We have seen some huge names join Manchester United in the 11 years since Sir Alex Ferguson’s exit, all desperate to bring success back to Old Trafford.
The money United have spent since Ferguson’s retirement is simply staggering, especially given the lack of Premier League success to come from it.
United have chased big names and big signings but failed to reap the rewards.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Paul Pogba, Romelu Lukaku, Alexis Sanchez, Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane, Cristiano Ronaldo, Casemiro – the list of big names joining United just goes on and on.
The success rate of those signings is mixed to say the very least, and that is without even mentioning Angel Di Maria.
The Argentinian joined United back in 2014 but lasted just one year with Andreas Pereira suggesting earlier this week that he just didn’t settle despite looking incredible in training.
Bastian Schweinsteiger on United exile
Just a year after Di Maria’s arrival, United brought in Bastian Schweinsteiger from Bayern Munich for just £6.5million.
Schweinsteiger’s spell at United is often forgotten as he just wasn’t able to replicate his Bayern hero status at Old Trafford.
The German played 500 times for Bayern but managed just 35 games for United after reuniting with his former Bayern boss Louis van Gaal.
Schweinsteiger featured prominently in Van Gaal’s final season at the club but was effectively frozen out under Jose Mourinho.
The midfielder then joined Chicago Fire, finishing his career in Major League Soccer.
Schweinsteiger has now opened up on his United exit with some stunning claims about life under Mourinho.
Speaking on Gary Neville’s The Overlap, Schweinsteiger admitted that John Murtough came to tell him in the summer of 2016 that he was no longer allowed in the dressing room at Carrington.
Schweinsteiger was given ‘no warning’, leaving Neville absolutely stunned as the former midfielder noted that Mourinho didn’t think he was happy at United.
“You wanna know? It was [Euro] 2016, with the Germany national team, we went far, to the semi-finals, so I stepped in a little bit later,” said Schweinsteiger. “The team had been on the US tour, I think, so when I came first day, I actually trained with Zlatan, he was also there, I was like ‘oh great, a player who has the vision and amazing to play with’. Then, the next day – my birthday – when I came to Carrington, John Murtough was there and he said ‘you’re not allowed to walk into the dressing room’. I said ‘why’, and he said ‘the coach said so’. Nothing, no warning.”
“He just stood there and told me that. It’s also not easy for him to tell me, I must say. First day, I was training, so somebody could have told me there, no problem, or explain it to me in a normal way, but okay, I went to the youth dressing room, I changed there and trained with the Under-16’s.”
“Was this made public at the time?” said Neville, who couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Jose must have spoken to you?”
“I said to him, ‘can I talk to the manager in the afternoon or something’, he’s like ‘okay, we’ll ask him’. Anyway, when I came back from the Under-16 training, then I had a meeting with him in the afternoon. He just explained to me that he didn’t see me happy here at United because when I had my injury, I did my rehab with the German doctors, for example, and I spent time then in Germany. Of course, I came back to United and was in contact with the doctors and I watched the games.”
“The conversation when [Van Gaal] was the coach, he said ‘look, come on the weekends to United, be in contact with the doctor and do your rehab, you need to be fit’, because there was the FA Cup final, which I almost could have played. That was our agreement and I just kept to the agreement.”
Neville and Schweinsteiger discuss Mourinho
Schweinsteiger went on to state that he was the only played moved to the Under-16’s at the time, believing that it was just a way to force him out of the club.
GN: “Did anyone get get moved to the Under-16’s?”
BS:“No, it was just me. Then, actually, after that I was just training alone for at least three months with a fitness guy. So I trained always before the team trained.”
GN: “So Jose never you train with the first team?”
BS: “No.”
GN: “Why?”
BS: “I don’t know. I guess they wanted to get rid of me.”
GN: “I get that, that’s pretty obvious, but there is a way to do things.”
Schweinsteiger doesn’t full pin the situation on Mourinho though, believing that there may have been some influence from above.
The World Cup winner added that he was eventually brought back into first-team training after three months of solitary training.
“I knew it was not only Jose’s decision, it was also the club’s decision. I guess so, because Jose… actually, when we spoke, he knows me as a player and when he was working for Real or Inter Milan, there were some interactions as well, so I think it was both, a little bit”
“I must also say that, after three months of training on my own, one day Jose or his assistant Rui [Faria], he came to me and sad ‘you can train with us, you train from tomorrow with us’, then I trained with them and actually, I think I trained well.”
United fans will be hearing all of this for the first time with Schweinsteiger refusing to go to the media at the time and leak the story to the press.
We have seen leaks become a huge problem at United in recent years and a few players could maybe take a leaf out of Schweinsteiger’s book in terms of his professionalism.