Owen Hargreaves

Manchester United just concluded their 2016-17 Premier League season and in many ways, it was one of their most forgettable campaigns in recent times as Jose Mourinho could only push the team to a 6th spot finish in the top tier English League.

Finishing in the 6th position of the English Premier League is not good enough for a club to qualify for the UEFA Champions League but Manchester United was able to win the UEFA Europa League of that same season and are automatically qualified for the Champions League of the upcoming season of 2017-18.

Unfortunately for Jose Mourinho, one of his star players sustained an injury which left him unable to perform for the final stages of the season and this was what occurred with Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

This injury forced the Portuguese coach on having to play the final 7 matches of the season without the Swedish attacker.

Wayne Rooney continues to underperform and now there are a number of players that have been linked with a potential move to Old Trafford including: Antoine Griezmann, Alvaro Morata and Paulo Dybala just to name a few.

According to the former Manchester United player and current pundit for BT Sport, Owen Hargreaves has revealed his thoughts on which attackers should Jose Mourinho focus on signing during this approaching summer transfer window as the 36 year old Canadian pundit said:

´´You have to look at what you have and what you desperately need. I think they need a Dybala-type player. Everybody speaks about Griezmann, I think Griezmann would be terrific. But I think Dybala, he’s a little bit younger, he’s going to be a superstar if he isn’t already. He would be magnificent. That star power that Ibra bought, I think Dybala could bring that as well.”

Owen Hargreaves also went on to praise the 19 year old rising star Marcus Rashford as the retiree stated that Rashford has what it takes to become the next big attacker for Manchester United but he still needs more time to fully develop himself as a player.

Former Manchester United midfielder Owen Hargreaves claims that the club lack the ability to win matches whenever Zlatan Ibrahimovic does not feature.

The Swedish striker has been a huge presence for the club this season. He has scored 28 goals in all competitions, and he is expected to be nominated for the PFA Player of the Year award. After having cost United nothing to join from Paris St Germain, he is already looking like transfers of the season – especially in comparison with Paul Pogba, who cost an astronomical £ 90 million. However, the presence of Ibrahimovic has been the only positive factor, as United have not been able to get performances from elsewhere across the pitch.

The likes of Wayne Rooney, Marcus Rashford, and Anthony Martial have been disappointing this season. The lack of goals from these forwards coupled with players like Paul Pogba not contributing much in terms of goals has meant that Manchester United have been over reliant on the 35-year-old striker.

Owing to the lack of contribution from other players, it is looking highly unlikely that the club will be able to secure a top four finish at the end of the campaign. The club are currently four points behind Manchester City, who are in the top four place.

“Besides Ibrahimovic, Pogba, Herrera and Mata were out which is a lot of quality missing. They have got the most draws – if they could have turned those three or four draws into victories, they would genuinely be in the top four or competing for the title. They created tons of chances against West Brom – conversion is an issue for Mourinho when Ibrahimovic is missing,” said Hargreaves, who has the experience of winning Premier League titles. It is widely believed that José Mourinho will make significant changes to the squad in the summer in order to start challenging for the top honours.

Owen Hargreaves credits Antonio Conte for making those players look world-class whose abilities were questioned in the past.

Hargreaves says people were not sure if somebody like Marcos Alonso was up to the standard of the Premier League, if he belonged to this level, but, he is making such a hell of a lot of difference under Conte and has been the reason of several of Chelsea’s wins.

So, it’s actually the credit of the coach that he is taking 100% out of each individual who is at his disposal.
Hargreaves however refuses to declare Chelsea the certain Premiership winners at this stage.

Despite so many wins coming back to back for Chelsea; Hargreaves, who himself played in the Premiership for 5 years, is not convinced just yet that the title is well and truly in their grasp.

The former playmaker reckons the Blues can still lose the race.
As per Hargreaves, Chelsea has had the services of its main players available throughout the season so far and that’s why they are cruising, but, they will actually be tested when they have a couple of injury issues.

Singling out the Hazard-Costa duo, Hargreaves says if any one of those two is taken away from the eleven, the strength of Chelsea will decrease significantly because those two are of a different class and the other players playing at their positions can’t make the same impact that they are making.

Before Hargreaves, Jurgen Klopp had also talked about the same thing some time back and had suggested that Chelsea, which is way ahead in the points’ standings right now, may not have a cake walk in the second half of the season with their players due to get injured at some point of time.

Former Manchester City player Owen Hargreaves believes that despite the fairly slow start of the season that Manchester United has been going through; they still have a realistic opportunity of becoming the new champions of the Premier League.

Out of the 11 league matches that Manchester United has played so far, they have gathered 18 points with 5 triumphs, 3 defeats and 3 draws. This is not an extremely underwhelming start of season but Jose Mourinho and his squad have dropped a significant amount of points against opponents that they were expected to come out on top with a victory.

On October 2 of 2016, Manchester United locked horns with Stoke City in a match that concluded in a draw and 27 days later they had to settle with yet another tie but this time when facing off with Burnley.

Neither Burnley or Stoke City are considered to be title-contenders while Manchester United were one of the clubs that were initially expected to lift the Premier League, especially with the arrival of Jose Mourinho as the Portuguese is a manager with huge ambitions but these recent results have seen Manchester United slowly slipping away from the top spots and they are currently positioned at the 6th spot.

Even though Manchester United has been slipping away and losing a considerable amount of points, Owen Hargreaves believes that Jose Mourinho and his men still have a realistic chance of emerging as the champions but only if the Portuguese coach utilizes his best players as Hargreaves says:

“I think they can win the Premier League if Mourinho plays his best players. The team right now as it is won’t finish in the top four.”

Owen Hargreaves was known as a vigorous and solid defensive midfielder who worked tirelessly to win the ball and maintain possession.

However, his time at Manchester United was laden with injuries and he was allowed to leave the club having completed his contract in June 2011.

Jose Mourinho has tried different formations since his switch from Chelsea to Manchester United, yet the team is yet to stabilize. Owen Hargreaves has thus suggested the use of a different one.

The former Manchester United player suggested Jose Mourinho should play a 4-3-1-2 formation if he is to reignite Manchester United’s season as the former coach, Sir Alex Ferguson did.

The Red Devils suffered their third successive defeat at Watford on Sunday 18th of September followed by three consecutive victories in all competitions before their unlucky 1-1 draw against Stoke City which landed them in the 8th position on the Premier League table.

The Portuguese tactician seemed uncertain over his team’s formation at the beginning of the season. The Old Trafford dwellers appeared to begin the campaign in a 4-3-3 system but that changed to 4-2-3-1 in the consequent matches, amid a growing clamour among supporters for Wayne Rooney to be withdrawn.

Hargreaves, a key player of United’s Premier League and Champions League double-winning side in 2007/08, claims he would retain Wayne Rooney while suggesting this 4-3-1-2 best XI formation, up front in a partnership with the Sweden international, Zlatan Ibrahimovic who joined them at Old Trafford this season.

He said Henrikh Mkhitaryan should be bought to reinforce United’s right wing, and also as a playmaker in front of a midfield three of Michael Carrick, Ander Herrera and Paul Pogba.

“The back four can then include Antonio Valencia, Eric Bailly, Chris Smalling and Luke Shaw in front of David de Gea.” Hargreaves advised.