Darren Fletcher believes the injury to Paul Pogba has restricted the way Manchester United have played this season.
The former United midfielder has highlighted a lack of creativity as the biggest problem affecting Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's side this season — with Pogba's absence key to that.
Pogba made a comeback of sorts around the festive period with substitute appearances against Watford and Newcastle, but suffered a recurrence of his ankle injury and has had surgery.
Despite the fact he comes in for criticism from some United fans, Pogba has been the biggest miss according to Fletcher.
"We are a great counter-attacking side, but Ole wants us to be good in possession as well," the Scot told talkSPORT.
"But we’ve lost our most creative player this season – Paul Pogba. Pogba, say what you like about him, I think he gets a hard time.
"There is no doubt we’ve missed him this season – the stats are there [to prove it]. Relative to how people think he’s performed – whether he’s lived up to the price tag or not – Paul Pogba creates on the pitch, makes things happen, and tries things with his passes, and they’ve missed that 100 per cent.
"So now their biggest asset is counter-attacking as they don’t have the players capable of breaking down teams, so it’s a difficult period for Solskjaer."
Fletcher then added that Solskjaer is being brave by shunning the chance to sign players for the short-term to replace injured stars like Pogba and Scott McTominay.
“Solskjaer could have been selfish and could have got players in for a quick fix,” he added. “But he wants to do the best for Manchester United long-term – and he’s doing it the hard way.
“He has to be respected for that.
“It’s probably going to take a little bit of pain – it’s probably going to take a lot of pain – but I believe that if we stick with the process we will look back on this period and think, ‘yes, we took that pain, but look where we are now because of those decisions’.”
