Harry: Good for England, not for United
EVEN when things are going well for Harry Maguire, he’s never too far away from a moment where his status as football’s pantomime villain is reaffirmed.
News of the United defender’s misfortune had evidently spread to Iran, given the banners some of their fans carried into the Khalifa International Stadium on Monday.
‘Harry Maguire: Your defence is terrified’ and ‘It’s not coming home because of Harry Maguire’ felt particularly cutting and unfair.
Although the Reds skipper has generally been excellent for England, it didn’t stop the Wembley crowd from booing him on a couple of occasions recently. His name was also jeered in Australia on United’s pre-season tour and now he’s the butt of jokes for Iranian football fans too.
But he turned in a pretty composed and assured performance in England’s opening World Cup game, until he started feeling unwell at the most inopportune moment.
Maguire had just signalled to the bench that he needed to come off when Iran finally put together an attack worthy of the name.
Mehdi Taremi ran off the back of a dazed and groggy Maguire and rifled in a fine finish. It wasn’t great defending from the 29-year-old, but if ever he can be excused it was surely here, suffering from double vision and looking unwell as he gingerly left the pitch.
If that mistake can, to a degree, be overlooked, then the rest of his performance was good. Given time on the ball he was able to pick passes and fire forward balls into the feet of his midfielders, helping England dominate the game.
He was also a significant threat in the other penalty area. He hit the crossbar with a header, set up Bukayo Saka’s first goal after climbing above his man from a corner and should quite clearly have had a penalty as well.
It was justification for Gareth
Southgate’s decision to stick with him.
As much as he’s become a figure of mockery at United as well, there’s an argument having a good World Cup would be good for his club as well.
You can see why he plays well for England. He can be a threat on opposition set-pieces, can command his own box and when England are required to defend deep it is an obvious strength.
It’s no coincidence his best performance for United this season came against West Ham, when the Reds were forced deeper and deeper in the second half and Maguire had to do some old-fashioned defending.
Where he struggles is when he’s exposed in defending one-on-one situations, or being caught in a high line and having to make splitsecond decisions high up the pitch.
That is something he will have to do at United a lot, given the domination they will often have in games and Erik ten Hag’s wish to play that high line.
Given Maguire’s strengths and
weaknesses, it’s possible to simply say defending in this England system suits him, but doing so for United doesn’t, at least not to the same extent.
In reality, he’s now club captain at Old Trafford but Ten Hag’s fourthchoice central defender. It doesn’t feel like a long-term solution, given his transfer fee and salary and the fact he knows he needs to be playing to stay in the England team.
It’s hard to see Maguire breaking up the partnership of Lisandro Martinez and Raphael Varane at United and he’s been below Victor Lindelof as well this season. The Swede seems more likely to be accepting of a squad role than Maguire might be.
How player and club part ways, if it comes to that, is the big challenge.
United made Maguire the most expensive central defender in the world when they signed him for £80m. They will have to take a big loss on that, as they will with £45m signing Aaron Wan-Bissaka, also from that expensive 2019 window.
Despite all the criticism and the unjustified comedy, there is still clearly a very good defender in Maguire, just maybe one who doesn’t suit United under Ten Hag.
If he can enjoy an excellent World Cup, just as he did in last summer’s European Championship, then it might remind potential suitors of those strengths.