With the Premier League season drawing towards its close, punters in the Football Transfer Tavern are wondering what on earth they are going to do with themselves over the summer with no World Cup or alternative major summer tournament on the agenda.
Yes; Wimbledon will be coming around but our punters are split on jumping aboard the Andy Murray bandwagon.
At least our resident Manchester United fans are happy however and their beaming smiles stem from the fact that they have all but secured Champions League qualification at the first attempt under new boss Louis van Gaal.
Barring a miracle, Manchester United will finish above arch-rivals Liverpool (yes, this has caused a few scuffles by the bar in recent weeks!) and will return to European football’s top table after an unwanted absence.
With PSV Eindhoven’s Memphis Depay also already in the bag, there is nobody bringing down Manchester United fans at the moment.
Yes; Louis van Gaal needs to address defensive deficiencies and yes, he will have to consider what to do about a problem like Angel but the Red Devils appear to be on the right track again after the David Moyes mess of a season ago.
With a tasty looking match up against Arsenal with Danny Welbeck revenge on the minds of many to come at the weekend, our resident United fans are using the meantime to list their most underrated Red Devils XI of recent times.
Click on down below to see if you agree with them.
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Click on these super cool Red Devils fans to reveal our most underrated Man United XI of recent years.
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Ben Foster
When Manchester United landed bright young thing Ben Foster from Stoke City back in 2005, they may have hoped he would’ve gone on to achieve the exploits of Joe Hart who represents somebody who did indeed take his chance across town at Manchester City following a similar path to Foster, arriving from the Football League.
In an eventual five-year spell at Old Trafford, Ben Foster simply made up the numbers, appearing 12 times in the Premier League under Sir Alex Ferguson and finding himself sent out on loan to Watford – twice.
That said, fast forward to 2015 and Ben Foster is revered by many as one of the most underrated Premier League number one’s in the country, doing himself justice at West Bromwich Albion.
Before Victor Valdes signed in January, United boasted Anders Lindegaard and Ben Amos as David De Gea’s immediate back up and probably would’ve welcomed Foster back, such has been his development in recent years.
Still an England international, Foster needed more time to succeed at Old Trafford but then again, he had to compete with Edwin van der Sar – no mean feat.
Phil Neville
Right back; lets just for a moment think that Gary Neville never existed and Phil was an only child – gutting I know because Gary surely has to be one of the most likeable chaps in the game now following his hated playing days!
But when you think of the Neville’s, Phil was always thought of as more of a utility man whereas Gary often stole the plaudits as one of the Premier League’s best right backs – rightly so. The same could probably be said about their punditry!
Nevertheless, Phil Neville was still a veteran of 263 appearances for United, proving his worth as a versatile member of the squad being deployed at full back, centre half and in midfield to boot.
Going on to register 242 appearances along the East Lanc Road at Everton, Phil Neville is probably one of the Premier League’s most underrated pros, let alone United’s.
Mikael Silvestre
The problem with Mikael Silvestre is that most people remember his time in England for that terrible end of career spell at Arsenal where aside from a goal against Tottenham Hotspur, he looked a doomed transfer from the beginning.
With a section of Gunners fans questioning whether Arsene Wenger had lost it after signing Silvestre from United in a strange move, Silvestre only went on to appear 26 times for the North London side in the league.
This was in stark contrast to his spell at Old Trafford however where he made a remarkable 249 appearances. Yes, he wasn’t Gary Pallister, Nemanja Vidic or Rio Ferdinand but Silvestre proved a consistent, able first team star when called upon.
Gerard Pique
Surely one of the mother of all mistakes on the part of Sir Alex Ferguson.
Pique’s boyhood club Barcelona triggered a £5 million release clause in the young Spaniard’s contract back in 2008 and well, the rest is history.
Having gone on to win well, everything in both the domestic and international game with both Barcelona and Spain, not to mention bagging Shakira, Pique only made 12 Premier League appearances for United’s first team.
We wonder if he still remembers the night he appeared from the bench to replace John O’Shea in a League Cup fixture at Gresty Road, Crewe back in 2004!
Gabriel Heinze
Remember him? A tough and uncompromising defender capable of playing at centre half or left back, Gabriel Heinze is now retired but managed to accumulate 52 Premier League appearances for United between 2004 and 2007.
