Signing a player late in the transfer window is far from ideal because they’ve gone through their pre-season training somewhere else, so they will need extra time to get up to speed and gel with their teammates.
Alex Telles has had further setbacks at Man United due to Covid-19 tests and injuries, so he’s still waiting to make his mark on the Premier League.
There’s a hope that he’s now in a position to play some football and actually show everyone what he can do, so it will be interesting to see if he’s an upgrade on Luke Shaw and Brandon Williams.
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Legendary Man United defender Denis Irwin was speaking to the club’s official site about Telles and what he can bring to the team, and he sounds excited that he’ll help in defence alongside causing problems in the final third too:
“It’s an opportunity for him now, with the games coming up, to get his foot in there. Sometimes it’s through lack of injuries that you manage to hold down the place of the left-back position.
“I mean, we haven’t seen him too much [from him] defensively wise, but the Premier League is a tough league and he’s a full-back, so he’ll have to be good defensively. But we’ve already seen his qualities going forward in that game in the 70 or so minutes he played.
“There’s no doubt that, on set-pieces, he’s going to be a huge asset to us in that respect. I’m not going to compare him to David Beckham! But it looks like he’s got a fantastic left foot that can whip a ball in with pace, which our strikers would love to get in at the end of.”
It’s his ability to put dangerous balls into the box from set-pieces and open play that make him an intriguing signing, while that ability could also bring the best out of Edinson Cavani once he settles into the side too.