Sancho's Man Utd struggles must make Haaland consider next move

Stefan Bienkowski

• 4 Nov 2021 11:48 CDT
• 8 min read

Jadon Sancho’s spell at Manchester United has gotten so bad that it’s now verging on the prospect of becoming a cautionary tale for other young players at the top of European football.

Since making the move from Borussia Dortmund in the summer for £76.5 million, Sancho has made just five starts for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side and found his career plummet to new depths.

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As if sitting on the bench at Old Trafford wasn’t bad enough, Sancho has now been overlooked in Gareth Southgate’s last two England squads. And unless something dramatically changes with his standing at Man Utd, the young winger may have to accept that he made a terrible move in the summer window.

Did Sancho make a mistake joining Man Utd?

With the benefit of hindsight, it certainly seems as though Man Utd were perhaps a poor choice for Sancho.

Not only have the club struggled to match their potential for some time now under Solskjaer, but they also already had a number of wide players that played in Sancho’s position.

Whether it be Jesse Lingard, Marcus Rashford or Anthony Martial, Sancho would have always had to have hit the ground running just to pick up a starting role in Man Utd’s team. Hardly an appropriate situation for a young player to throw himself into.

Indeed, this poor decision making now seems to be a wide-spread consideration, with former Germany international Lothar Matthaus explaining to Sky Sports why Sancho should have never left Dortmund for Manchester.

"You see the players who are playing in Man United; you have Rashford, [Cristiano] Ronaldo, this means you have two from three then you have another four players who can play in this certain position,” said Matthaus.

"One of these players is Sancho. I don't know how he trains in Man United, he has to work very hard to make this step in the first XI. Now, he's far away from the first XI.

"When I see how many minutes he was playing this season or which game he was playing then I think it was a mistake [to join Man United] he has more money but he has less games."

Could this impact on Haaland’s future plans?

One player that will certainly be watching Sancho’s struggles at Man Utd closely is Dortmund striker Erling Haaland.

Not only was Haaland a good friend of Sancho’s when they played together in Germany, but he may also be looking to make the step up to a larger club next summer. And he’ll be desperate to avoid the kind of anguish Sancho has gone through at Old Trafford this season.

Perhaps unlike Sancho, Haaland will surely look to prioritise the project he’s joining - i.e a proven manager and space in the squad for him to play and develop as a player - rather than simply head to the biggest club in any of Europe’s top leagues that will offer the most amount of money.

Whether or not Sancho ends up working out at Man Utd, the young England international is currently an unfortunate cautionary tale for players like Haaland, who will undoubtedly now act accordingly based on the winger’s struggles at Old Trafford.