The misunderstood prodigy: Did Manchester United know what they were getting with Jadon Sancho

Does he fit the team’s philosophy? He’s from London so he probably supports United. Does his skillset bode well with the players we have on the right-hand side? Did you not see him nutmeg Marco Verratti? Will the wages we have to sign him on disturb squad harmony? I’m pretty sure we could get a juicy sponsorship from this NFT malarkey.

These were the all-important questions the Manchester United hierarchy needed to ask themselves in the summer of 2021, and these are the responses I speculate to have met those questions. It’s no secret that the board and its parts possess a considerable amount of ineptitude, but you would expect a club so preoccupied with the monetary aspect of football - would leave the decision to sign a £100 million asset to people who knew what they were doing.

Now Sancho was eventually signed for an amortised fee of £73 million, which sounds like a bargain for a player, who by the age of 22 has been directly involved in 122 goals. For comparative purposes, seven-time Balon-Dor winner Lionel Messi; only had 59.

So, the numbers tell a story of a kid from Kennington, being twice the player of arguably the greatest to ever grace a football pitch, was deliberation even needed, he should’ve been signed last year!

With the commencement of the 2021/22 season, you’d think pairing this calibre of talent with the likes of Paul Pogba, Bruno Fernandes and (checks notes) Cristiano Ronaldo; would end up in Sancho’s name embedded in stardom, as the plucky reds canter to a first Premier League win in a decade.

Well, if you were to go upstairs into your kid’s room and rummage through his wardrobe to find the Ronaldo jersey you bought him in the summer. Turn that around and the number you see on the back is the position the mighty Red Devils find themselves in.

So where did it go wrong?

There’s a lot, so let’s just focus on Sancho. First, let’s understand what type of player he is.

Sancho is one example of what one Athletic subscriber described as United’s “silo signings” - players whose acquisitions make sense in isolation, but need a bit more thought and consideration before being properly integrated into the whole squad.

“He is a player who combines intelligence, understanding of space and movement and creation through both dribbling and passing. He can be a catalyst for ball progression, he can attract pressure to create space for others.” Footballper90 writer Jamie Scott tells The Athletic.

“He can score and assist with regularity. These sorts of players will always be a success in a healthy team scenario.”

A large emphasis on “a healthy team scenario” – which certainly doesn’t describe Man Utd’s situation. The club has seen a changeover of 3 managers, with the current coach in the hot seat: an interim, of the interim, of the coach who was meant to be just an interim. The constant changing of stylistic systems disrupts a player like Sancho’s game, who depends on the intelligence of knowing where his teammates are – so he can combine effectively.

Without those on-field relationships building – Sancho is a shell of the player he was at Dortmund. This is nicely represented by his massive drop in npXG +XA, which has decreased from 0.58, ranking him in the 92nd percentile amongst forwards to 0.38 – which is in the 52nd percentile.

Such a downturn in form is prevalent when watching a United game, you will see Sancho cut a frustrated figure multiple times due to the lack of red shirts within 5 yards of him. I asked Jamie what could be done with squad personnel to immediately improve Sancho’s performance, he recommended the signing of

“A striker and a midfield runner. Maybe DCL and (can I be cheeky) Donny van de Beek”.

Despite the many mitigating factors, Sancho is still a multi-talented player who with the right conditions will return to stardom soon.

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