Do Man United need to fix their defence this summer?
Talk of the Devils: The Athletic FC's Manchester United show
The Athletic
4.6 • 771 Ratings
🗓️ 25 March 2026
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
It's part two of our early look into summer transfer business, and the first parting of the ways on opinion. Everyone agrees midfield is the highest priority, but how important is it to bring in defensive reinforcements?
The club has been well stocked with centre backs for quite a while now, not least because the team was playing with three of them under Ruben Amorim. Now that the formation requires only two, all is well, right? Spoiler alert: yes, but...
Fullback is where things start to get interesting. Tyrell Malacia is expected to leave and Patrick Dorgu has been employed further forward by Michael Carrick. That means a long-term replacement is needed for Luke Shaw, but how urgently? And then there's the matter of competition/support for Senne Lammens. Plenty to discuss!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Athletic FFC. |
| 0:24.3 | This is Talk of the Devils, the Athletic Show dedicated to Manchester United. |
| 0:28.2 | Coming up today, it's part two of our summer transfer special. |
| 0:31.6 | Today we are going to look at the defence for Manchester United. |
| 0:35.7 | So what we've got in net, at centreback and at fullback, |
| 0:58.2 | what we think Manchester United might need and who we think Manchester United might be targeting. Spoiler alert, I don't think it's going to be quite as sexy as the chat around the midfielders because there was a lot of names that was put out on Monday's show. If you've not watched that already, go back and have a look because we looked at the midfield for Manchester United lots and lots and lots of good information in that video. |
| 0:59.8 | So we're going to have a watch of that, but welcome. |
| 1:00.6 | Andy's here. |
| 1:04.3 | Joining us from home, Laurie and Carl are here in the studio with me as well. |
| 1:05.7 | We're going to talk about defence. |
| 1:11.6 | So there are different priorities unquestionably in this summer for Manchester United where do you think the defence |
| 1:13.4 | and I'm talking centre back |
| 1:15.3 | full back goalkeepers |
| 1:16.5 | where do you think that ranks |
| 1:17.9 | for the club |
| 1:19.2 | maybe third in the list |
| 1:22.6 | I think there's maybe |
| 1:23.3 | yeah I just think |
| 1:24.6 | perhaps another attacker would be |
| 1:26.6 | or a winger some sort would be ahead of that, |
| 1:28.9 | you know, after midfield being such a priority. |
| 1:32.0 | Because of the shift from, you know, a back three to now, or a back four. |
... |
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