The answer is not picking him. We can't afford to have a player in our midfield who doesn't get any work done. Ronaldo and Messi are the only players who you could argue shouldn't have to get through defending. Pogba is not nearly as talented as these players, and as such if he doesn't want to work for the team, then the team won't work for him and he can go and find a side that will.
United don't live or die due to how Pogba plays, I think we showed that today by beating our biggest rivals with a youth product and a little attacking mid in midfield.
You're conflating two issues to make one point. Pogba will get back, as best as he can, the fact he is not positionally aware on the defensive end is due to him not being a proper, two-way CM. If a manager deploys Pogba in a deep position, and he so happens to not know what he's supposed to be doing, which is a strong possibility, then it's the manager's fault - you should know your players, what they are capable of, what they will most likely not be able to do and what they excel at.
Pogba has never, not once in his career shown a penchant for tracking runners or having a clue what he should be doing in the defensive third of the pitch. He can try and do those jobs, but any even half decent opposing manager will target him knowing full well he will lapse in those duties because he isn't that kind of midfielder and most probably never will be.
We bought a player who became renowned playing in a specific position on the pitch. If we're going to play him in any other way than that, then it's unknown territory and you cannot be guaranteed like-for-like performance to what his reputation was built upon.
Besides that, at Juventus, the team was so settled and automated that every player knew their job, where to go and what to do in each given scenario. That's perfect for a player learning his craft and you can't just take all of that away and then wonder why there are drops in performance and a relatively erratic level of output.
Pogba's running stats prove he is not lazy, but if you're expecting him to be 100% clued in on the defensive end of the game, you're creating a reality that he's never shown and then blasting him with it, effectively creating a strawman.
All this chopping and changing is far removed from what the majority of teams do. Practically any team worth its salt has a set system, line-up and plans of execution. Even before a ball is kicked, you know what the job brief is of their personnel. We've not even settled on an xi yet, let alone implemented a universal system and that's bound to create teething problems. Disrupting things further by adding Sanchez mid-season and plopping him right on top of Pogba's space is going to add to that. Pogba is a superior player to Sanchez and shouldn't be having his position compromised for him. We bought an £89m talent, coveted by the likes of Real Madrid, and haven't built around it. Perhaps in time we will, but for now, there are problems that aren't entirely Pogba's fault and are on the manager to fix. The player can do better, but the fact he's not allowed to have dips whilst those around him are, stinks of bias and irrational reasoning.
I disagree. The first goal palace scored said it all for me, just slowly jogging back not bothering to get in front of the man. Then sometimes he'll go back to fullback but not really defend, just stand there and pretend he's doing his bit.
In Italy it's fine to do this, it's a slower game and he didn't need to defend in a pivot midfield. But at United i and we should all expect more out of our midfielders. At the minute I just see him as somebody not dedicated enough to be a midfielder, and not talented enough to be an attacker. Many will disagree and that's fair enough, but I want to see more out of our midfielders, and I'm far from sold on Pogba at the moment.
Where you should expect more out of Pogba is in impacting the game on the offensive end. This is the department where he should be doing better. If he's in a team to defend, instead of contributing as some kind of steer, then that team has not been built correctly. Pogba should be doing better with his offensive contributions, and I bet if he was, we'd not hear a thing about how he is on the defensive side of the play.
