Getting a much needed win at Everton on the weekend, Manchester United climbed up to 14th in the table at the international break. While that is a dreadful spot for a club like this to be, they do have a game in hand on three others sides (although that still doesn’t make it too much better).
Up next is a home league clash against West Bromwich Albion a week from Saturday. So with the time off, let’s take a look at what the talk is in the United online world today. The Tuesday edition covers two Mino Raiola clients, Paul Pogba and Jesse Lingard.
France National Team Manager Didier Deschamps has said he’ll have a talk with Pogba about his current situation at Old Trafford, and his club future. Pogba has been pretty much a super sub only this season for United, as he’s started just two of the six contests since the October internationals concluded.
The most expensive player in British history really should be getting more run than that right now!
“I know him well and he knows the group well,” Deschamps said, via France Football. “He is in a situation with his club where he cannot be happy, neither with his playing time, nor with his positioning.”
“He is not in his best period, he has had a series of injuries and the Covid-19 which has hit him quite hard. He needs to find his rhythm.”
“He will tell me about his feelings and as I know him very well, it will go in a positive direction. Even if it is also up to him to make all his efforts.”
Pogba, who has fallen well short of expectations in his second stint at Old Trafford, recently saw the club option picked up on his current deal.
He’ll be a free agent at the end of next season.
Elsewhere, sticking with the theme of Raiola clients who are overpaid and underproducing, Jesse Lingard will reportedly move on from his current agent.
According to an ESPN FC report, Lingard will just be represented by family, friends and other people in his innermost of circles.
It was thought that Lingard would move on this summer transfer window, but it didn’t happen. While his high wages certainly turns off a lot of potential suitors, there is still a market for the young English winger, who has missed the last seven games with a hip issue.
He has not featured since a League Cup clash in September.
United have a club option to extend his current deal by an additional year, which would keep him under contract until the summer of 2022, but the ESPN article says they have not yet triggered it.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank, partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” has regularly appeared in WGN, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Tribune and SB Nation. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.