Time for your daily David de Gea update. It’s a a never ending soap opera like Arturo Vidal was last summer. Will he stay at Manchester United, or move to Real Madrid? As Sideshow Mel from The Simpsons famously said “this endeavor, is the height of tedium!”
Nothing is official yet of course, but here’s the latest headlines on the situation.
For most of the summer, the narrative went that David de Gea would not act like Raheem Sterling did at Liverpool. The United goalkeeper would be professional about his situation. Like Sterling, it was clear that he wanted to leave his current club, but he wouldn’t go that route- the refusing to play for current team routine (as Sterling did).
And all the way up until the Premier League season began De Gea had indeed been that professional.
Today however, claims from United Manager Louis van Gaal indicate that De Gea has gone full Sterling on the Red Devils. Sure, we haven’t heard the De Gea side of the story yet, but why would Van Gaal publicly air such grievances? What’s the upside to him saying things such as these:
“We talked with him [De Gea] and he fully agreed with our decision,” Van Gaal said. “I have one assistant coach and another assistant coach so we speak about that kind of thing together. We have a goalkeeping coach, Frans Hoek, and I’m not doing everything alone.
“Frans Hoek … he has a meeting with David de Gea and he asked him: ‘Do you want to play?’” Asked what the response was, Van Gaal said: “‘No.’ Then I have to take the decision. It is a process. We had been observing him in preparation, he was not so good, he was not the same David de Gea as before. He was my best player last season. According to the fans, he was the best of the last two years.”
Van Gaal’s revelations came after a press conference when he had been asked about De Gea’s position and made it clear there was no change – “he remains out of the squad” – before saying it would be better to discuss it in a “more intimate setting later”. At the end of his conference, he took a seat beside the journalist who had asked him whether De Gea actually wanted to play and, clarifying that he was still talking on-the-record, proceeded to say it was the goalkeeper’s wish to be left out of the squad.
Paul M. Banks owns, operates and writes The Sports Bank.net, which is part of the FOX Sports Engage Network. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes to the Chicago Tribune RedEye edition. He also appears regularly on numerous talk radio stations all across the country. Catch him Tuesdays on KOZN 1620 The Zone.
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