Manchester United will be adding to the middle of their side in the summer following comments from the boss.
Sir Alex Ferguson has laughed off suggestions that Manchester United are going to be one of the teams in the hunt to sign Falcao from Atletico Madrid this summer.
When Fergie makes such claims, he rarely does so with some sort of secret motive which means it’s a black and white case over how to judge the way United are going to behave in the summer transfer market.
In short, it’s all going to be about the midfield and fans of the club can expect a couple of key signings in that area but shouldn’t get their hopes up over the other sections of the side.
United have been missing a body in the middle of the team this season, which is the reason Ferguson chose to play Wayne Rooney in a central role for the Premier League match against Stoke over the weekend.
Looking at the players United have been linked with over the last couple of months, the majority of them seem to be central midfield players which also hints at the chance Paul Scholes could retire at the end of the season.
The main players linked with the club are Kevin Strootman of PSV Eindhoven and Benfica’s Nemanja Matic.
Any of those players are going to cost a lot of cash and Fergie has sometimes been a little reluctant to spend big on more than one occasion during a transfer window. He’ll spend on more than one player but we’re talking big fees that get the best players.
All of those players mentioned would aid and improve United as a team and they are all centrally midfield based players.
It’s also come to the boss’ attention that United have to improve in wide areas this summer because of the inconsistency shown by Nani, Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young in wide roles.
Fortunately the club already owns two players in Bebe – an outside shot – and Wilfried Zaha who can come in and do a job out wide for United, as they look for more productivity and efficiency from this area of the team.
That leaves the defence which isn’t exactly cursed in terms of top quality players available with a trio of Phil Jones, Chris Smalling and Jonny Evans all more than capable of playing centrally as Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic require further rests.
In short, if United are not interested in going after Falcao then they can’t be seen as being interested in any other forward because they don’t come much better than the Colombian.
We can draw from that the fact Fergie is probably thinking of keeping his attacking quartet as it is which means the main addition is going to be possibly two central midfield players; one holding player and one creative player to feed the strikers.
Which midfielder will the club go after?
image: © gordonflood.com
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