Part of a United side that won the league title in 2006/07 and the League Cup in 2005/06, Heinze could be considered a pretty decent signing.
After all, he was only signed for a measly £6.9 million, small fry compared to the £16 million forked out on fellow Argentine Marcos Rojo last summer. How fees in the game have moved on!
Park Ji-Sung
One of the most successful South Korean exports and probably the best, Park Ji-Sung was always deployed from the start in those crunch top four battles under the careful guidance of Sir Alex Ferguson wasn’t he?
Now retired after a forgettable spell at QPR, Park rarely let the United cause down, whether he was deployed as a central midfielder or on the flanks.
Appearing 134 times in the league for the Red Devils, Arsenal fans will claim he was always a thorn in their side whenever the two great English rivals locked horns.
Paul Pogba
If Sir Alex Ferguson got it badly wrong with Pique, he got it horrendously wrong with the decision to allow Paul Pogba to flee Old Trafford for Juventus.
Now rightly considered a truly world class midfielder who is currently commanding reported fees up to and sometimes exceeding £60 million as reported by the press, United fans would love to have the rangy Frenchman back in their squad to partner Daley Blind.
In truth, the United fans didn’t get to see much of Pogba at all with the now French international having only appeared just three times in the league under Sir Alex but fast forward and Pogba is an assured box-to-box midfielder in the Patrick Vieira mould. He doesn’t half have a great shot on him to boot!
Michael Carrick
The only current member of the Manchester United squad in our underrated eleven, are there many more footballers more underrated than Michael Carrick?
On Monday Night Football a few weeks ago, Gary Neville spoke about the Red Devils’ lack of penetrating through balls when Carrick is unavailable and United are certainly a worse team when unable to deploy the former West Ham United graduate.
Carrick brings a calming assurance to United’s build up play and the fact he has only registered 33 senior international caps for England since 2001 shows that well, he’s been underrated.
He has only just found his way back into Roy Hodgson’s England fold but I suppose Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard had something to do with his many absences.
Robbie Brady
Blink and you would’ve missed Robbie Brady’s spell at Manchester United; after all he only made one first team appearance for United back in 2012 as a substitute in a League Cup tie against Newcastle United.
Despite never making the grade at Old Trafford, the now Republic of Ireland international has gone on to cut his teeth in the Premier League quite admirably and boasts wicked ability from a dead ball situation.
Currently trying his best to keep Hull City in the Premier League, Brady’s dead ball prowess was showcased in abundance against Burnley last weekend whereby he hit the beans on toast not once, but twice in a crushing 1-0 loss to the Clarets.
We’re not saying Brady would’ve been the next Ronaldo but he may have been maintained as a utility player for a few years; he can’t have been worse than Bebe surely?
Louis Saha
Louis Saha makes our underrated XI simply due to the fact of the sheer quality of the striking company that has graced Old Trafford down the years.
Andy Cole, Dwight Yorke, Teddy Sheringham, Ruud van Nistelrooy and Wayne Rooney have all enjoyed more successful Old Trafford spells than Saha but that’s not to say for one minute that the Frenchman’s was a waste of time.
Scoring 28 times in 86 league appearances for the Red Devils, Saha’s prowess in front of goal was good, not great and in truth, his story is a case of what might have been with the former Fulham man’s career as a whole being blighted by injuries on many an occasion.
Despite these troubles, he was never as bad as the likes of Diego Forlan however!
Giuseppe Rossi
Perhaps not on the same scale as Pique and Pogba but another bright young thing in United’s academy in recent years was American-born Italian star Giuseppe Rossi who burst onto the scene at Old Trafford back in 2004.
Making his Red Devils debut in a League Cup tie against Crystal Palace back in 2004, Rossi only went on to appear for United five times in the Premier League but its what he’s done following his Manchester United spell that has made people sit up and take note.
Currently having lost his way through a lack of form and injury at Fiorentina, it was the immediate years after Rossi’s Old Trafford departure in which he took his goalscoring form to new heights, smashing in 54 goals in 136 appearances for La Liga outfit Villarreal.
It remains to be seen whether Rossi will scale such heights again with the Italian international currently enduring a long spell on the sidelines.
