Former Manchester United manager David Moyes has said Ole Gunnar Solskjaer is getting the club back to winning ways by following the club’s “values of old” in the transfer market – but predicts a tricky season ahead for the current Old Trafford boss.
Speaking to The Daily Mirror, Moyes seemed to imply that a scattergun approach to transfers – which the report totals at £620m before Solskjaer’s arrival – has attributed to United’s downfall since the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson in 2013.
However, Moyes – manager for just 10 months during the 2013/14 season – believes that the recent transfer activity at Old Trafford has the side on the right track.
He said: “I think it will be another tough season for Ole, but he is trying to do everything to get it right. I hope he is successful. But there are massive expectations.”
Moyes thinks United’s acquisitions of Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Daniel James – both 21 years of age – is a sign of the club returning to a transfer policy that has previously delivered results, and has urged the club to continue in that vein.
He continued: “They have now chosen to sign some young players, and when you look back, they signed Wayne Rooney from us at Everton aged 18. Cristiano Ronaldo was also 18 when he joined, so over the years they have had a policy of signing young players and many of them have been the best up-and-coming future stars.
“I think Man United just need to follow their values of old.”
While Moyes may not have had the benefit of time to prove otherwise, his two transfer windows as United boss were hardly an indication that buying young talent was a personal ethos of his own – with the two permanent signings during his reign (Marouane Fellaini and Juan Mata) both 25 years old when they joined the club.
And both successors Louis van Gaal and Jose Mourinho – who each had a minimum of two full seasons at the helm – had their fair share of youngsters join under their respective stewardships, including Anthony Martial and Diogo Dalot, who were both teenagers when becoming United players.
So the signings of youngsters alone won’t do for United if their recent seasons are anything to go by – and the comments of Moyes may just be a sign of the hindsight the Scotsman has, having seen his successors fail at the job in which he barely had time to settle.
