Why do you care?
Nemanja Matic| BBC says deal agreed
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Why do you care?
Matic-Herrera-Pogba is a fantastic midfield 3
There is a photo of Matic in a United training top posted by the Telegraph. This is definitely a done deal me thinks. Probably will be announced tomorrow.
I think it could be 4-2-3-1 with Matic and Herrera behind Pogba when we need the two deepest midfielders to be sound defensively. But, since we played it at times last season, I think we will play 4-3-3 too.
I think people are mostly unhappy just because of his transfer fee, cannot see any other reason. 4-5 years ago you'd expect a Summer that concludes with signing Lindelof, Matic, Perisic and Lukaku to close in £100m and not £200m but this is where market has gone. Matic at £40m is today's equivalent of Carrick at £18.6m. He comes here much older than Carrick was but also more proven.
I also think we are going to play 433. But I can see Mourinho playing 352 if we sign Perisic with Lukaku and Rashford/Martial up front.
Think Matic is criminally under rated on here. For the three and a half seasons he's been at Chelsea when fit he's started, and they've won the league twice in that period.
It is strange they are willing to sell him though. Many Chelsea fans were complaining about him last season.
I think he wanted to leave. He wanted to leave last year and Conte had to persuade him to stay no?
I'm amazed they are letting him go. Effectively they have Kante, Fabregas and Bakayoko to fill 2 midfield slots.
Your reasoning has a few holes in it to be fair.
Immediately after leaving Madrid, both Robben and Sneijder went to the two most successful teams in the world, both competing for historic trebles, while Madrid ended the season trophyless. In hindsight, choosing Robinho over Robben was a terrible decision but at the time it was reasonable enough - Madrid had a relative abundance of options at that time. Looking a bit closer to home, since Arsenal bought Welbeck, United have finished below Arsenal in every season.
Those examples are obviously at very different ends of the spectrum - Robben and Sneijder were obvious catalysts to Inter and Bayern moving ahead of Madrid, while Welbeck has had very little influence in Arsenal's superiority over us. Matic could be either of those two, or he could fail. In any case the internal logic falls down pretty quickly.
This will come back to haunt Chelsea, should've never have sold him to us. We have the strongest midfield 3 in the league now in my opinion. Pogba, Herrera and Matic as a dm. That is a tough three, not my first option but Jose knows what we need. I think a bit more experience was needed in this side, we need more people who have won the premier league in this side.
He is a good player and needs only motivation to get back to his best, 29 isnt too old for a sitting midfielder.
You could probably do better for £40m but whatever, he'll improve your team. Herrera, Matic, Pogba is a very solid midfield.
When he's been good, he's been very good. But he had a middling last season, and had a lot less impact in the new year the season before. Expecting him to be solid but not sure if he has the other gear left.
No its not, PSG have a very good depth of midfielders. I doubt Matic would even get into their team
"I'm not going to lose my hair speaking about Antonio" 
Matic is 7 years younger than Carrick, we can still get tons of value out of him
So? Who cares? As long as we're signing a good player I don't care how much we pay for him.
He has very good passing range. Not quite on Carricks level but not that far off. Good vision and good decision making.
He'll play for Mourinho. We're getting good player here!
I wouldn't exactly say we'eve been getting great value out of Carrick these last 4 years. Not 40m worth of value anyway. Much as I liked him as player in his peak, the fact Carrick has played so much football in this late stage of his career was down to our chronic underinvestment in midfield in the 5-6 years prior to Mou's appointment. Which is only now being rectified.
Many Chelsea fans (and rival fans) were also saying things like this too:
There was plenty of recognition that he'd bounced back after a terrible season and was an important part of the team last year. This narrative that's now building that he's totally expendable and a Chelsea reject would've been seen as silly a few months ago. No doubt he's far from being irreplaceable, but lots of the people happy to see the back of Matic aren't fond of him because he's slow and dull. The reality is neither of these things are remotely indicative of a player's quality in that position.
Alonso was both of those things but an important cog in CL title wins at three different clubs. Carrick has been criticised throughout his time here for both despite the fact he's been an essential part of the most successful period in United's history, and has been recognised as such by his manager, his team-mates, experts and others. There are loads of slow, boring centre mids that have been the same throughout the history of the game and across the world.
