A striker who doesn't score goals, a keeper who costs us points, and a midfielder who is never fit. Our marquee Summer signings have NOT improved us.

[The Oracle]

From the club's official website:

"Our first signing of the transfer window was confirmed on 5 July, when England international Mason Mount officially put pen-to-paper after sealing his move from Chelsea.

Goalkeeper Andre Onana joined from Internazionale on 20 July, after being the club's top choice to replace David De Gea.

Denmark striker Rasmus Hojlund was presented to the crowd at Old Trafford on 5 August, minutes before the Reds played Lens in the team's penultimate pre-season friendly."


They haven't improved us! We are worse than we were last season.
Bad recruitment or bad luck?

 

[Big Ben Foster]

Bad recruitment. Indulging the manager and letting him take the lead on transfers is a suicidal strategy these days.

 

[AndySmith1990]

Not sure. Might be because the club structure is bad and Eriksen is injured

 

[Dec9003]

Bad recruitment. Not necessarily bad players but not what we needed at this time.

 

[tomaldinho1]

We’ve got like 10 of these threads already

 

[Skills]

But at least we signed them early and for pre-season right? Because apparently if you don't sign the managers targets in time for pre-season you're screwing them over.

 

[The Purley King]

Onana = single handedly cost us CL qualification

Mount = never fit plus seemingly not trusted by ETH

Hoijlund = decent player in there but is like a great white trying to feed off plankton.

Don’t know where to start but that is a fecking shit effort at getting out of the group stage.

 

[IRELANDUNITED]

Just in case you don’t know - you don’t need to create a thread for every single thought that pops into your head.

 

[Cutch]

Is this the new 'did we waste 200m in the summer' thread

 

[Red00012]

Start a new thread FC

 

[The Irish Connection]

Absolutely shocking recruitment. Mount for 55m in the last year of his contract after a poor season was just baffling.

Onana had a history of making howlers but definitely more composed on the ball than De Gea. Doesn’t do the basics though.

And Hojlund is raw, had 9 goals for the season in Serie A.

The Glazers have fecked us financially but the recruitment is genuinely awful.

I hope under Ratcliffe we just write off the bad signings, take a hit but move them on and get proper quality in.
No more number 10s for central midfield.
Could still be hamstrung by FFP though.

 

[lex talionis]

Horrifying decision-making in rebuilding the squad. No one, it seems, was the adult in the room to say no when ten Hag demanded we sign Antony, Mount, Onana and Hojlund.

 

[TempusFugit]

I don't even know how good Højlund is at shooting or even just finishing. He barely gets ONE chance a game where we play the ball into his feet and let him do his job. Zero service for the kid, it's a disgrace. How many times have we had him taking shots in the box? It's always the scrappy chances, balls flashed across the box or him basically making something out of nothing. We don't create clear cut chances as a team, bring in even Kane and he'll look average here.

 

[Plant0x84]

Denmark striker Rasmus Hojlund was presented to the crowd at Old Trafford on 5 August, minutes before the Reds played Lens in the team's penultimate pre-season friendly."

He’s a 20 year old kid, cut him some slack. He’s had injuries and our team is that disjointed that his service as a striker is basically no existent. Yes he need to impose himself into games more, but if our creative core aren’t finding him with passes then he’s already on a hiding to nothing.

 

[Trequarista10]

Onana has been the worst. I hadn't seen much of him so had no strong opinion, but the consensus on here seemed to be that he would be transformative.

Mount signing was always strange as we have plenty of mids who excel further up the pitch but we're lacking deeper options. Has spent more time injured than fit, but I'm not confident he will make an impact ir provide what we need even when fit

Hojlund, meh. There's some talent there but ultimately needs to score more. In an ideal world he'd have been eased in as second choice because he's clearly raw. Feel for him. If his lack of goals continues it won't be long until he gets Weghorst like mockery, which could be crushing for the kid.

Amrabat, meh. A bit shite, but no more shite than most of our squad. A reminder for me that a couple televised games and highlight videos can be deceiving, as I was convinced by him.

The best signing, amusingly, has probably been Jonny Evans.

-

Question is, are they better or worse than last season's signings? Martinez, Malacia, Casemiro, Eriksen, Antony? Maybe last years is a touch better (Martinez is class, Casemiro had a good few months and Eriksen a bright spell), but it's close enough I may have a different opinion by the end of the season.

 

[NewGlory]

You can criticize Onana and Mount all you want, but please stop being negative towards Hojlund.

