Rate our (extended) Summer 2020 Transfer Window

[Red_Orchestra]

A solid D for me... 3/10
We once again did not address getting an anchor in the center back department and did not address getting an anchor in the midfield department.
A center back and central defensive midfielder were much more needed than focusing on Jadon fecking Sancho all transfer window long in my opinion.

Never mind the INs that we could have brought in, lets focus on the OUTs.
We only sold ONE whole entire player this window, Smalling.
Year in and year out, it is the same talk on this forum, git rid of Jones, Rojo, Bailey, Lingard, Dalot, Matic and so on. I cant believe we haven't gotten rid of any of them yet. I don't understand what they are waiting for to sell?

 

[eltigreFalcao]

• Donny van de Beek 6/10
• Alex Telles 6/10
• Edinson Cavani 2/10
• Amad Diallo (2021) bebe/10
• Facundo Pellistri bebe/10
• 4.6/10

In terms of players I'd rate pretty similar this window. Except for Telles who I give a 5/10; hard to tell if he will flop ala Darmian. Hopefully the youngsters grow up as good players. But mainly the primary needs were not addressed and everything about everything during the whole window looked terrible, it was an awful window in which we only cemented our place as joker negotiators and an overall failure.

Can't say I'm disappointed at this point.

3/10

 

[Nou_Camp99]

3 out of 10.

Our 2 weakest positions still not filled. RW n CB.

This Pellestri kid isn't going straight in the mix. The lad from Atalanta doesn't even join for another 3 months and he's pretty raw too at 18 and barely any first team experience.

Cavani isnt the Cavani of old. Donny n Telles are decent signings on the face of it.

Ole has been given 35m net spend and chucked under the bus. This club is rotten to the core and Woodward n Glazers are scum.

 

[Zed 101]

got to be a 2/10 for me absolute dogpile..... Woodward and the Glazers are beyond a joke, we need a DOF but it's never going to happen

 

[Bwuk]

Hard to rate both Diallo and Pellestri. Hope they come in and are amazing buts it’s unfair pressure on them.

Happy with VdB. Telles too. Cavani on a free is fine.

We haven’t solved the glaring weaknesses in our side though. 4/10

 

[sewey89]

According to you we addressed 3 of 5 positions. So surely a 6/10.

Also, if that young lad really is for the first team, then surely that bumps it up to a 7.

Its a 7 for me, 6 for you with any reasonable scoring system.

But not with the targets we wanted.

We clearly wanted Sancho and Upamecano. Add those two and it’s 10/10. Scrambling to bring players in on deadline day doesn’t push it anywhere near a 7 for me

 

[DevilRed]

Alot of people haven't mentioned this but we are signing 3 players for the senior team that have won quite a few trophies.

Seems to be understated but hopefully they will bring that winning mentality to a team that frankly hasn't a clue what it takes to win a league.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

A 6 out of 10 on paper.

Telles and Cavani could either push that up, or push it down depending on how they settle and perform.

We needed a solid 9/10 window to challenge and even if Cavani and Telles prove excellent additions, we’ll almost certainly still be somewhat short.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

But not with the targets we wanted.

We clearly wanted Sancho and Upamecano.

Did we feck.

The caf wanted him, I wanted him, but the club clearly had little interest in a new CB.

 

[Escobar]

Players wise difficult to say, maybe a 2 or 3. Acting wise, a solid 1. we didnt offload the deadwood either

 

[Bobtu]

If all these signings happened in August, where they all definitely could’ve then I would be content. But how can anyone say this is how a top team should be run.

 

[UpWithRivers]

I think you need to separate the performance of the Recruitment Team from the players signed.

