The Manchester United captain seems incapable of catching a break with last season’s lamentable form having carried over into the new campaign and big decisions over his role are now being made two games into the season.<\/p>\n
It looks like United\u2019s new gaffer Erik ten Hag and his predecessor Ralf Rangnick could be on the same page insofar as\u00a0book dropping club captain Harry Maguire. The former Leicester City stalwart has clearly endured a torrid time for the main tenure of his Red Devils career, with constant question marks arising over his ability at the highest level often answered with bewildering, error-prone displays come to a head at the tail-end of last season, so much so that things came to a head and Rangnick made the decision to take Maguire out of the firing line for a few games.<\/p>\n
It is now widely believed that Ten Hag is considering opting for the same course of action when Liverpool visit Old Trafford on Monday evening. Maguire has been a starter in both of United’s games so far this term, with both resulting in humiliating defeats.<\/p>\n
Saturday night’s shameful 4-0 debacle at Brentford ensured United sat bottom of the Premier League table for the first time since August 1992, while Ten Hag became the first Red Devils manager in 100 years to lose his first two games at the helm.<\/p>\n
Maguire was partnered alongside Ten Hag’s most expensive recruit to date \u2013 \u00a355million Lisandro Martinez \u2013 in both outings. Despite the Argentine having faced question marks over his ability to keep up with the physical side of the Premier League, it seems unlikely that he’ll come out of the team given he is a Ten Hag recruit. Yet something needs to change and it looks as if the manager feels like that ‘something’ is the club captain.<\/p>\n
The Manchester Evening News\u00a0report that Ten Hag is keen on the idea of partnering new boy Martinez with former Real Madrid star Raphael Varane to deal with the attacking threat posed by Jurgen Klopp’s side.<\/p>\n
“Maguire we heard but you see, if you perform, it slows down,\u201d Ten Hag explained.<\/p>\n
“I think he, the team, impressed by the way we played. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s the [thing] to find out if I understand it. “It\u2019s about how we can change it. So it\u2019s the team and Harry himself performing. That is what we\u2019re working on; that is the only focus.”<\/p>\n
Unfortunately for the England and United defender, he seems to be doing very little to slow the jeering so far this season.<\/p>\n
Ten Hag defied a lot of critics and stuck to Maguire when he insisted the latter would remain club captain, but dropping himself before the end of August is surely going to undermine the defender’s dressing room auhtority.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"