17
Mason Mount’s arrival at Manchester United is bound to trigger some adjustments within the crew and in keeping with one footballer-turned-pundit, a giant one is on the way in which.
Gabriel Agbonlahor, talking to Soccer Insider, mentioned that Christian Eriksen’s days within the first crew at the moment are numbered with the arrival of Mount.
He mentioned the Dane “lacks the legs” to play in Erik ten Hag’s system and the “extra cell” Mount will instantly relegate him to the bench.
He had a dim view of Eriksen’s performances final season, saying “he didn’t do very nicely” and “couldn’t get the ball again as a lot”.
Eriksen made 44 appearances in all competitions final season, scoring two targets and notching 10 assists.
He typically performed as one of many two deep holding midfielders alongside Casemiro in a 4-2-3-1. It’s a function that calls for a variety of bodily work and defensive nous, two issues that aren’t his power.
He proved invaluable to United’s buildup play together with his fast vertical passes which broke the opposition’s defensive traces.
Nonetheless, it’s true that he appeared overrun within the larger video games when the opponents pressed relentlessly. The sport appeared to go by him as his legs gave out. It left Casemiro chasing shadows single-handedly whereas Bruno Fernandes was successfully diminished to a box-to-box participant regardless of enjoying as an attacking midfielder.
In mitigation, he suffered a freak harm final season and positively performed greater than anybody may have envisioned as Ten Hag didn’t land his different midfield goal in Frenkie de Jong.
Moreover, United’s outstanding match load final season meant gamers had been run into the bottom. Eriksen performed 3,079 minutes final season regardless of lacking almost two months of motion on account of harm.
Due to this fact, whereas Mount will undeniably show to be an improve over the Dane by way of athleticism, it’s too quickly to say that Eriksen’s significance will wane.
His ball-retention and chance-creation talents are nonetheless elite and if something, Mount’s arrival will assist the supervisor to type Eriksen’s workload higher, inflicting an enchancment in his type.
