As long as we are rational with the fee we want for him he wont be that difficult to move to be honest despite his wages , he is English regular and if we make clear to him he wont be first choice going forward and replace him, chances are he would be more amenable to move even on lower wages .
How do we sell Harry Maguire?
- Thread starter Fortitude
- Start date
-
In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
- Status
England played with a back four for most of that tournament, including the whole knock-out phase if I recall correctly. And sure, making the all-tournament team in the Euros matters not a jot, and says nothing about his qualities as a player.
The only part of last season where he wasn't good was really those opening three games, when the whole team was pretty much a horror show. But he was particularly good - at times outstanding - during the last 2/3 of the season.
Get out of here with your mad theories.England played with a back four for most of that tournament, including the whole knock-out phase if I recall correctly. And sure, making the all-tournament team in the Euros matters not a jot, and says nothing about his qualities as a player.
The only part of last season where he wasn't good was really those opening three games, when the whole team was pretty much a horror show. But he was particularly good - at times outstanding - during the last 2/3 of the season.
WhatEngland played with a back four for most of that tournament, including the whole knock-out phase if I recall correctly. And sure, making the all-tournament team in the Euros matters not a jot, and says nothing about his qualities as a player.
The only part of last season where he wasn't good was really those opening three games, when the whole team was pretty much a horror show. But he was particularly good - at times outstanding - during the last 2/3 of the season.
Well, as long as he bangs in an important header against Andorra or whoever that will shut us all up!
I was arguing in a different thread that de Ligt is twice the player / worth twice as much as Harry and people were calling me crazy
Absolutely - we're coming up to a full season now littered with catastrophic mistakes. I wasn't convinced by him last season either.
If he manages to score against San Marino he will take his shirt off and do a Ronaldo SIU backwards. That will teach them haters who is the Franz Beckenbauer of Britain.
Even Kleberson Is now having a go at Harry 
Kleberson won the World Cup. Harry won Mario bricks destroying contest.Even Kleberson Is now having a go at Harry
I directly tell you what parts of your post I disagree with. It’s not simply Ralfs system. It’s not a downturn in form. He is one of the worst signings. His behaviour with police in Greece is shameful of a United captain.
Not sure why you’d choose a part of your post I said I agree with over the clearly mentioned parts I said I do not. Moving on.
You’ve missed the point, England could play with a back 6 the question is what does him playing for a differe team against a different level of opposition tell us about a man that struggles against Burnley for his club side? Since when did making an international Team of the Tournament make up for terrible club form? You’re taking a 4 week tournament for another team & extrapolating it over the nonsense we witness weekly.England played with a back four for most of that tournament, including the whole knock-out phase if I recall correctly. And sure, making the all-tournament team in the Euros matters not a jot, and says nothing about his qualities as a player.
indeed.Did we play Spurs in the first 3 games? Did Instanbul not happen? Your unwavering support for the man is misplaced. . .
2019-2022
. . . You might want to take your red tinted specs off & grab a bowl of popcorn.
This would all be fine @AFC NimbleThumb but we have never looked better without Maguire. I would see the point people were making if we dropped him and suddenly we looked more solid, but unfortunately for his critics, we look absolutely dreadful without him so there's never been a compelling reason for a manager to drop him.
I know it's unfair to think about individual games but Maguire missed the end of last season and we defended horribly and shipped goals at a rate of knots. Bear in mind, we were playing the negative 4-2-3-1 counter in those games too. Maguire missed the Villarreal games this season and we got absolutely torn apart and Varane in particular looked all over the place. Maguire missed the Aston Villa game, and we blew a 2-0 lead with Villa scoring two very simple goals with their only two real attacks of note. Maguire missed (most of) the Brentford game, and I think all would agree we were very, very fortunate not to be 0-2 at HT. Add to that the fact that we have only kept clean sheets this season when Maguire has started (literally 100% of them have come with Maguire in the XI) and you go back to my original point...."if not Maguire, then who?"....because our own alternatives have shown themselves to be worse when given the opportunity.
Surely you must see that point? Has Maguire ever NOT played and we've gone "wow, we look so much more solid!"? I think our defence has struggled because we've been so poor/unprepared tactically, not because they are "bad" players. I actually think we have 5/6 CBs at the club most teams would kill for. Personally, I still prefer my original suggestion. Let Varane and Maguire play together until the end of the season, in a proper system with a manager who has tactical acumen and THEN let's decide how we progress into next season.
We shouldn't sell him. We'll get 30 or 40m for him and he's as good as any replacement we can find for that money. He's in terrible form and confidence but he's a better player than we are seeing now.
