Jose Mourinho looks set to strengthen up the spine of his team.

The deal to bring in midfielder Fred is all but done and now the Manchester United boss should be going all out for a new centre-back that can solidify his backline.

A move for Tottenham Hotspur’s Belgian international defender Toby Alderweireld looks to be costly and seems to have hit a bit of deadlock as the two sides disagree over the transfer fee.

If Jose decides to look at potential alternatives then the Portuguese boss should check out his old club Inter Milan and their centre-back Milan Skriniar.

Skriniar is a tough tackling, strong defender and United have been missing that kind of player at the back since former club captain Namanja Vidic quit the club in 2014.

Milan is a player that wants to win the ball back for his team and get it away from his own penalty area. It should also be noted that he had a fantastic 91% passing success rate in Serie A last term.

He has a no nonsense approach and that would suit Man United at this time.

Another plus would be his concentration levels. Both Chris Smalling and Phil Jones have been plagued by injuries and defensive slip-ups, Skriniar doesn’t seem to have those issues to worry about.

For Inter last season, the Slovakian managed on average 2.9 tackles, 4.5 clearances and around one interception in his debut season at the San Siro (which consisted of thirty-eight league outings).

The fact he managed to play in every league game is another thing that would interest Mourinho. All of his centre-halves had injury problems last season. So he’ll be crying out for a consistent member of his team to have in his backline for the majority of the fixtures in their next campaign.

Having moved from Slovak Superliga to Sampdoria and then to Inter, Milan has shown that he’s ambitious and meets every challenge head on.

The only issue would be persuading the twenty-three year old to leave Italy’s fashion capital. He has helped  Nerazzurri to a Champions League spot for next year and has stated his intention in staying:

“I don’t worry about transfer rumours,” 

“The objective was to reach the Champions League with Inter. I’m happy in Milan, I’ve never played for a move away from Italy, we’ve never discussed my future.”

That shouldn’t stop Jose Mourinho and Manchester United from at least tempting both Inter Milan and the young defender to at least discuss a possible deal. As they say, money talks and not many teams can compete with Man Utd’s financial strength.

United fans would be extremely excited if Eric Bailly can get back in the Red Devils first eleven and be partnered by Milan Skriniar as they could become the next Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand!

Posted on June 8th, 2018 by scott
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