Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has a difficult task at hand to rebuild Manchester United, and one of the key areas that they need to strengthen ahead of the 2019-20 season is the centre-back position.
The Red Devils have lacked a quality defender to lead them to glory for quite a while now, as they haven’t replaced former defensive stalwarts Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic.
Two centre-backs have been linked with a move to Manchester United over the last couple of years – Leicester City’s Harry Maguire and Napoli’s Kalidou Koulibaly, with fans demanding the signature of at least one of the two.
Former Liverpool defender and current ESPN pundit Steve Nicol believes that Manchester United need to sign both Maguire and Koulibaly this season as he believes that none of the current centre-backs at Manchester United are good enough.
Nicol said that Chris Smalling, Phil Jones, Marcos Rojo, Eric Bailly, and even Victor Lindelof – who was one of United’s best defenders last year, would not get “in a proper team”.
Maguire has been linked heavily with Manchester United over the last few weeks, with reports suggesting that Solskjaer’s side could put in a bid of £80 million.
Manchester United need to sign Koulibaly or Maguire
Manchester United need a leader at the back, which they have sorely missed since the days of Ferdinand and Vidic. The Red Devils’ current crop of centre-backs came into the club with a lot of promise as all five of them were signed with the hope of them becoming the best in the Premier League, but it hasn’t turned out that way.
The English club are keen on signing Maguire, despite many fans and pundits suggesting that the transfer fee spoken about is way more than what he is actually worth.
The rumours linking Koulibaly to United have died down over the last few weeks, after being linked for around a year with United.
The club need to sign one of the two and not both as the transfer fees would be close to £200 million for both of them combined, which doesn’t quite make sense when United already have five centre-backs in their squad.
The fees for both are also massive for players who are 26 and 28 years of age, and possibly have 5 or fewer years at the top of the game.
Lindelof has shown that he can be a good centre-back, and Solskjaer should pair him with one of Koulibaly or Maguire, which would be a strong defensive partnership.