Overall Recruitment Team Performance for this window - 1/10 - Sht show.
Minus points for the fact we just scrambled all signings last minute bar VDB. Which means they were not first choice signings but panic buys/ 3rd/4th choices.
Minus points for getting no first team options.
Minus points for not addressing the areas of the team that needed addressing - RW/CM/DM
Minus points for all our rivals having a much better window than us. Literally every top 7 ish team was better. City and Liverpool were obvious but Everton, Spurs, Chelsea, Arsenal all much better. Even Wolves and Leceister
Minus points for gambling - yet again. Cavani is a gamble. I dont care if you love him or hate him. The fact is that its a gamble.
Minus points for chasing Sancho for 6 months and not only not getting him but dragging it out until the last day. If they wernt going to get him then they should have moved on to other targets 3 weeks ago.
Minus points for not enough sales - We have 3 f the highest paid goalkeepers a load of ambulance chasers on high wages and players running down contracts (Lingard. Pogba) still on our books
Minus points for all the negative media. Romeros wife was having a go in the end!
Minus points for the fact that Liverpool won the league and our response is a Net spend of 35 mill!

Plus points for improving the squad depth
Plus points for getting rid of Sanchez
Plus points for Adama and Pelestri. The recruitment department finally tried to look outside the scope of obvious and try to get exciting young players before they are recruited by Dortmund etc and having to buy them for 100 mill in 3 years

Signings Overall 6/10
VDB - 6/10 Looks a tidy player but I dont see him as first teamer. Also just an obvious signing that was handed to us on a plate by Van Der Sar.
Pelestri (handed to us by Forlan) and Adama - Ones for the future. Look really good. Im excited to see what they can do. Also actual Right wingers!
Telles - 6/10 Great attacking wise. Will give us a lot of options like 5 at the back. I dont see him replacing Shaw at all. From what Ive seen he is weak defensively and with the sht CB's we have that is too much of a gamble.
Cavani - 5/10. Literally 50/50 gamble. It depends what Cavani we are getting. If he is anything near the Cavani of old could end up a 9/10 signing. If hes injured and his legs are gone then could end up a 1/10 singing. No one knows. Not even Ole. I dont believe anyone that says otherwise.

 

[mitchmouse]

I don't see how the new signings (except to a degree DvB) is really going to improve us. Don't see them giving us a very real possibility of top four. It's all very well planning for the future (and having a plan - which I don't believe we have) but the PL is very much a "right now" project. Maybe Cavani will prove me wrong but others have strengthened much more significantly and not been afraid to spend the cash

 

[Langers7274]

Anyone that gives this window a 5 out of 10 must be on Woodward's payroll. The Cavani deal has Falcao written all over this, some will say he'll have the same effect on the club as Ibra, I personally don't think so! Telles, let's wait and see, only 1 international cap. We haven't solved our issues at all, clearly need a CB, clearly need a DM, clearly need a RW, some will point to the two youngsters we've signed but they'll be for the future. Sill have Jones and Rojo on the books, why have we just not come to an agreement with them two to get them off the books like we did with Sanchez? Why is Romero still on the books? Every man and his dog can see that this club has no guidance or direction and is desperate for DoF. That surely must be our next, and most important signing!

 

[SteveW]

Tricky to assess. All of the incomings make sense in their own right. Overall our squad and options are stronger. But we've failed to solve the pressing issues in the short term. In the same way we desperately needed 2 CMs last summer we could have immediately improved team so much with a top class winger and CB. But clearly the Glazers don't want to spend and are happy to build slowly and cheaply.

So it's going to be a continuation of last season. Start with holes in the squad and slowly develop players to fill them. We need a pacey CB. Mengi and Tuanzebe will likely get opportunities to show what they can do in that regard. I'm hugely optimistic about Mengi and can see Axel doing well too if he can get fit.

We need a winger. Pellestri and Traore in January will be developed as the season goes on to potentially fill that gap. If it all goes well we may again look much better by the end of the season than we did at the start. We started last season talking about mid table and even some on about relegation. We ended it with people questioning whether Ole was the right man to take on Liverpool and City. That was a sign of how much progress they had quietly made throughout the season.

But again there's going to be some pain. Maybe quite a lot in the very short term. Tough start, horrible run of fixtures coming up. The excitement is well and truly gone. Ole and the coaches will have accept the abuse and criticism and dig in just like last season and turn it around over the space of a few months. Given the way they haven't been backed properly a realistic expectation is top 4 again but with a much reduced points deficit to the leaders. And hopefully a cup run. Anything better will be exceptional.

