Micah Richards, John Stones, Rob Holding....
Wonderkids or not, doesn't mean shit.
When do we cut our losses on Maguire?
- Thread starter Schmeichel's Cartwheel
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
Wonderkids or not, doesn't mean shit.
Ok Let's back off for a second, Harry Maguire is a giant and is know for his heading abilities and his ball playing abilities. I agree we have seen little of the ball playing abilities. In fact I myself criticized his passing range as narrow but I have admired him since his personal problems away from the pitch. He has come back stronger and I think we need to back him right now. He's only 27 and that's not old in CB years. Some of the best CBs mature into great ones at 29-30. He will come good for us and he's a strong character. Just stop gasping so much and let Axel play beside him or Victor actually works. We can get Upamecano in the winter or summer and everything will light up but it's not as bad you say. While our midfield is a problem.
The truth is we need another CB better than him before we ever get rid of him; our best CB.
We can't trust our recruitment to get rid of Maguire and replace him with two better CBs.
Finally, we wont recoup the money we paid, but he's still better than anyone we could get for what he'd be sold for other than Upamecano.
We can't trust our recruitment to get rid of Maguire and replace him with two better CBs.
Finally, we wont recoup the money we paid, but he's still better than anyone we could get for what he'd be sold for other than Upamecano.
You are talking absolute nonsense. Go back to tour original point which was about if Pep wanted him. I merely pointed out that this is in no way a valid reason to consider him good enough, when you look at his track record with defenders. It is that simple.
If you want to exclude back up signings, then fine. Pep has only ever signed one cenral defender that can be considered a total success under him and that was Pique.
So far that's a 1 in 5 record.
First Choice
Excellent - Pique
Uproven - Laporte & Dias
Rubbish - Benatia & Stones
Backups
Unproven - Ake
Rubbish - Chygrinski, Tasci, Kirchoff, Henrique, Caceres
Is that classified enough for you?
The reference to Gomez matters because you said Maguire has been better than him for years. He's got 4 years on him, Gomez has just completed his first full season for Liverpool.If you looked closely you would see that Gomez only started last season because Matip was injured a lot. Like I said, he was playing in a defence with the best defender in the world, he wasn't the leader of that defence.
That's the point here about Maguire here. He is a good defender, I'm not disputing that, the stats are there for all to see.
Is he good enough to be the main man at the back in a side that wants to win major trophies? In my opinion the answer to that is no. He is supposed to be the leader of the Utd defence. He is the captain. He is also the player that is supposed to be the leader on the pitch, he's not, he's just not a natural leader.
James is rated? by who? and to call a 20yr old Williams average is absolutely ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as your claim that Telles is elite when he's unproven in a proper league.
Many of our players are young and some of our fans rightfully talk up their potential but even outside of the match-day thread there are lot who love to run down our players and at times no one on the team seems to be good enough for United.
There's even a thread about it: https://www.redcafe.net/threads/players-you-believe-get-a-raw-deal-on-the-caf.459087/
People have repeatedly pointed out that Maguire isn't our worst defender (and shown stats to back up the claim that he's the best defender we have) and isn't the biggest problem with the team so they feel the thread is a bit OTT.
For that, you get the hyperbolic response of worshippers of mediocrity.
You should have called them Maguire fan bois rather than fans by the way. Rookie mistake there.
I do and I'm having a hard time recalling too many brilliant games.
He was better than what we had at the time,but he’s nowhere close to being a world class CB.Nowhere close to Ferdinand/Vidic level....I don’t think we should sell him immediately though,we just focus on signing a top quality CB and see if that brings the best out of Maguire.,,
Same. Was genuinely surprised when I saw the date.
Smalling's lack of England appearances recently has nothing to do with how good or bad of a defender he is. Southgate said he doesn't like him as a player and stuck to that with selecting worse players instead.People insist we should have stuck with Chris fecking Smalling
The memories of people are very short here his good form at Roma(where he plays in a back 3) doesn`t negate how average he was here at Utd and how much stick he used to get for being a bambi on ice on the ball. He hasn`t gotten an England call up for almost 3 years now and at 31 likely never will but I`m supposed to believe he`s better than a CB thats actually a regular for his country who`s scored important goals for them(including in a World Cup) and one who has 15 cleansheets in 23 games this season
The original discussion was about whether Maguire is good enough to be starting centre back in a winning team or no.
You don't know whether he will come failure or no if he was signed, using track record with 2 poor signings in 12 years doesn't give you the answer. How is trying to argue about Pep's track record will conclude this discussion that Maguire is good enough or no for his starting centre back?
Did this you called poor track record prove that Laporte wouldn't be good enough in title winning XI? Clearly it didn't, because Laporte was part of his starting XI in his winning title team.
What we know, the year after he won the league, Pep wanted Maguire to be his starting centre back. This tells you a winning title manager rated him highly and it is justified enough with the fact that Maguire has been more regular centre back than Gomez since 2019-2020 in England National, that was the year when Gomez became regular centre back in Liverpool. This is the reason why I mentioned Pep wanted him. Any backup signings mean he rated them as just backup quality, irrelevant.
