Manchester United's Defence, Something to Worry About?

The English Premier League season is just seven days away and the twenty times champion, Manchester United have a huge task ahead of them as they will have to play themselves back into reckoning after a disappointing 7th place finish last season which means they will not be playing in Europe this season.


Though United has appointed a new Coach; an experienced one at that in Louis Van Gaal, something that remains a cause of concern however is the episode of experienced defenders from the club. Captain, Nemanja Vidic left for Inter Milan, Rio Ferdinand for QPR and Patrice Evra for Juventus after playing together for about seven years and forming a strong partnership in those years under the then manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, it is left to be seen if the likes of Chris Smalling, Phil Jones, and Johny Evans can hold the forte against the rampaging Premier League attacks.

Something that has always worked in the Premier League is a strong defence line, it helps stop the power playing, extremely fast attack force of the clubs, but without an experienced signing so far for Van Gaal it is left to be seen if the lot of new signings Luke Shaw and Ander Herrera will change the situation of the club.

With Chris Smalling and Phil Jones used sparingly by David Moyes last season, and Evans out injured, while Buttner was  given little time to play with Evra ever present at the left fullback, the relatively young and inexperience United backline is going to have huge task on their hands as they might not be able to fill the huge shoe left by their experienced trio which has form a core of the United defence in years past.

Van Gaal is strongly linked with Defensive duo of Thomas Vermaelen and Mats Hummels which means the Dutch man acknowledges the fact that they will need to beef-up at the rear, so as to put the Club in a level playing ground alongside other tittle contenders for the trophy and possibly seal a top four finish come the end of the 2014/2015 season.

WIth the new 3-4-2-1 formation employed by Van Gaal during United's tour of the United States which they won by defeating Liverpool at the final, it seems the formal Netherlands coach has decided to work around what he has at his disposal if he can not add to it.