Manchester United spent nearly £220million in the summer transfer window - but their best signing might just have cost them nothing.
Christian Eriksen, who was brought in on a free transfer after his contract with Brentford expired in June, has become Erik ten Hag's saviour only six games into his Old Trafford career. That's because Ten Hag and the Red Devils' ever-savvy recruitment team decided to devote a huge chunk of time over the summer months chasing Frenkie de Jong.
The new United manager planned to make De Jong the linchpin of his team, ushering in a total-football era at the club. But there was one issue: he didn't want to come. Despite Ten Hag's efforts to convince him otherwise, the 25-year-old midfielder was intent on staying at Barcelona, who - because of their well-documented financial woes - were even willing to flog him after a £63million deal was agreed between the two clubs.
Red Devils chief executive Richard Arnold and football director John Murtough even flew out to Catalunya to thrash out a deal, but De Jong's refusal to reunite with Ten Hag - who coached him to stardom at Ajax - quashed any chance of him being United's new playmaker by September 1.
The transfer saga took place in pre-season, when Ten Hag was constantly having to field questions about whether the Netherlands international would indeed be reuniting with him in Manchester. Asked what he'd do if De Jong wasn't signed, the newly-appointed Red Devils boss confirmed that he'd promote from within rather than to turn an alternative target.
"We're looking for a player who can play in the holding midfield position, but it has to be the right one," Ten Hag explained during the club's tour of Australia in July. "There are not many in that position capable of the level we demand. When we can't find him, we have to deal with the players in our squad now and we will develop one in that position."
That's where Eriksen comes in. The Denmark captain was somewhat of a surprise acquisition for United, who - as the new Premier League season dawned - had only snapped up left-back Tyrell Malacia and were feeling the pressure from supporters to make some signings.
Eriksen put pen to paper on a three-year deal just over 12 months after suffering a cardiac arrest during a match at the European Championship in 2021. Upon his arrival, the 30-year-old was viewed by the vast majority of pundits as a fringe player to provide competition for the likes of Bruno Fernandes and, potentially, De Jong.
But Ten Hag had another plan. Since playing him as a makeshift striker for the first 53 minutes of the Red Devils' opening-day defeat to Brighton, the Dutch tactician has deployed Eriksen in the aforementioned holding midfield role which was set up for De Jong to play. The Dane hasn't merely filled the vacant slot, he's thrived in it.
As explained by United legend Paul Scholes following Sunday's 3-1 victory over Arsenal - in which Eriksen picked up the Man of the Match award for his typically classy display - the former Tottenham Hotspur star has himself given Ten Hag and co exactly what they wanted from De Jong.
"Forwards know when the ball's coming, they know they've got a midfield player who is thinking about them even before the ball comes," Scholes told Premier League Productions, heaping praise on Eriksen's performance. "They know he's watching, he's looking all the time. He's always scanning the pitch and he's only thinking about going forward.
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"I can't tell you how important that is as a number 10 and as a wide player. If you don't have that and you have the players that we've had playing in there who are always facing backwards and going backwards, their movement's a waste of time, so whatever movement they do it doesn't matter.
"You see Bruno [Fernandes], who's so clever to get in those spaces behind the midfield and in front of the back four, but you need someone to find him. Christian Eriksen has certainly got that. For a number 10 to have any kind of influence on a football game then they need a midfield player of that kind of quality."
Eriksen might not be the man who Ten Hag dreamed of having as his chief Red Devils playmaker, but United's new midfield maestro is already making fans forget about missing out on De Jong.
