Ralf Rangnick: Manchester United refused to sign forwards like Luis Diaz in January
Ralf Rangnick has revealed that Manchester United had refused to sign forwards like Luis Diaz in the January transfer window. That decision seems to have affected their sporting prospects as they look set to miss out on next season’s UEFA Champions League.
Man United had facilitated a loan move for Anthony Martial that saw him join Sevilla for the rest of this season back in January. Meanwhile, Mason Greenwood was suspended by the club indefinitely around that time. While Anthony Elanga was brought into the mix, Edinson Cavani’s fitness concerns did leave them light-handed in the forward areas.
Speaking in the pre-match presser ahead of the Brighton clash (h/t Sky Sports), Rangnick has confirmed that the Red Devils board did not allow him to sign a forward in the winter transfer window. He added that players like Liverpool’s Diaz, Manchester City-bound Julian Alvarez and Dusan Vlahovic of Juventus were available for them at that time.
“The answer at the time was no there was no player on the market that could really help us – there were a few, Diaz who is now at Liverpool, Alvarez who will be at Manchester City in the summer, Vlahovic who at the time still was with Fiorentina those are just three of them that come across my mind now.”
Another transfer mistake?
“We had four days off at the time and on the Sunday I was informed about the issues with Mason Greenwood and obviously Anthony Martial had already left and then I was aware that within four days we had some strikers missing and it might make sense, we were still in three competitions – Champions League, FA Cup and fourth in the league but that’s the past and it doesn’t help us anymore.”
It is understandable to an extent why the Manchester club’s management did not want to bring in an attacker in January. After all, Rangnick is only an interim coach, and we did not have a permanent manager ready to take over the reins from the next campaign onwards.
Then again, the hierarchy should have realised the risks involved and discussed the matter with all the managerial targets who were on the shortlist at that time. While the task would not have been easy, desperate times require desperate measures.
“I spoke to the board and said shouldn’t we at least speak and try and analyse if we could get a player either on loan or as a permanent deal but in the end the answer was no.”
Even our other options, like Marcus Rashford, were underperforming at that time, which greatly increased the need to bring in an attacking reinforcement. Unfortunately, that was not the case, and we have experienced several times how the attack has failed to deliver us the good from that point onwards.
Perhaps, the board could have at least tried to address the issue rather than firmly denying to even discuss the matter. That is very baffling indeed, as we could have searched the market to see whether there were some loan options that could have helped us in such situations.
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That being said, it is good to see that the management has finally agreed with Rangnick, as Samuel Luckhurst, the club’s correspondent for Manchester Evening News on Twitter, has revealed that Man United have fired Marcel Bout and Jim Lawlor from the scouting department for conveying that there were no options available in January.
Let’s hope that there would be a massive clear-out of lethargic personnel at Old Trafford, as having such individuals would not help us in our rebuild. Whether there would be more actions or not remains to be seen.
