A decent fee for a centre-back who had become a laughing stock. Maguire has made so many mistakes in recent seasons that it came as no surprise to hear him being booed by his own club’s fans in last week’s friendly against Athletic Club. The task now is to bring in a much better replacement – and £30m should go a long way towards enabling United to do precisely that. The club erred badly when they made the overrated Maguire the most expensive defender in the world in 2019, but they’ve at least managed to make some of their money back.
it has been an undeniable gamble for Westham, but one that might well pay off. Maguire is certainly far more suited to David Moyes’ archaic and attritional style of football than Erik ten Hag’s modern approach. He will be asked to keep it simple and regularly knock it long, which is right up his alley. It’s also worth pointing out that Maguire performed impressively at the World Cup for England – despite colossal criticism of Gareth Southgate’s decision to take him to Qatar – so there is clearly still a decent centre-back in there.
As for Maguire its an end to the misery. United were obviously right to get rid of Maguire – but he also needed to get the hell out of Old Trafford, which had become a toxic environment for him. West Ham are offering him a much-needed shot at redemption, a chance to rebuild his confidence, which had been shattered by umpteen errors and being stripped of the captain’s armband at United. At 30, there is still time for Maguire to restore his reputation.
