing anything of note in the game. Tragic.
The overwhelming feeling is he has no love for football despite being immensely talented. There’s not much to be done with that unless the player has the fire in their belly to do everything in their power to make the best of their ability.
The obvious snake move is a couple of years in Saudi Arabia before moving on to Newcastle, if he has any desire to do so.
A killer in the modern game is that if you want to check out as a young star, you’ve made the kind of money that you never have to work again in your life whilst living out any dream or fantasy you have. Sancho will have over £100m in the bank, if not more before he’s 26. You can’t contest that; any drive to have a long and illustrious career has to come from the player. Hell, if he‘s money motivated, that’ll probably be his driver to see out his career even if he’s only phoning it in.
Yeah, he looks like a lost cause.
Which is a shame. And I won't have people telling me he never was anything special to begin with.
Issues (that very few of us were aware of) or not, he was objectively a huge talent and absolutely a player worth going for.
Which is a shame. And I won't have people telling me he never was anything special to begin with.
Issues (that very few of us were aware of) or not, he was objectively a huge talent and absolutely a player worth going for.
Here here. Precisely why I don’t absolve ten hag of the blame for our mediocre transfer record under him. Yeah the club were stupid enough to give him such power but it’s laughable to try and detach ten hag from our transfers when he had the opportunity to take advise and chose not to. I know the club tries really hard to go along with the managers wishes when it comes to transfers but how many fecking times do we have to get burnt to realise this isn’t the way. Five times now we’ve done this. It’s absolute insanity. Rangnick must be sitting there and laughing really.
Such a good post, classic talent who has the luck to make bank after 2-3 good seasons. Afterwards, he just mimics playing football.
I watched him extensively for England at youth level and again at Dortmund and I firmly believed he'd take United to a different level. It is crazy what has happened to Sancho, Hudson-Odoi and Sessegnon. They looked like world class players in the making. What separates Bellingham and Saka is obviously a mentality and attitude that pushes them higher. Of course injuries don't help.
The way we almost got him and then we couldn't push it on in time, and then dortmund being smug about it. Finally got him for a better few and few years of these.. my lord. Just send him anywhere. What a traumatic transfer. This makes sanzhez transfer looks like Eric Cantona deal.
I've genuinely never seen it with him.
Before he joined, the little I saw was pretty poor, but, because I had seen so little, I trusted the 'cafe. Then he joined us and I've still yet to see even one performance that justified the hype. Not one.
Before he joined, the little I saw was pretty poor, but, because I had seen so little, I trusted the 'cafe. Then he joined us and I've still yet to see even one performance that justified the hype. Not one.
Doubt we'll be so lucky.
Can see him shining at his next club.
After Greenwood the biggest disappointment I’ve witnessed at United. I mean technically a player like him should not be anything other than top class. He’s incredibly gifted. But the desire and willingness to fight on a football pitch simply isn’t there. He wants it easy - he should get away to a place that can afford him such comforts.
We need to vet player’s mentality much more thoroughly. I wonder why clubs don’t get external agencies / professionals to provide detailed reports like you would with financial data in this regard? Especially given the enormous sums involved.
We need to vet player’s mentality much more thoroughly. I wonder why clubs don’t get external agencies / professionals to provide detailed reports like you would with financial data in this regard? Especially given the enormous sums involved.
That's a fair point, but feels a little bit shifting the responsibility away from the player. Of course there should be a better environment that will enable success, but demanding the wage he was sign on, feels a little a crass to then say "well the environment wasn't right for me to succeed". I take the point squad balance is pretty poor and it's probably why we went for players like Varane and Casemiro to try and counter that - also appears that may have not had the effect we were hoping.
Very good comparison actually and Kazan may be the Saudi player in this story.
I hope it doesn't go down that route, as it would be a shame to see such talent wasted. There will be a well trodden path back to Europe from Saudi soon, I can't imagine Gabi Veiga is going to spend his whole career there, for example.
The fault absolutely lies with Sancho. No doubt about that. But the underlying mindset was present before you got him. And you should have considered it. I believe players like this can be somewhat guided to success. We saw it with Neymar, for example. Back at Barca he was playing at an unreal level. At Paris he declined rather quickly to the point that I believe some people have forgotten how good he was. Him being so good at Barca is partly down to the leaders the club had at the time. You don't down tools when Pique, Xavi, Iniesta, Messi and others are playing in your team. Or Özil at Real. And if you do, you won't be part of the team any longer, no matter who you are. Sancho never had this positive pressure from his teammates at United, I believe. And this would have been necessary in order to compensate for his lack of intrinsic motivation.
I don't think it is always bad or wrong to sign players like this. But you can only afford this type of players in certain situations. Yours just isn't right for someone like him. But I felt you were so desperate for someone like him, young, English and loaded with potential, that once you knew you could actually get him, you just ignored the warning signs.
Any reliable reports?
Saudis aren’t stupid.
At best we will get 15 mil including add-ons.
And even then I don’t think they are prepared to match the salary we are paying him.
Saudis aren’t stupid.
At best we will get 15 mil including add-ons.
And even then I don’t think they are prepared to match the salary we are paying him.
What makes a player flush their United career like this? People say laziness..... But I don't think lazy got him to where he gets signed as the great hope for United. What a shame...
Turn up for training on time 5 days in any one week = £5m
Probably not going to see that money…….
That’s very funny.
All very fair points and good examples. I guess the first failed attempt to sign him may have been where we should have walked away. He may have come into a better environment at that point and if we had got him and we'd be talking different of him now, or perhaps this was just destined to happen at our club. I hope we can recoup some money and move on from it all.
Agreed, we will probably know in 10 years. But I suspect that it's not Football related.
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Despite being negative this I feel is actually a really good post. You’ve not engaged in superlatives and it’s an honest (and dire) assessment of our transfers over time.
As for Sancho best thing for him would be to move to Saudi play some easy football where he can relax and make a ridiculous sum of money. The only hope is that we get a good fee too so we can reinvest in the squad.
Sancho is giving off major Anakin Skywalker vibes. Meant to be the chosen one to bring balance to our wings but ends up storming the Jedi temple and calling Yoda a “Pep Guardiola is my idol” all the while still being paid by Palpatine (Glazers) who could give two shits about Padme and the baby you know?
In hindsight, his struggles with England were a massive red flag. After every international break you'd have the whole of Germany up in arms as to why a Bundesliga superstar couldn't get a start. Thing is when he did, you sometimes saw moments but no sustained good performances - actually very similar to United
People talk about laziness and whatnot about why he failed. I think it's as simple as he was never that good. Throughout out football history, there have been players who made it big and then got lazy. They rested on their laurels. However, you still saw glimpses of their potential greatness at times. With Sancho, we've seen nothing. Three different managers, multiple chances to prove himself, and nothing. Not one 90 minutes where you thought "okay, I see why we paid that much for him".
Oh how I remember those nights. Only the stars and our pitchforks were illuminating the darkness, as we marched to the British embassy to demand what is right. Quite a few diplomats suffered our anger. But that's on them for disrespecting the Bundesliga. They won't make the same mistake again. They couldn't if they tried.
I think it was pretty clear for awhile before he moved to United that he couldn't thrive in England. The performances for England. I think anyone with the job of scout could easily have seen that the setup in Germany was different to what he'd face in England, and that at United in particular he was going to struggle. It should have been seen more as a calculated risk, not as the sure thing it was touted as being.
Really good analysis.
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