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Manchester United chief executive Omar Berrada has insisted the club will no longer recruit players to suit the manager’s system, as has been the case over the past few years.
Erik ten Hag, Ruben Amorim’s predecessor, frequently faced criticism for signing Dutch players or those he had previously coached at Ajax. Sir Jim Ratcliffe recently acknowledged this in an interview, noting Ten Hag’s preference for recruiting talent from his homeland.
Now, there is growing curiosity about whether United will target players this summer who can exclusively slot into Amorim’s 3-4-3 formation.
Berrada has provided clarity, confirming that United have changed their transfer strategy and will only bring in players for the club.
The Red Devils’ chief said [via Manchester Evening News], “I think it’s riskier if you have a coach that doesn’t have a clear idea of how he wants to play. And with Ruben we don’t see that risk.”
“And when it comes to our recruitment strategy, without commenting too much, the idea we have is to be able to bring in versatile players that can be adaptable to multiple systems.”
“And ultimately Ruben himself has said it, it’s not about the 3-4-3 tactical formation, it’s about an idea, a concept of how he wants to see the team playing. He wants to see the team playing more on the front foot, more of a possession, attacking-based style of football.”
“So for that, you need players that can play in multiple positions that can adapt to that vision that Ruben has. And this is what we’re going to try to do over the next years in our recruitment.”
Berrada emphasised the importance of data analytics in helping shape United’s recruitment strategy and making it more efficient.
He also stressed that while winning the Europa League and securing Champions League qualification would provide the club with greater financial flexibility this summer, contingency plans are in place should United fail to reach the continent’s top competition.
“There’s no doubt that if we qualify to the Champions League we will have more revenues and we’ll have more capacity to invest in the team. But we are putting in place various financial measures to allow us to go and invest at the summer, even if we’re outside of Europe.”
“Ultimately, what we want to do is to be more efficient in our investment into the squad. So just because we’ll have more revenues to invest if we’re in the Champions League, it doesn’t mean we’re going to go and over-invest. We need to be cautious and we need to try to make as many good decisions as we can in recruitment.”
“And also when it comes to sales, we will do it purely on the basis of whether it helps improve the team or not, not for financial reasons.”
“On the technical side, we have a coach that has a very clear identity and very clear idea of how he wants the team to play. Then we have Jason Wilcox as a technical director who works extremely closely with Ruben and they’re very aligned on what we need to do in terms of recruitment.”
“Then there are certain areas that need to be improved. Data analytics is one of them. And again, it’s at the top of our list of the areas that we want to invest in to get better at. Because as you all know, to improve, to be really good at recruitment, you need the very good technical people that are complemented by very good data analytics insights.”
United currently sit 14th in the Premier League, and if they fail to win the Europa League, it would mark only the second time in 35 years that they miss out on European football entirely.
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