Sir Alex would rather let one player rot on the bench than sell him.

by ka888g68u on 2009-12-03 23:42:25

Sir Alex would rather let one person rot on the bench than sell him; Manchester United's £20 million investment has gone down the drain. December 2, 2009, 10:57

The starting midfield for the 0-1 home loss against Beşiktaş was exactly the same as this match, with Sir Alex fielding Park Ji-sung and Obertan on the left and right wings respectively. However, in the match against Beşiktaş, Sir Alex could still leave Nani on the bench, but in the League Cup quarter-final against Tottenham Hotspur, he even excluded the physically fit Nani from the 18-man squad.

Since the early November Champions League home game that ended in a 3-3 draw against CSKA Moscow, Nani has not played a single second for Manchester United in nearly a month. To date, Nani has not appeared in any of Manchester United’s last five games, which is clearly abnormal.

In this match, Sir Alex included Tadić, who had recently scored twice in the reserve team league and completed a stoppage-time winner, in the substitute list, giving the Serbian player an opportunity to play before the end of the game.

At the 82nd minute, Sir Alex substituted Anderson, who performed excellently in this match, with Tadić. At the 87th minute, Tadić passed the ball to the center immediately after receiving it on the wing and handed it over to his teammate in the middle. At the 88th minute, Tadić made a through pass, allowing Welbeck to break into the penalty area, where his cross was blocked out of bounds by the opponent's defender. At the 89th minute, Tadić even got the chance to take a corner kick, though his delivery was headed clear by the opposition.

Valencia, Giggs, Park Ji-sung, Obertan, Nani, and Tadić are the current flying wing options for Manchester United. Before this game, Nani, worth £17 million, ranked fifth in terms of playing order among the flying wings, and in this match, his order dropped to sixth. Nani's current contract with Manchester United expires in June 2012. Last month, the "People" reported that the Red Devils had prepared a new four-year contract worth £10 million for Nani. Nani's current weekly salary is £26,000, and if successfully renewed, the Portuguese player's weekly salary will reach £50,000, although even so, such a weekly salary at Manchester United can only be considered low-income.

But now it seems that Nani will almost certainly not fulfill his existing contract with Manchester United, and it is unlikely that Manchester United will offer Nani a £10 million big contract. Because he failed to seize the limited opportunities to prove himself and publicly criticized Ferguson in the media, Sir Alex is almost certain to clean up Nani, but the timing is likely not January, but next summer.

Serie A clubs Fiorentina and AC Milan were previously interested in Nani, but Sir Alex insisted that Nani was non-transferable. “Some big clubs have been mentioned by the media wanting to buy Nani, like AC Milan and Benfica, but there has been no contact so far. We will not sell him, and if someone comes in January to buy him, we will say that Nani is not going anywhere.”

Perhaps in Ferguson's view, winter is not the best time to clean up Nani because it would be difficult to get a good price. It appears that Nani has not only been forgotten by Sir Alex but also deliberately sidelined. Whether in the Premier League or the Champions League, the Portuguese player is not given any opportunities, and even in the League Cup, which is often seen as a secondary competition, Nani is not given any chance to play. Sir Alex would rather trust young players from the reserve team and willingly exclude Nani from the 18-man squad, having lost all patience with Nani. £17 million transfer fee + two years and five months of combined £3.3 million salary = £20.3 million! The more than £20 million that Manchester United spent on Nani has completely gone down the drain without making a sound.

Nani's outcome at Manchester United may very well be just one thing: spending the second half of the season rotting on the bench, then being sold by Sir Alex next summer to recoup some losses due to recruitment failures (of course, the premise is that he performs well on the World Cup stage). After all, even if Nani is sold after the World Cup, it is almost certain that the 23-year-old Nani will still be a hot commodity in the transfer market.