Manchester United – Jadon Sancho with teething problems: “This is not FIFA”

The transfer of Jadon Sancho from BVB to Manchester United dragged on for over a year. He was actually supposed to be the king’s transfer, but now the Englishman is struggling with starting difficulties. However, several reasons play a role here.

“This is home. This is where he belongs”. With a pompous video Manchester United announced the signing of Jadon Sancho at the end of July. A great production. Worthy of a royal transfer.

The EUR 85 million commitment had dragged on long enough. Now, after leaving city rivals Manchester City in 2017 due to a lack of prospects for Dortmund, Sancho has returned to the industrial city in the north-west of England. It was the most expensive transfer of the summer until then.

The cheers of the fans were great, Sancho even quickly became part of a fan song and his new coach Ole Gunnar Solskjaer raised high expectations: “Old Trafford will offer him the platform to unleash his untapped talent and play at the highest level”. Two months later, the euphoria in the club itself is still there, but it does not go back to the name Sancho, but to Cristiano Ronaldo.

The Portuguese is of course the actual king transfer of the Red Devils. Because CR7 is CR7. But because, unlike Ronaldo, Sancho did not shine with goals on the debut either. And not later either. Not a single scorer point has been recorded in six appearances, mostly as a substitute. The Ronaldo shadow is big, but the starting difficulties are complex in nature.

Manchester United: Jadon Sancho has to get used to the Premier League

Already at the start of the season, before United had even dreamed of a return from CR7, Sancho had to get in line. The bank place resulted from a practically non-existent preparation at his new club. The 21-year-old started training on August 9th, and the new season started on August 14th. Before that, he had stormed to the final of the European Championship with England and had accordingly been given a longer vacation.

This was also suboptimal for the offensive man. In the first group game he was deleted from the squad, only in the quarter-finals against Ukraine he was allowed to play from the start. On top of that, he was substituted on for the penalty shoot-out in the final against Italy and gave away from the point.

Just five days after the start of training and over a month after the European Championship final, he made his 15-minute debut in a 5-1 victory over Leeds United in the Premier League. “He still lacks a bit of fitness,” stated Solskjaer afterwards. Two weeks was enough for the starting XI for the first time, but he was still a little strange.

He too has to get used to the toughness and style of play in the Premier League. So far he has had an underground duel rate of 21 percent. “He’s 21 years old, he’s learning how we train, he’s learning how we play, he’s getting to know the Premier League, but he’s hungry and wants to study,” said Solskjaer.

The positioning of Sancho in particular plays an important role. Although he was nominally also positioned as a left attacking midfielder at BVB, he enjoyed a lot of freedom and always moved to the center. Under Solskjaer, on the other hand, he should above all hold the position, spread the game and act with the offensive Luke Shaw, who usually runs behind.

Manchester United: Roy Keane defends Jadon Sancho

The vote is still missing here, and Sancho’s move to the gate is not (yet) effective. This is reflected in his previous statistics. He only fired two shots in 200 Premier League minutes, one of which was blocked. Only a few 1: 1 situations that otherwise distinguish him have been successful so far.

Former ManUnited player Paul Ince sounds the alarm: “I understand that he has to learn. But that’s not FIFA. It’s not just about dribbling and dropping two, three, four or five players. […] Just play real football, “said the 53-year-old The United Stand.

And yet the principle of patience applies to the only small number of minutes used. After all, there are parallels to the previous season. In the Bundesliga he only had four assists by Christmas, before BVB coach Edin Terzic made “small adjustments” and Sancho exploded. In the end he had collected 36 scorer points across all competitions.

“I won’t change my game. I just have to show the fans what I can do for the team, as I did in Germany,” said Sancho confidently in an interview with UMM on YouTube. At BVB, he also had teething problems in the first year. At that time he only came to the train in the second half of the season. In the end, there were one goal and four assists in twelve Bundesliga appearances.

So patience is required. The notoriously critical press on the island seems to have given him this so far. “He’s only been with the club for two months. There have been a lot of changes, new players have come into the club – leave the boy alone,” said United legend Roy Keane Sky Sports to the side. “He’s coming to a new club in which he is certainly not the star and in which he is at the bottom of the ranking,” explained the current TV expert.

Jadon Sancho: Performance data of his career

Manchester United: Tremendous competition for Jadon Sancho

With this, Keane addresses another important point in the assessment of Sancho’s first months in the Red Devils jersey: the enormous competition. With Bruno Fernandes, Marcus Rashford, Mason Greenwood, Anthony Martial, Jesse Lingard, Juan Mata and Sancho himself, Solskjaer has a total of seven players for the offensive row of three in the preferred 4-2-3-1 system.

In addition, the actual central midfielder, Paul Pogba, acted several times on the left wing at the start of the season. At least the Norwegian coach sees Ronaldo as a center forward, which means that at least CR7 is not a competitor for playing time.

In any case, Sancho does not give the impression that the concentrated quality around him disturbs him, as he has a good relationship with Rashford and Greenwood, his teammates from the English national team. “It’ll be crazy when all three of us are on the field,” announced Sancho. Anyway, despite the ambitious goals with the top-class reinforcements this year, Manchester United is also going into the future.

“We knew his talent and we hired him with the thought that we would have a top offensive player here for the next ten or twelve years,” said Solskjaer only last weekend. If the club has this patience with the Englishman, in a few years the fans might be able to speak of Sancho as the king transfer in the past transition period and say: “This is where he belongs”.

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