Ok, with the exception of the first couple of games of this season (where a lot of our team were terrible) can you recall too many games where you would say he’s been awful?
Yep. We sold the most realistic partner for him. Our next best option now is to hope Tuanzebe stays fit and impresses over the rest of the season. Might save us having to spend on a CB with just selling Rojo and Jones over the next couple windows. If he doesn't, then we'll definitely need to buy next summer.
I think you're in for a lot of future disappointment if you use Rio and Vidic as the benchmark for a CB, no matter who we sign.
Dias, Sterling, Tierney, maybe.
Yeah, Maguire is good. No argument. But the OP is saying "let's sell him for some good cash if we can and buy someone better".
And Maguire is not so good that this question isn't even worth considering.
That's the primary reason I didn't want him at the club. I knew he was a good defender and better than Lindelof but had massive doubts he'd be VVD level which is what people would expect of him.
Not that I care about his price tag, but who is a £80m Centre Back these days anyway?
I think he is. You put him alongside VVD, Varane, Lenglet, Alaba, De Ligt, etc.
Won't be out of place at all. In fact I think he will strengthen them two folds.
EDIT:
Heck, I can't even imagine Liverpool with VVD and Maguire, that would be unstoppable.
couldn’t care less what he was doing when he was 19. I’m interested in what he’s doing now and in the future. Your having a pointless argument with yourself.
smalling was a non league player a 19. Clearly he was never a world class player, but it’s a ridiculous stock to beat Maguire with, to criticise his level 5-6 years ago.
Jones was touted as the next big thing, playing regularly at 19, and earned a massive transfer to Man Utd. If the only criteria was to play when your a teenager, then he should have been one of the best players in the world.
you’ve gone down a very fruitless rabbit hole.
Who feckin is these days? I agree. Based on the injury profile of our defenders we do need to get in quality defenders who can stay fit.
I'm not sure why getting rid of Maguire is a good idea when he's the only one capable of playing every game and is nowhere near our worst defender.
The issue with the partnership with Lindelof is that they are too similar. If we can't keep our pacy defenders, Bailly or Tuanzebe, fit then what's what we need to bring in but not while we sell Maguire and not for 40m.
The answer is no then, mainly because its obvious, he needs someone stronger beside him.
You can go on referencing Laporte, Gomez etc all you like, simple factor the matter is they had top class CB parnters beside them. Maguire is supposed to be be that, he isn't. He isn't even close to Van Dijk or Kompany as an all round defender.
What you don't know is that there are not many Kompany & Van Dijk level centre back out there available. This is the standard of nowdays centre back Laporte and Maguire.
He’s not worth the 80million but cutting our losses ?
give it a rest
give it a rest
When do we cut our losses on Bruno?
(c.2005) when do we cut our losses on Ronaldo?
(c.1990) when do we cut our losses on Ferguson?
(c.2005) when do we cut our losses on Ronaldo?
(c.1990) when do we cut our losses on Ferguson?
People are so reactionary and are expecting OP to be reactionary based on the last few games where Maguire hasnt been a liability.
The truth is that Maguire was marketed and brought to be a ball playing and 'modern' centre back as OP said. He is clearly not good enough as a ball playing centreback, and he takes a million touches to do anything. This is pretty much what a certain dutch pundit said a year or two ago and was dismissed. Neither is he a solid 'wall' at the back like a Vidic. He is a solid centre back, but if we want to be a title winning side or a champions league contender he isn't good enough to start.
We've had the same issue with multiple players, where they had mediocre careers with United and flashes here or there and the fan base calls anyone asking them to be sold as delusional or short sighted. Martial is a similar case where his career with United has been ridiculously inconsistent and people bring up anything to justify us keeping him. Why did we keep Martial and sell Memphis? Since Memphis was sold he's had a far better career than Martial and better overall performances as well.
I don't think we can sell him because we probably overpaid his wages and definitely overpaid for his price tag. I think in a few years at this rate he will be a fringe player in the United squad similar to a Smalling, and we're better off recruiting another centre back to be our main man. Whether this happens or not is hard to tell, but I'd say its unlikely considering the stupid figure we paid for him and his nationality.
The truth is that Maguire was marketed and brought to be a ball playing and 'modern' centre back as OP said. He is clearly not good enough as a ball playing centreback, and he takes a million touches to do anything. This is pretty much what a certain dutch pundit said a year or two ago and was dismissed. Neither is he a solid 'wall' at the back like a Vidic. He is a solid centre back, but if we want to be a title winning side or a champions league contender he isn't good enough to start.
We've had the same issue with multiple players, where they had mediocre careers with United and flashes here or there and the fan base calls anyone asking them to be sold as delusional or short sighted. Martial is a similar case where his career with United has been ridiculously inconsistent and people bring up anything to justify us keeping him. Why did we keep Martial and sell Memphis? Since Memphis was sold he's had a far better career than Martial and better overall performances as well.
I don't think we can sell him because we probably overpaid his wages and definitely overpaid for his price tag. I think in a few years at this rate he will be a fringe player in the United squad similar to a Smalling, and we're better off recruiting another centre back to be our main man. Whether this happens or not is hard to tell, but I'd say its unlikely considering the stupid figure we paid for him and his nationality.
