The Athletic journalist Laurie Whitwell has said it is surprising that Manuel Ugarte has not been involved in two of Manchester United’s big away games lately.
The Uruguayan was chased all summer by the club and after weeks of back and forth negotiations with Paris Saint Germain, they finally got a deal over the line for an initial €50 million.
Ugarte was United’s number one target throughout the summer and they viewed him as the ideal partner for young Kobbie Mainoo in the centre of the park.
Nonetheless a month after his debut, he has struggled to regularly break into the United first team, making five appearances and only three starts.
In fact his last appearance was the 0-3 loss to Tottenham Hotspur and he did not make it off the bench in either away trips to FC Porto or Aston Villa.
Speaking on The Athletic’s Talk of the Devils Podcast, journalist Laurie Whitwell commented, “Manu Ugarte not even coming on is a [] really interesting point. We didn’t talk about that after Porto, and that was an obvious thing we missed out because it is surprising.”
The journalist then queried why he was left out when you consider that the combative midfielder was theoretically brought in for exactly these types of games to provide extra steel and coverage in the centre of the park.
“I mean two difficult away games, they feel like the sort of games they bought Ugarte to play in,” he said.
The host of the show Ian Irving added to this point by stating, “the idea is that he is this tenacity-fuelled midfielder who can break up play and give it to other midfielders who can create and stop counters as well”, so it is peculiar that Ten Hag did not trust him to play a part in either vital match.
Irving suggested that athleticism is “the question with him” and pondered whether he has “that energy to get up and down the pitch” especially against a midfield’s like Villa’s. But then the use of Christian Eriksen makes this a moot point, due to the Dane’s own lack of mobility.
It was reported that Ugarte was not exactly Ten Hag’s first choice as he would have been happy to keep Scott McTominay and bring in Sofyan Amrabat instead of splurging the cash on the Uruguay international last summer.
Nonetheless, Ten Hag’s decision to bench his own regular defensive line of Matthijs de Ligt and Lisandro Martinez for the experienced duo of Jonny Evans and Harry Maguire also raise numerous questions of his own recruitment, and the confidence he currently has in it.
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