Will cost a bit. Need a new midfield and full backs.
Pogba will help when coming back, but creativity is a team thing, a team attitude. You can’t put Zidane in a Stoke team and just say ‘create’. I think the most creative sides are constructed with creativity piece by piece. All players have their roles, like defenders must defend etc, but they are chosen based on how they fit a collective ethos. You look at Pep. The goalkeeper is good at stopping goals, but even he has been selected on this basis. The full-backs must be comfortable on the ball, the defensive midfielder must be comfortable on he ball, CMs etc. Same with Barcelona. Busquets, Xavi and Iniesta. Pique behind. Alba coming from one side, Alves from the other. You can’t just say ‘buy Essien and Scott Parker then put Iniesta in front of them and then you have a midfield that can create and defend’. Doesn’t work like that.
I’m not saying Xavi, Iniesta and Busquets is the only midfield, but the point is, even players like Fernandinho, who could easily be a United type of player, can do the defensive bit and the workrate bit while still being able to move symbiotically with his teammates on and off the ball. Our structure is disjointed. McTominay, Fred, Wan-Bissaka, Pogba and Martial do not belong in the same football team. They are all good players, but I don’t think a top team with an identity could possibly have a first XI with the same contradiction of footballers. They don’t have the same operating system or identity. I agree that work rate is important in a team, and not suggesting a lazy team of technique, but the likes of City, Barca etc have always worked, and I think there have been other great teams not as extreme as them with a better balance too.