He is a 20 years old for feck's sake, playing with wingers who do not pass and playing in a new league. Even with all of that he makes us stronger in every game with his pressing.

Hojlund will be great for us, if we take care of him. It's not ok to mix him up with Onana and Mount just because you are trying to make a point about Ten Hag.

The mistake was putting the pressure of bing United's main striker on Hojlund. Signing Hojlund was not a mistake. We should have also signed a senior striker.

 

[Sky1981]

Manchester United seems to be the club with the most "manager that spents 50+ million on a big signing and dont even know where to play them"

DVB
Mount
Sancho
Pogba

It's proposterus

 

[Denis79]

He’s a 20 year old kid, cut him some slack. He’s had injuries and our team is that disjointed that his service as a striker is basically no existent. Yes he need to impose himself into games more, but if our creative core aren’t finding him with passes then he’s already on a hiding to nothing.

I like him but he won't become a top striker, he would have shown some magic by now. I feel sorry for him being put under pressure so young but thats on Ten Hag.

 

[paulscholes18]

Maybe Weghorst wasn’t as bad as we made him look. We don’t create chances for our strikers.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

I'd argue they all improve the squad. I'll take Hojlund over Martial any day. Onana I believe will come good and people forget how poor De Gea was. Mount is better than the player he replaced in the squad which is Fred. Although, I'll admit I rate Mount more than most.

Whether they improve the team enough for the money spent is a different question.

 

[SRB87]

If ETH and management were just a little smarter, everything could have looked differently by now. 400fkn million spent and we got worse. With just a little bit of common sense, i think we could have done so much better.

I am certain that even if we went with a cheap alternatives in some positions, turning them into squad players, we would have been better off. For instance, Mitrovic would have cost much less than Hojlund and is proven in the prem. I know its the Saudi league but hes still got 22 goals in 23 games. As for wingers, there were and are so many good options within the league. For what Antony cost, we could have gotten Diaby and someone like Cunha who i rank highly. The 50mil on Onana we dont even have to talk about and almost deserves a sacking - GK was in no way a priority here.

Guys that were legitimately available and we had demand for:
Diaby,
Mitrovic
James madison for 46M
Doku (we didnt scout)
Brennan Johnson
Pau Torres
Joao Pedro (for half the price, maybe a better and less risky talent to pursue)
Szobozlai
Van de Ven
pedro porro
Cunha
Kudus for 40m
etc. etc. etc.
This list keeps on going and i do understand hindsight is 20/20 but ETH has to take the blame. A huge reason why we are bad is because we essentially had no transfers considering theyre mostly all flops and not even playing. Crazy to think so many still want him here considering the damage.

 

[Todd]

On paper, signing Onana was a smart move. He fit the profile of what we needed at the position, was coming off of a great season, and was available for a not-outrageous fee. I can't fault us for making that signing, and I don't think anyone would've expected he'd turn out to be so unreliable.

The Højlund signing was bad business, we overpaid terribly for a kid.

The Mount signing might go down as one of the stupidest bits of business we've done ever.

 

[The_Midfielder]

On paper, signing Onana was a smart move. He fit the profile of what we needed at the position, was coming off of a great season, and was available for a not-outrageous fee. I can't fault us for making that signing, and I don't think anyone would've expected he'd turn out to be so unreliable.

The Højlund signing was bad business, we overpaid terribly for a kid.

The Mount signing might go down as one of the stupidest bits of business we've done ever.

If you really think Onana was a better signing .. think again..
He was good but if yiu had looked at. His technique , you would have noticed he was not that good ..
Any top goalkeeper coach/ recruiter would have identified that ..

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

I think of the 3 only Onana can be unfailingly placed at EtH’s feet. We needed to sign homegrown and were planning to flog McTominay and Maguire, and were selling Fred, so Mount fits the profile even though I and many others had reselevation about our shape with him in the team. Hojlund we overpaid but you can’t convince me that EtH passed over the chance of signing someone like Kane or Osimhen over him, there were rumours of getting Taremi to share the load and that fell through as well.

The well known ‘3 signings a summer’ fecked us again, we spent badly but in the best of case we still needed more.

 

[mu4c_20le]

He’s a 20 year old kid, cut him some slack. He’s had injuries and our team is that disjointed that his service as a striker is basically no existent. Yes he need to impose himself into games more, but if our creative core aren’t finding him with passes then he’s already on a hiding to nothing.

Martial was 20 when he came here and scored 11 goals in the league in a defensive system.