 

[downunder red]

2/10 for me. With the strange end and start to the seasons Ole would have appreciated early signings so he could start jelling the new players into the side. Ed just amplified these strange times with his bumbling transfer attempts. Cavani smells of a desperate buy. DVB will be good if Ole has the balls to drop his favorites. Telles I'm just hoping for the best. In these times the football side of the club needed Ed to stand up and produce. He typically fckd up again.

 

[UNITED ACADEMY]

If Ed & Matt knew it's impossible to sign Sancho this year long back during or after the lockdown pandemic or at least August, I'm sure Ole would have an alternative plan what to do in transfer window. Bayern moved on quickly by saying they won't sign Perisic permanently while Real Madrid made it clear to Zidane that they couldn't afford to spend money to sign player this summer, this quick decision from their board made the manager's job easier. They are successful football clubs because they are well organised properly.

 

[Igor Drefljak]

3/10 for me.

Cavani - Screams desperate last day scattergun
VdB - Good signing but in a position we didn't really need
Telles - Again, good signing but in a position that needed looking at but lower down in the list/
2 Young lads that haven't featured much for the sides, so we've got feck all idea. Could turn good but for now, we gain nothing.

Didn't improve at CB, Didn't improve at RW, Needed a CDM more than VdB

We have Romero at the squad now to throw on top of Rojo, Jones, Mata and Lingard in players that are worthless but we're spending probably 500k a week on.

Absolute farce of a window from a side that started with two defeats and lucky to get three points in another.
Watch our side get smashed 6-1 and this is the result a day later

 

[lewwoo]

Awful. Most of our rivals for top four have strengthened their first eleven while we have bought youngsters and back ups. Yet again missing out on the managers targets because not willing to spend what is needed to push on. Sancho will go somewhere else next season and work his magic for a rival while we bounce around top 6. Sick of it. I do think I have finally learnt my lesson not to believe we will ever want to spend what it takes to reach the top while these bastards are in control though. I would drive the Saudis here myself at this point.

 

[Plant0x84]

Distinctly underwhelming . We should have squashed the Sancho talk when it became obvious we couldn’t get him, and switched to other targets - or just paid up and got him. The money was there, we just didn’t want to spend it.

Donny is a good addition, hopefully Telles will be better than Shaw and strengthen our left side but the others we have signed are basically all free hits - no expectations of them at all. In that regard if any of them succeed then it’s a bonus.

 

[Eurotrash]

Had we got these signings in early, I would feel happier about it. Now I get the feeling we were panic buying. I just hope that is not the case. 5/10.

 

[CG1010]

I am displeased because atleast for the next season, we have simply moved sideways (or even regressed seeing how bad we are defensively at the moment).. but as we have got a couple of punts we don't know how this window will play out in the long run. I bet the window where we got Cristiano was rated poorly at that time but we all look at it fondly now!

 

[jackal&hyde]

7/10.

We have to face the reality we did not have 200mil to spend to get Sancho plus the other areas we needed strengthening. 3 players for the here and now and 2 very highly rated youngsters.

 

[11101]

A massive failure that will cost Ole his job.

We went into the summer with huge optimism and needed one statement signing in Sancho and a little strengthening in a couple of other key areas. We knew he was available but we fecked around all summer with it and got nowhere, dragging the club name through the mud in the process and erasing all that early promise. If we couldn't afford him then fine but why the summer long pursuit at the expense of any other target if that was the case?

Once we finally realised Sancho wasn't going to happen we made a deadline day panic buy on a free transfer who has been available all summer, and signed a couple of kids nobody had heard of until a few weeks ago.

We've done nothing that takes us any closer to being a title challenger and there's a huge cloud over the club now. I'd be furious if we hadn't already seen this all before.

 

[pacifictheme]

But not with the targets we wanted.

We clearly wanted Sancho and Upamecano. Add those two and it’s 10/10. Scrambling to bring players in on deadline day doesn’t push it anywhere near a 7 for me

I know, I'm joking a bit. Delerious in a bad way maybe. Did we really sign two no names for rw instead of sancho? 2 nor wpotential Dan James on the books. Christ.

 

[pacifictheme]

Had we got these signings in early, I would feel happier about it. Now I get the feeling we were panic buying. I just hope that is not the case. 5/10.

