Manchester United legend Gary Neville has compared Manchester United’s current crop of young players to the class of 92.
Former United captain Gary Neville believes that the club’s current crop of youngsters don’t have a good enough spine around them to truly flourish. Neville came to United through the highly successful Class of 92, who eventually went on to win the treble with many more accolades.
Neville believes that the difference between the current youngsters and the Class of 92 is that the group of players he was a part of had better support from the senior players in the team.
“I actually think it’s a step backwards but a step in the right direction because enough is enough of all these players who have been coming in, not good enough, not fitting the style of play,” Neville said on Monday Night Football.
“It’s a change of direction, younger players who have hopefully got a future at Manchester United for the next 10 years. The three of them have started well and if you look at that team that played on Saturday, Wan-Bissaka, McTominary, James, Pereira, Rashford.
“There’s five young players there that are in the team. Are they good enough at this moment in time? No, they’ve got to prove themself, they’re all promising and they’re all working their absolute maximum every single match.
“Then I went back to the early days of ourselves. If you look at these players here now, Bruce, Pallister, Schmeichel, Keane, Cole, Cantona. The spine of that team is immense. The problem with Manchester United’s team now is not the five young players on the pitch or the three on the bench, the spine of the team is Lindelof, Matic, Mata, Young, De Gea.
“Who knows what Rashford is going to become, what James is going to become, Pereira, Wan-Bissaka. They’ve all got promise. What I do know is that five or six players there carried us as young players. Manchester United, somehow, have got to find a spine.
“Liverpool’s spine, City’s spine, they’re strong. All Championship-winning teams have a strong spine. So my thing at the moment is, how do Manchester United recruit in the next 12 to 18 months a spine to support those young players.”
Manchester United begin their Europa League campaign against Astana. This game will be a good opportunity for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer to rotate his squad and hand opportunities to youngsters like Mason Greenwood, Angel Gomes and Tahith Chong.