Speed is just something that people care about because it's hard to miss the direct impact of it. In lots of cases it's not really that important. Bobby Moore was slow but is widely recognised as England's greatest ever defender. Dalglish is arguably the greatest British forward of all time and he was far from rapid. Zidane is arguably the greatest European player of the last few decades and he obviously wasn't very quick. Xavi is aruably the greatest centre mid of all time and was pretty slow.
They're all different players from Matic, but that's the point - across any number of positions in any number of scenarios, pace isn't really that important. What is universally important is decision-making, composure, consistency and core technique, all of which are obvious strengths of Matic. He might be slow in the feet but he's quick where it matters. Let's just hope Mourinho doesn't destroy his confidence again...because he was less than useless in 15/16.
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They would need time to adjust to the Premiership. Of course, there are players who manage to fit in immediately but most need time and United can't afford to waste time - as we did last season with Mikhatarayan, almost half-a-season lost. French football is considerably different than the Premiership which is faster and more physical and its difficult to predict how a foreign player would handle it. Most though need at least two season to familiarise. Hopefully, Matic will only need a few games to adjust.
He was the second best player we could have realistically signed for this position this window, with Fabinho being many people's favourite. Still, a Herrera, Matic, Pogba midfield could work very well.
Happy with this signing.
Happy with this signing.
I hope there won't be plenty of games where we see Matic and Pogba as holding midfielder while Fellaini is given free role no.10 up top.
Luckhurst was bang on with his information from May. We all slagged him off because we all wanted Fabinho and thought he was coming and also because no one wanted Matic. Or at least most didn't.
Luckhurst definitely called this and Dier way before time and many thought it was lazy journalism. He should be taken more seriously. Obviously has a good source in the club.
In certain games when we have all of Pogba, Fellaini, Matic on the field, I imagine the opponent players would just stop even trying to hoof long balls.
Not bad to have Pogba/Herrera/Matic and Pereira/Fellaini/Carrick as backups although if Pereira fails to step up this year we won't have enough depth to win major competitions.
Not bad to have Pogba/Herrera/Matic and Pereira/Fellaini/Carrick as backups although if Pereira fails to step up this year we won't have enough depth to win major competitions.
I like the balance of Matic, Herrera and Pogba in a 3. This is a quality signing IMO and will pay dividends for us in freeing up his CM partners to get forward. It may also get Jose to be more comfortable with having both FBs push further forward when in possession.
We'll need a less aggressive song for him
Nemanja woooo
Nemanja woooo
He comes from Serbia
He'll take the ball off ya
Nemanja woooo
Nemanja woooo
He comes from Serbia
He'll take the ball off ya
£40m for a player of Matic's quality in this market is a steal. Not to mention, taking a starting player off the defending Premier league champions, that improves the weakest part of the roster for United.
every good player is over priced
Same... It's a very balanced midfield, for sure... Matic is basically an improvement on what Schneiderlin was meant to be hopefully.
Now I can relax with a defensive midfielder coming on board. For those that are close to the academy, do we have a talent defensive midfielder coming through? I'm only aware of Gomes and he's not defensive.
Depending on what Mourinho wants, i.e more attacking or defensive, Herrera and Martial/Mata are the ones that loses out in minutes compared to last year.
Matic partnering Pogba means Miki through the middle with Lingard and Rashford flanking Lukaku.
Bloody hell we have a stacked squad and could field an impressive 2nd squad.
Matic partnering Pogba means Miki through the middle with Lingard and Rashford flanking Lukaku.
Bloody hell we have a stacked squad and could field an impressive 2nd squad.
Carrick Herrera Pogba is a fantastic midfeild, hes not hung out to dry just yet.
You are dead right sir and Willian too, it appeares that Conte persuaded both to stay last season Matic maybe wanted out more than he let on. I am a little more surprised at Willian as that lad would walk into most sides and he is not starting all that much.
Matic will be a good addition to us and a loss for Chelsea make no mistake, Crappyoko is not of that standard. At least yet! Time will tell if he can fill Matic boots, i dont think he will as he is not as good as Matic.
4 or 5 years ago Chelsea paid £1.5 million for Matic. That's a very good return. Matic has a great engine and keeps going. When he plays for Chelsea over the last couple of years Chelsea have been a better team. He will definitely improve us. Plus, now we can rest Carrick.
Doesnt change the fact and the craziness is mostly associated with PL teams.
Cos we dont have unlimited funds. Over spending on one player reduces the funds available to get other players. The squad still has many needs.
Thats is not true.
If we were playing 1 game a month then yeah..
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