Write off the idea he's an 80m defender, give the Captaincy to somebody else and use him as a rotation option. He would be a good backup to a top class defensive pairing but we are asking him to be this progressive, ball playing leader and he is just not that and never was.
Write off the idea he's an 80m defender, give the Captaincy to somebody else and use him as a rotation option. He would be a good backup to a top class defensive pairing but we are asking him to be this progressive, ball playing leader and he is just not that and never was.
The point I'm making is simple: If you're one of two CBs in Europe named to the Euros tournament team, that probably means you're not a completely shit player.You’ve missed the point, England could play with a back 6 the question is what does him playing for a differe team against a different level of opposition tell us about a man that struggles against Burnley for his club side? Since when did making an international Team of the Tournament make up for terrible club form? You’re taking a 4 week tournament for another team & extrapolating it over the nonsense we witness weekly.
Did we play Spurs in the first 3 games? Did Instanbul not happen? Your unwavering support for the man is misplaced. . .
2019-2022
. . . You might want to take your red tinted specs off & grab a bowl of popcorn.
And yeah, we did play Spurs in the first three PL games of last season. The third one, to be exact.
Your notion of "my unwavering support for the man" just shows how deeply you've climbed into the trench. I'm probably no happier at his performance this season and his form right now than anybody else on this thread. But that's not enough for you, is it - he's got to be a shit player, and he's got to have always been a shit player. And that's simply not the case.
How long does terrible form last? He’s been shit all season. Wasn’t exactly great last season and hit or miss the first year. Absolute catastrophic signing.
I have never been a huge fan and did not want him signed because of his obvious flaws, especially at that price. I have said many times that he is a good player at around Lescott level and would have been treated as such in a prior era.
We should definitely look to shift him as soon as possible and he should generate a good fee, however, when you lose ratings while at United the hyperbole means that clubs don't pay the fee that the player would cost if he performed the exact same at a different club.
Either way, he should not be our captain and we should sell or take the hit and bench him like Chelsea have with Kepa and buy a quality partner for Varane.
We should definitely look to shift him as soon as possible and he should generate a good fee, however, when you lose ratings while at United the hyperbole means that clubs don't pay the fee that the player would cost if he performed the exact same at a different club.
Either way, he should not be our captain and we should sell or take the hit and bench him like Chelsea have with Kepa and buy a quality partner for Varane.
It's either a fire sale or contract being runned down.
Awful, awful, player
People saying he's in bad form, what a joke.
He's playing at the best of his ability right now and he's a fecking shit defender.
He's playing at the best of his ability right now and he's a fecking shit defender.
you’re right - probably over reacted there.
but we’re still better off without him
I completely agree in terms of the first XI.
He can be our substitute/back-up unless he proves himself worthy of more.
I try and take out the cost of any player because it isn’t our (the fans) or the their (the players) fault and the cost of the player is something the clubs agree to.
I also think their is a huge discrepancy between what we ‘paid’ for him and what we actually paid. Just like there was with Martial, and presumably the majority of other players. I include the players wages in that theory too
Is he allowed back in Greece ?
He's out of his depth. Remember when Liverpool were buying British players like Andy Carroll, Paul Konchesky, Stewart Downing and Charlie Adams? Maguire and AWB are similar. Players who looked good for mid table clubs but failed to make the step up.
Wouldn't mind doing a swap with Wolves for Coady. He's decent and at the very least has a captains presence.
We wouldn't be having this discussion if we'd converted just one of the numerous chances we created in the last 3 games. That's the reason we didn't win any of those games, no other reason. Maguire makes one error (if you can even call it that) after 4 or 5 very solid displays in succession and people are all over him like a bad rush. Almost as if they were waiting for the right moment to strike.
All the Greece and "I don't like the way he looks" talk absolutely wreaks of an agenda just so you know.
All the Greece and "I don't like the way he looks" talk absolutely wreaks of an agenda just so you know.
He has lapse in his game like a 20 yo. He should be at his prime now yet he is so prone to mistake. I think overall our midfield needs to control the game. If Maguire joins City, he definitely has better performance as they hold 65-70% of the possession.
You can't play a high-line with him (or going by this season, any line) because he hasn't got the pace in coming back, his anticipation is appalling nowadays and his ball playing and heading ability has gradually declined over the course of the past two campaigns, elements that were regarded as two of his stronger attributes.
As a leader on the field he seems nonplussed too, much like the fans in the stadium.
