Looking at the current MU squad, we can see that Carrington’s imprint is not much. This is far different from what coach Erik ten Hag announced when he took office. Did the Dutch teacher go back on his word?
In the MU first team, only two academy players promoted by Ten Hag have a fairly certain place: Alejandro Garnacho and Kobbie Mainoo. Meanwhile, the number of young talents that MU has pushed away in the past 2 years is very large.
Most recently, both Hannibal Mejbri and Alvaro Fernandez moved to Sevilla and Benfica respectively on loan with a buyout clause. Before that, James Garner, Anthony Elanga, Zidane Iqbal and Charlie Savage were all sold to rivals.
Looking at the way Elanga celebrated after defeating MU with his Nottingham teammates on the last day of 2023, you can see how determined and satisfied the Swedish winger is. After the match, Elanga did not hesitate to admit: “Last season was not easy for me, I could only enter the field for 5-10 minutes and then hardly played all 10 matches continuously, forcing me to choose to leave MU. This match was personal for me, proving I can play at the highest level.”
This season, Elanga has 4 goals and 6 assists in 20 Premier League matches. Elanga’s effectiveness is much better than Antony – a player considered Ten Hag’s “favorite” since his time at Ajax but played extremely miserably this season. At this point, people immediately repeated what Ten Hag said when he took office at MU. He affirmed that he will revive the core values of the team, including the use of “homegrown” players. Now Ten Hag seems to have turned its back on that?
Such a conclusion is a bit hasty! If you look closely, you can see that Ten Hag is very willing to give opportunities to young players. Especially in pre-season. Hannibal is a typical example of not taking advantage of opportunities to win Ten Hag’s trust. He has 5 matches in the Premier League this season, and an additional 61 minutes in the Champions League. But as everyone can see, the ruffled midfielder’s abilities are quite limited and cannot play at the highest level.
MU let Hannibal go to Sevilla on loan with the option to buy outright. But even after officially becoming a member of Sevilla, Hannibal can still return to MU because the contract includes a buyback clause. That means MU still has some faith that Hannibal can grow up in the future.
In fact, with the pressure of winning and winning titles always weighing heavily, coaches of every big team have to consider a lot when using self-trained young players. With its potential, MU can absolutely buy quality stars to use immediately, instead of waiting patiently for a certain “seed” to grow.
But it must be said again and again, if Mason Greenwood was not involved in a scandal in his private life, he could combine with Rashford and Garnacho to form a “devil-blooded” attack. With Mainoo and Jonny Evans below, Ten Hag can use up to 5 “homegrown” products in an 11-man squad at the same time. This is a very large “localization” rate for a big team.
Finally, one must sympathize with Ten Hag. The MU boat is rocking violently this season. Boat drivers like Ten Hag are sometimes confused because they have too many things to worry about and cannot devote themselves to taking care of the young players. If MU’s situation stabilizes again, there is belief that Ten Hag will dig deeper and exploit Carrington even more.
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