 

[frostbite]

If you really think Onana was a better signing .. think again..
He was good but if yiu had looked at. His technique , you would have noticed he was not that good ..
Any top goalkeeper coach/ recruiter would have identified that ..

Ten Hag was Onana's manager at Ajax, he worked with him every day, he wanted him again, and that's why he ditched De Gea. If his own manager doesn't know whether he is good or bad, then obviously the main problem is that you have the wrong manager!

 

[Plant0x84]

I like him but he won't become a top striker, he would have shown some magic by now. I feel sorry for him being put under pressure so young but thats on Ten Hag.

He’s joint top scorer in this season CL, level with Haaland, and better than Kane, Mbappe, Bellingham and Griezmann. He’s got time, he’ll be just fine!

 

[Leftback99]

Our two best signings by far from the the £400m were free transfers (Eriksen and Evans).

 

[RoadTrip]

Bad recruitment. Indulging the manager and letting him take the lead on transfers is a suicidal strategy these days.

It’s a failure of the club if ETH is deciding who to sign unilaterally. ETH signs who he feels he should sign if the club give him that power. It’s not how any big club is run and is destined for failure. The problem here is bigger than just ETH signing shit players.

 

[Ayoba]

Just in case you don’t know - you don’t need to create a thread for every single thought that pops into your head.

Are you the forum police?

 

[Baneofthegame]

Not sure what Hojlund is meant to do when he’s not getting any service.

Onana has been okay in the league, terrible in the CL.

Mount can’t get fit and when he’s fit he doesn’t seem to play because as I said in another thread we seem to see DVB was a waste of 40 million because Bruno has unreal fitness and thought, you know what? Let’s spend 60 million on the next one.

 

[TrustInJanuzaj]

Mount is the only poor signing. Just not what we needed at all. But people are downplaying our injuries, we haven’t been able to play a consistent team all season.

 

[Spaghetti]

Onana = single handedly cost us CL qualification

Mount = never fit plus seemingly not trusted by ETH

Hoijlund = decent player in there but is like a great white trying to feed off plankton.

Don’t know where to start but that is a fecking shit effort at getting out of the group stage.

Not really. He’s missed loads of good chances.

 

[JohnnyKills]

The problem isn't this year's signings. It's last year's.

We paid Real Madrid 60 million for Casemiro's injuries, and we signed a one-footed winger with no pace for 80 million. Two shocking bits of business even by our standards.

Too early to call any of this summer's signings IMO.

 

[Dr. StrangeHate]

Striker wise, Hojlund was the best we could have gotten.
99% of the CAF could have told you that Mount would be a failure even considering 99.99% of us are idiots.
Onana is a mystery to me. He single handedly took us out of the CL and he is also responsible for that non-penalty decision in the beginning of the season which has cost us so many points already. How did we get that one so wrong?

 

[Ace of Spades]

The manager wanted these players, and is not even using them to their strengths. Terrible management.

 

[Ayoba]

Striker wise, Hojlund was the best we could have gotten.
99% of the CAF could have told you that Mount would be a failure even considering 99.99% of us are idiots.
Onana is a mystery to me. He single handedly took us out of the CL and he is also responsible for that non-penalty decision in the beginning of the season which has cost us so many points already. How did we get that one so wrong?

I refuse to believe there isnt a better striker out there for £72million. Not having a go at Hojlund btw, I just dont think he's ready yet.

 

[soapythecat]

I feel for the next manager who has to try and get a tune out of these 3 and Antony.

 

[devilish]

Being a United keeper had always been tricky. SAF was a genius but he was only able to find 3 decent keepers one of which was already way past his 30s when signed and the latter wasn't WC anymore as soon as he hit 30. Schmeichel used to call the role as the loneliest role in the world which might explain why he fecked off after the treble. On top of that the defensive department at United is shocking. Martinez is out, Shaw and Varane are injury prone and the rest are quite frankly not good enough. Not to forget that we don't have a DM and our 2 other midfielders (McT and Bruno) think that they are strikers. Hojlund was a mistake. The talent is there but at that price and giving our circumstances we should have gone for a more experienced forward.

The reality is that our team is a mess. You can count the amount of ball playing defenders we've got on one hand, our wingers don't pass the ball and we don't have a DM

 

[acnumber9]

On paper, signing Onana was a smart move. He fit the profile of what we needed at the position, was coming off of a great season, and was available for a not-outrageous fee. I can't fault us for making that signing, and I don't think anyone would've expected he'd turn out to be so unreliable.

He’s the third most expensive goalkeeper of all time and if the manager who had worked with him before didn’t know then what hope have we got?