Axe MUST fall for De Gea and Maguire.. or it could be Ole who gets the chop
THIS is what Premier League managers get paid the big bucks for.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has a keeper who cannot stop letting in goals and a centrehalf who has most recently been a liability for club and country.
Never mind that keeper is a four- time Manchester United Player of the Year and that centre-half is the club captain.
Never mind David de Gea is an Old Trafford hall-of-famer and Harry Maguire has previously been solid for United and England.
Never mind De Gea is on a £ 350,000- a- week contract with a minimum of almost three years to run and that Maguire is the world’s most expensive defender.
The pair are in a slump. De Gea’s is more prolonged than Maguire’s but the two are in a trough of form, nevertheless.
The Spa n i a r d ’s international travails this week were less stark than those of his club skipper’s but his positioning for Ukraine’s winner in Kiev on Tuesday was clearly awry.
After one prominent journalist claimed the United player was the “worst starting keeper in the history of the Spanish team”, national team manager Luis Enrique said:
“Blaming De
Gea ... has become an obsession, a turnon.”
Interestingly made, but Enrique might have a point.
However, while it would be harsh to apportion unfiltered blame to De Gea for any of United’s concessions this season, the bald fact is he has shipped 11 goals in three games.
S o l s k j a er has a replacement available who could not have more confidence and believes he should be No.1.
Dean Henderson also has a very good body of work behind him.
It would be a ballsy move to drop De Gea but Solskjaer does have a high- quality alternative. That is why it would be a ballsier move to give Maguire a break – because the alternatives are not exactly blue-chip.
There are few who have not connected Maguire’s struggles with his Mykonos troubles.
There are many who think he is in some sort of p sychological battle, his mind elsewhere after the ‘ordeal’ in Greece.
But maybe he is just in a rotten vein of form and the timing of his challenges – so important to the game of a defender who is not naturally pacy - has simply gone to pot.
Maybe that is because his fitness is not where it should be and extra work on the training ground would do him good.
These are big decisions for Solskjaer but if he wants to be
classed in that cabal of elite managers, rs, they are the sort of decisions ions he has to start taking.
Newcastle United are not what you would d call formidable opposition on but they are in decent nick ick and have the players to expose obvious weaknesses.
And while class might ight be permanent and all that, at, De Gea and Maguire are obvious weaknesses.
Th e Un i t e d manager can sit on his hands, reaffirm his trust in two outstanding club servants ervants and do nothing.
But if he does, and Maguire and De Gea continue in their current form, Solskjaer aer will be confirming what many suspect – that elite e level management might ht be beyond him and he is now just keeping the seat warm for Mauricio Pochettino. no.
Solskjaer needs to be bold, and standing down Maguire and De Gea is the sort of bold move ve he mus t
make.
Solskjaer has a replacement in Dean Henderson who couldn’t have more confidence ..and believes he should be No1