Firstly I’d like to say I understand our main needs are a RW, CB, RB, and CM. Getting those 4 is ideal but let’s say if we only spend “big” on one of those positions (example being Sancho for RW) and relatively fair priced for the others, it might leave us money to go after Ziyech.
Ziyech is 26 years old, primarily plays RW and CAM, and he’s progressively gotten better and better every year. He has 20 goals and 21 assists in all competitions this season & a whopping 100 goal involvements (49 goals, 51 assists) in 130 games since joining Ajax in 2016/17...and he has a release clause of £25m. That’s it. In today’s market that’s pocket change and I see no excuse as to why a big club like United would even have to think twice to make such a move for what would be chump change for us.
...player is quality and obviously ready to take the next step in his career by joining a bigger club. He’s prime aged and oozes talent.
People say his play is reminiscent of Ozil offensively from years past. Off the ball, he has a high motor and is relentless in covering ground. Has a knack for tackling and being hard to play against never easing up. With the ball or with the team in attack, he’s as fluid and unpredictable as anyone always making runs and cutting. Which is a lot more than our static forwards who are known to be slackers that don’t have a high enough work rate.
He would be an excellent primary bench option to Pogba or Sancho or could even start along with Pogba in midfield against certain sides and take pressure off him by not letting him be the only option the team has to funnel any sort of offense through. And he’s not selfish either as his primary instinct is to distribute the ball by making key short and/or long passes versus just dribbling through opponents. Constantly looking around to play the right ball with his high IQ which engages the rest of the team as well and ups the overall team creativity by nature...I don’t see why he can’t be a Mata replacement who’s likely to leave, let alone a better option than Lingard.