It appears that we have scouted the two young lads for a while so maybe we decided to buy them once we knew sancho was not coming rather than wait.

 

[Riz]

With 0/10 being signing and selling nobody I’d give this window a 4/10.

+ VDB looks a smart addition and at a reasonable price. We needed cover for Bruno

+ Telles should add a different dimension to our fullbacks and it also means Williams can cover the right side instead of the left.

= Cavani I don’t know, none of us know. I imagine he’ll be better cover than Ighalo and it’s a relatively risk free signing but he was available all summer so it still appears to be a panic signing.

= The 2 kids I don’t know enough to comment on.

- The biggest priority of the window for me was a first choice right winger. It has been for years. We signed no one and wasted the whole window looking incompetent. Again.

- The centre back situation has actually got worse overall with selling Smalling and signing nobody. The start to the season that Maguire and Lindelof have both made has been tragic.

- We only sold Smalling. A player I wasn’t that keen on selling anyway. It’s good to get Sanchez out the door but I’m not classing that as a positive since we’ve paid him to leave. Rest of the dross are either still here or out on loan.

- The general mood around the club has been brought crashing down after the “highs” of finishing 3rd. It looked the perfect opportunity to really flex our finances this summer and kick on. Instead we’ve been outspent by Arsenal, Spurs, Everton and even fecking Villa.

 

[CG1010]

Also if we were rating Woody he will get a solid -2/10 from me:

- Could have got Sancho for 120 million by 10th August (with perhaps some scope of negotiation) but chose to bid 110 million at the 11th hour
- Could have got Adama earlier in the window and got him from now only. Instead we wait for a few months for him to join us
- If we knew that we will not be getting Sancho we could have tried to get Upmaceno earlier before signing of his contract and strengthened in that department
- By doing nothing for most of the window, demotivated the entire squad and mood of the club

As usual the board's indecisiveness and pig headed approach to negotiations have cost us dearly. We have a net spend of barely 70-75 million euros which is well below last few years and we certainly could afford more as we bid 110 million for Sancho just a couple of days ago.. All this money goes to glazers pockets basically.

 

[Raw]

5/10. I honestly don't think it's that bad. The absolute worst thing is neglecting that RW position yet again, along with being unable to get rid of the remaining deadwood clogging up the squad.

Contrary to our awful start, our starting 11 is still very very good. Adding depth was much needed or else we'd have relied on shite like Pereira, Ighalo or Fosu-Mensah again. Cavani has the potential to be Ibra-like in that his experience will be golden for our young attackers. Telles is a starting 11-tier fullback that can actually attack, one we've sorely lacked for so long. Van de Beek is a great midfielder who will add much needed rotation for Fernandes and Pogba, and should get plenty of games. Who knows, he could soon end up being first choice. The young signings I can't really comment on as I've not seen anything from them, but if reports are to be believed we've got a couple of very promising players in the ranks.

As for departures, we finally got rid of Smalling and made a decent amount of money off him. Getting rid of Sanchez was an absolute must. We loaned out Pereira and Dalot who were never getting any games here, and hopefully they'll impress enough to attract some buyers. The domestic window is still open so there's still time to get rid of more. The way we handled Romero is disgusting and I do hope we find him a new club soon. As for Jones, feck me, he's staying forever.

Overall the signings themselves aren't too bad. It's the way we handled it. If we wanted Cavani to start with, we could have got him ages ago so he's obviously a panic signing. The constant negotiating over Telles was tiresome and of course the Sancho saga was pathetic. Pure incompetence by Ed on show to the rest of the footballing world as Dortmund continuously slapped his pathetic offers aside. Then scrambling for Dembele at the last minute before getting swatted aside again. We haven't acted like a big club at all. All the hard work to get top 4 and instead of truly elevating us to title challengers, we come out with a window that we could have done if we hadn't even got top 4. I'm so tired of the Glazers.