As a leader on the field he seems nonplussed too, much like the fans in the stadium.
I’m not in ‘a trench’. I’ve no issue saying I am a long time detractor. It’s posters like yourself who claim he ‘played badly for 3 games’ last season [again, did Instanbul not happen?] who want to spin his form as something temporary & dismiss other lapses when infact his dips in form have been reoccurring throughout his tenure [see the video you ignored for reference].
A 4 week period for England has 0 relevance for Manchester United Football Club, I can’t explain this further. Guess it’s time to re-sign Lukaku & get Hojberg in by that barometer. You seem wed to the notion Maguire is the player he’s never been for United, I’m not saying he’s a ‘bad’ player. He’s just certainly not a consistent enough one at club level.
By the way the ‘opening 3 games last season’ were Palace, Luton, & Brighton. Oh no, now you meant League games. Again,
indeed.That would all be fine @Lentwood if that were even the argument I was making.
We didn’t ‘ship goals at a rate of knots’ without him to end last season, the only game we conceded above the average we did with him was against Liverpool when they scored 4, we literally played a B team against Leicester & conceded 2 otherwise we conceded the goal a game a Maguire defence is known to do. Who started alongside Bailly & shipped 5 goals in 2 legs against Roma again? This is the issue when people cherry pick, he’s not bad all the time - far from it but I don’t get this defence that because we’re absolutely shit without him that being shit with him is somehow acceptable. The premise of argument acts as if we haven’t had multiple windows to rectify his contemporaries & him. The compelling reasons to drop him are rather stark, the issue is when we do there are no decent alternatives. We can be bad with Maguire & bad without him, they’re not mutually exclusive.
Somehow you’ve skewed my post into a ‘drop Harry for X’ which unfortunately isn’t possible due to lack of quality alternatives. Are you saying I shouldn’t criticise Maguire for his poor performances because others CBs perform poorly too?
We’ll have to disagree on the 5/6 CBs point. Tactics, or a lack there of, certainly play their role but instances like the one against Burnley aren’t tactical he’s simply irrational when it comes to certain aspects of his defending.
This is a tri-annual topic with this guy, surely that tells us something. Yes the board can be reactionary but there are posts from 18 months ago in the ‘sell’ thread telling people to get behind him & saying he was just in bad form then. I’d love to have a great English CB, unfortunately we do not.
The trouble with talking about him being in form or out of form, is that it's almost irrelevant. Because it's as simple as this for me: Harry Maguire at his best, is still not good enough to justify the level that he's been elevated to. That's it. That's the issue with him.
It's not that he's completely incompetent, or that he's not capable of putting in solid performances (because he is), but more to do with the fact that he should not be an automatic starter, and certainly shouldn't be captain. But that's the position he's now in. He should be made a squad player and replaced with a genuinely world class CB. I doubt that's going to happen, but that's what should happen. Because at his best, he's just a solid CB.
It's not that he's completely incompetent, or that he's not capable of putting in solid performances (because he is), but more to do with the fact that he should not be an automatic starter, and certainly shouldn't be captain. But that's the position he's now in. He should be made a squad player and replaced with a genuinely world class CB. I doubt that's going to happen, but that's what should happen. Because at his best, he's just a solid CB.
Yeah, because obviously I had the Luton game in mind when I wrote "first 3 games of the season" and not the Spurs game, because I'm so clueless and infatuated with Maguire that I thought he played well against Spurs. However, since you've now cleverly put me on the spot, I have to change tack, and pretend I meant the Spurs game all along. The Istanbul game I'll just keep on ignoring, because obviously if I admitted he played less than well in a CL game in which the whole team played like shit, my whole argument that he was largely good to great last season would fall apart completely.I’m not in ‘a trench’. I’ve no issue saying I am a long time detractor. It’s posters like yourself who claim he ‘played badly for 3 games’ last season [again, did Instanbul not happen?] who want to spin his form as something temporary & dismiss other lapses when infact his dips in form have been reoccurring throughout his tenure [see the video you ignored for reference].
A 4 week period for England has 0 relevance for Manchester United Football Club, I can’t explain this further. Guess it’s time to re-sign Lukaku & get Hojberg in by that barometer. You seem wed to the notion Maguire is the player he’s never been for United, I’m not saying he’s a ‘bad’ player. He’s just certainly not a consistent enough one at club level.
By the way the ‘opening 3 games last season’ were Palace, Luton, & Brighton. Oh no, now you meant League games. Again,
Look mate, you're not just in a trench - your trench is in a tunnel, and the whole opening of the tunnel is filled by a picture you painted yourself.