I know, the title of the thread is what’s so annoying. It’s fine to have discussions between fans of Harry and people who don’t rate him bit cutting our losses insinuates he’s been a massive failure.
The only current player in our ranks that the term ‘cutting our losses’ should apply to is Pogba. Harry is totally committed to our cause and has performed very well for us on the whole.
WE can think of an upgrade when we have another CB (in addition to Lindelov) who is proven to be better and can stay fit for most of the season. That does not appear to be from within the club today.
To sum up this thread - we massively overpaid for a good but not great CB to add to our already good but not great CBs. Issue with 'cutting our losses' is we have a team full of crocks at CB and so it would be madness to sell Maguire.
That said - is there really that much quality around these says at CB? For me it's all about how team's setup - Dier is an average player but in Jose's system he looks good, VVD was good at Soton but he became unbelievable at Liverpool whereas Lovren was bang average despite being really solid for them. All about finding players to fit systems not just finding the most in form CB and for us we would kill for a technically competent CB who is rapid.
That said - is there really that much quality around these says at CB? For me it's all about how team's setup - Dier is an average player but in Jose's system he looks good, VVD was good at Soton but he became unbelievable at Liverpool whereas Lovren was bang average despite being really solid for them. All about finding players to fit systems not just finding the most in form CB and for us we would kill for a technically competent CB who is rapid.
Apologies for misreading. But I think the relative merits of our 'ball playing' CBs is fairly limited when we're basically forced to play two destroyers in Fred and McT in front of them because they both struggle to cope with counters. And when the outball is AWB who isn't great on the ball. I'm not sure either is good enough on the ball to make up for both having such glaring defensive weaknesses.
Other great CBs past and present like Vidic, Alderweireld, Van Dijk, Thiago Silva etc as teenagers were very unknown but it didn`t stop them from being the top CBs they were/are. Michael Keane was a teenage prodigy at Utd but now an ordinary CB at Everton. The potential of Jones and Micah Richards was huge but none had top top top careers. Heck look at Joe Gomez nobody knew him as a teenager but its taken him till like 23 to be a household name and 23 is when Maguire became a more known player at Hull every player develops in different paces so this is a VERY poor metric to use
The majority of them have just been stunningly average at best (lucky penalty escape against Chelsea springs to mind, and he also got away with it against West Brom, right before Bruno got flagged for a penalty.) I don't see an awful player, but I certainly don't see a fantastic one either.
I think this is a fair summary.
Wouldn’t it great if we could swap eyes for a match and properly check out each other’s perspective?
Indeed!Wouldn’t it great if we could swap eyes for a match and properly check out each other’s perspective?
Id want my eyes back though so I could get back to being right
Most central defenders peak around the 30 mark.
And if they don't rely on purely physical traits, the peak can easily last for several years.
Maguire is 27. And he's - here and now - a decent at worst player (and yes, that would mean decent at the highest level).
Were we fleeced on the transfer fee? Of course. Time to move on from that, though - eh? It's not going to change.
And if they don't rely on purely physical traits, the peak can easily last for several years.
Maguire is 27. And he's - here and now - a decent at worst player (and yes, that would mean decent at the highest level).
Were we fleeced on the transfer fee? Of course. Time to move on from that, though - eh? It's not going to change.
You do realize that I also posted VVD's numbers and Maguire was almost double him in that one category that you picked out right? And 3 times Lindelof
I am not a big Maguire fan. I was critical of this signing long before we signed him up. However, if Ole is on the way out and one of the candidates to replace him clearly state that he wants Maguire out then I believe that he shouldn't get the job. It's time we move away from managers with their 'philosophy' and sign people who are ready to adapt their tactics to fit what we've got. We need people who properly coach players rather then managers who come with a 200m bill every year and expect the club to simply fork that money out.
That's the point he is making to the OP.
I see people saying we should first find a better CB than him, then we can replace him.
This doesn't make sense to me because Maguire affects our overall style so greatly that even a lesser CB than him can have a greater effect on the whole team. If we find a CB who is good enough to help us play a higher line and make our pressing less inefficient and disjointed, we might not even need to worry about sitting deep and heading out balls from our box, which Maguire is very good at.
I wouldn't be opposed to selling him and getting a CB who ticks the boxes of a team looking to play 20 yards further up the pitch, even if that CB is not as individually good as Maguire. Just like Lukaku, Maguire might be a better fit for a team on the cusp like Everton or Inter, rather than a team looking to win the PL and CL which ( I hope) we are.
This doesn't make sense to me because Maguire affects our overall style so greatly that even a lesser CB than him can have a greater effect on the whole team. If we find a CB who is good enough to help us play a higher line and make our pressing less inefficient and disjointed, we might not even need to worry about sitting deep and heading out balls from our box, which Maguire is very good at.
I wouldn't be opposed to selling him and getting a CB who ticks the boxes of a team looking to play 20 yards further up the pitch, even if that CB is not as individually good as Maguire. Just like Lukaku, Maguire might be a better fit for a team on the cusp like Everton or Inter, rather than a team looking to win the PL and CL which ( I hope) we are.