 

[Zlatans Knee]

The Sancho chase was a catastrofeck. Everyone knows it.
We have signed two young players who could be come great players but they are a gamble and that would have been fine if we had the sure thing there.
I am quite hopeful about Cavani.
DVdB will be a good player for us but he was not the player that we urgently needed. Would you swap Partey for him? In all likelihood, yes.
Telles will keep Shaw out of the team, so that is good.
So basically we are still sort of screwed in RW, centre of midfield (none of our current 4 options would get in Liverpool, City, Leicester or even Everton starting line-up) and in the centre of defence (none of our current 8 options would get in Liverpool, City, Leicester or even Everton starting line-up).
At least there will be no doubting where we will wasting our time attempting to recruit next summer.

 

[Classical Mechanic]

On the surface it has been terrible. Seemed like chaos on the last day. We'll have to hope that these signings are better than they appear.

 

[diarm]

Have to rate it based on what we needed going in:

World class right winger - 0/10
Top class quick centre back - 0/10
Top class attacking fullback - 7/10
Top class defensive midfielder - 0/10
Attacking and midfield squad depth - 8/10

That's 15/50 or 3/10 for the window as a whole.

 

[scudetto_boy]

Pretty awful. Failed to strengthen any of our three weakest areas, missed out on our number one target because we wasted the whole window trying to call Dortmund's bluff (which of course turned out not to be a bluff) and finally embarrassed ourselves with a last minute desperate scramble on deadline day (the last refuge of the badly run, disorganised club).

Our rivals have strengthened and all the talk in July/August of pushing on and closing the gap on the top two, has given way to the more meagre aspiration of a 4th place finish.

I don't think you could have put it any better to be honest with you. You have covered all key points relating to the weaknesses of the team, how the clubs behaviour has -again- been an embarrassment & the club is a bit of a mess from boardroom down.

Not pretty picture you expressed it perfectly.

 

[lewwoo]

Sure ed dragged on the Sancho rumours and deal so he wouldn't have to spend big on any other first team RW.

 

[scudetto_boy]

Have to rate it based on what we needed going in:

World class right winger - 0/10
Top class quick centre back - 0/10
Top class attacking fullback - 7/10
Top class defensive midfielder - 0/10
Attacking and midfield squad depth - 8/10

That's 15/50 or 3/10 for the window as a whole.

A very effective & appropriate way to gauge yet another eye-sore of a transfer window!

Personally i'd probably give it 12 or 13 out of 15. Oh dear!

 

[Sparky_Hughes]

Delighted with vdb, cant wait for him to displace pogba.
Cautiously optimistic about cavani, hoping hes more ibra than falcao, and could hopefully add a little leadership and mentor the younger lads
Dont really know much about telles but happy at the thought he could displace shaw
Excited about the two young lads

Utterly pissed off that we still have gash like lingard, jones etc still stinking up the squad. The amount of cash we fork out to a total crock, and a useless manchild every week winds me up beyond belief.

Could have been better, could have been worse. Woodward is still a big pile of rancid helmet scrapings who should be fired.

 

[Sultan]

More than Sancho my biggest regret is United not going for Thomas Partey. This is based on what I witnessed watching him at Atletico.

IMO not having a disciplined and composed midfielder is one of United's biggest issue. We are just too open for the counter and the space between the defence and midfield is too easily exploited. This is more of an issue due to Lindelof and Maguire not being blessed with pace and Bissaka having lost his pitch compass. He would have settled the defence and brought balance to the team.

The fun is looking forward to seeing how the two unknown kids just purchased develop over the next few years. This is the most exciting part of being a United fan.

 

[Lynty]

Solid midfield depth.

An experienced striker who is a specialist at holding the ball up and linking with runners.

A clear upgrade at LB.

Thouh we failed to get our RW target, we get 2 good prospects for RW.

If you told me this in June I'd have been happy. What's frustrating is that all of these transfers could have easily been done in the first week of the window, yet we floundered until the final hours.

Our defensive issues can be masked with better organisation.

We quite obviously should have paid the money for Grealish though. Looking even better than last season.

 

[DavelinaJolie]

I voted displeased, mainly because A CB would have been so important and we still have players to ship out. I never really thought we'd get Sancho tbh so I'm not terribly disappointed he wasn't bought. I'm really intrigued by Diallo though, hope he works out when he arrives

 

[Ranchero]

I am convinced that those that said "ecstatic, one of the best in living memory" were believing that answer was pure sarcasm.