You’ll ignore the Instanbul game because it doesn’t suit the ‘3 game’ nonsense you spouted, the same way you ignored the video charting multiple mistakes since he joined, the same way you’ll ignore the fact that we should re-sign Lukaku based on the Euros, the same way you’ve ignored the fact I literally said he isn’t a bad player.
You’re really obsessed with this trench analogy, you can think Maguire is a decent player whilst also noting he’s had some very bad moments throughout his Ynited career; at this point you’re just trying to disagree with something.
Hopefully he has a good world cup and someone gives us £25m for him in the following window. Disaster signing, overpriced at £60m the summer before we paid the £80m, we'd have been better off keeping Smalling.
That video is brutal, championship level.I directly tell you what parts of your post I disagree with. It’s not simply Ralfs system. It’s not a downturn in form. He is one of the worst signings. His behaviour with police in Greece is shameful of a United captain.
Not sure why you’d choose a part of your post I said I agree with over the clearly mentioned parts I said I do not. Moving on.
You’ve missed the point, England could play with a back 6 the question is what does him playing for a differe team against a different level of opposition tell us about a man that struggles against Burnley for his club side? Since when did making an international Team of the Tournament make up for terrible club form? You’re taking a 4 week tournament for another team & extrapolating it over the nonsense we witness weekly.
Did we play Spurs in the first 3 games? Did Instanbul not happen? Your unwavering support for the man is misplaced. . .
2019-2022
. . . You might want to take your red tinted specs off & grab a bowl of popcorn.
It wasn't clumsy. It looked like a training ground routine. Either way...it shouldn't have been called off. Rodriguez wasn't in the fight for the ball. It wasn't like when Cavani got blocked off at Villa. In that case, Cavani got blocked from marking his man. Varane wasn't Rodriguez's man. If they are going to call that, then they can find a reason to call off pretty much any goal that is scored from a set piece. As for the yellow card, if you're beat you see what you can get away with. It wasn't the smartest move, but it was never going to be a red. If you think he's lucky to only receive yellow then you obviously don't understand the laws of the game...
You can know a bad player/manager by looking at how often they end up in the opposition's banter.
• Lukaku used to be a meme, despite his price tag. Did we miss him after his departure? No.
• Opposition fans used to sing "Ole at the wheel" at Old Trafford. Did we miss him after his departure? No.
• Maguire is currently a large stick to beat us with when Liverpool paid less money for VVD and transformed their squad. See the pattern here?
You may disregard the opposition's banter as unimportant. But looking at it from another perspective, they watch our players/manager and judge them objectively without any rose-tinted glasses.
My initial point was about being careful what we wish for. All I am saying is that whatever combination we have fielded over the last 3/4 seasons, we haven't defended particularly well, and seem to give up goals cheaply, particularly on the counter when we lose possession.
If the four International CBs we have (5 if you count Jones) aren't good enough, then I think it's legitimate to start thinking 'is it the individuals....or do we just not defend well as a team?'
Personally, I think we've been a poor side (tactically) for 4/5 seasons, since LvG left. Virgil van Dijk is a monster, and would look half-decent in any team, but apart from him, I reckon if you put any other CB in our side (Dias, T. Silva, Matip, Rudiger included) we wouldn't have looked significantly better. In fact, we'd probably be looking at Maguire at City and going 'why didn't we sign that lad, City's defensive record is excellent'.
Sometimes the easy thing when a team concedes goals is to blame the CBs, but I think our issues have been tactical, lack of pressing, lack of defensive shape, not working hard enough in forward areas, not good enough at turnovers/in transition.
Last thing I'll say on it for now because we're not going to agree but let's see how Maguire and Varane get on until the end of the season. If we get to the end of the season and we're still defending badly (not that I think we have defended badly lately) then we'll have to re-assess it again. But I do question what we can do about it, because we haven't got the luxury of going out and buying yet another CB.
You don't know the last man/clear goal scoring opp rule but then say someone else doesn't understand the laws of the game...I applaud your confidence as misplaced as it clearly is. It was even brought up by journos after the game in post match interviews.
Corner was clumsy, I sympathise with Maguire and it was a ridiculous decision i my view but he caused the goal to be disallowed, he then got done for their goal and escaped a red card when he pulled back Rodriguez.
Don't worry, Harry repeatedly explained to us after the match that the problem was down to the strikers needing to be more clinical.
Could put him on EBay?
In the grand scheme of things and considering what the club payed for him it's Imo the worst signing the club has ever made.
- Status