On the whole, his signings were pretty poor. Matic is a player I’d really liked and a position we needed, but he was 29. He was good for a season. That’s classic Jose, all about the here and now.
Ibra was great, for personality as much as performance, but hardly a long term solution.
Fred and Mkhitaryan can be forgiven as they looked good elsewhere but haven’t worked out as sometimes happens.
Bailly looked good but is a crock, sadly.
Lindelöf has done okay and Dalot is only 20, so although I have my doubts, I wouldn’t write him off yet.
Pogba was all Woodward; with Rooney going we needed a marquee name. The noodle partners are paying, in the main, for access and commercial use of the players. You need to have someone to slap on the billboards.
Then there’s Lukaku, which I think was unforgivable on Jose’s part. I’ll be honest, I’ve never, ever rated Lukaku. His technique is abysmal, always has been. Darren Bent and Jermaine Defoe scored plenty of top flight goals, but neither were world class. Lukaku just did it a bit younger because he was physically developed; he’s the same level as them. He’ll get you 15-25 goals a season, but the ones against top opposition or when you really need them will be few and far between.
However, the reason his signing was so awful, and why I blame Jose for him ever darkening the door at Old Trafford, was that Jose seemed convinced he could turn him into Drogba. It’s as though he’d never seen him play. All Lukaku can do is run the channels, play on the shoulder and look to get in behind. He’s not an awful finisher, but his game is and always has been pretty one dimensional. However, seemingly just because he’s massive, Jose figured he could play back to goal, have balls knocked into him, hold it up and bring others into play. The guy can’t trap a ball! We’d hoof it up to him, it would bounce off him, he’d take another two touches to bring it under control and any counter attack would grind to a shuddering halt. Rinse and repeat. We’re very, very lucky to have got our money back.