Rene Meulensteen ‘can’t believe’ Man Utd didn’t sign £40m star this summer

Former Manchester United coach Rene Meulensteen says the club missed a trick not signing ‘strong character’ Emiliano Martinez from Aston Villa in the summer.

Locking down a quality replacement for Andre Onana had been identified as one of United’s key priorities on the back of another error-strewn season for the Cameroon international last term.

Concrete discussions took place between United and Villa regarding a proposed deal for Martinez and the World Cup-winning Argentine was said to be eager to push through a move to Old Trafford.

But the Red Devils instead focussed their attentions on Senne Lammens as the transfer window drew to a close and the Belgian completed a deadline-day switch from Royal Antwerp, for a fee believed to be in the region of £18million.

Lammens went on to impress on debut in United’s 2-0 victory over Sunderland before the international break, coming away from the match with the side’s first clean sheet of the Premier League campaign.

However, Meulensteen, one of Sir Alex Ferguson’s closest aides during his time at United, ‘can’t believe’ the club chose to pursue Lammens over a more established option like Martinez – who was reportedly available for £40m.

‘The question is, why did they not bring Emi Martinez in now?’ he told BetVictor.

‘Because when you bring in a serial winner, look at Gianluigi Donnarumma, you bring in a player who knows what it’s like to win titles, to win Champions Leagues.

‘Martinez has won the World Cup. He knows what the Premier League is about. He’s a big, charismatic fella, a strong character.

‘I can’t believe why they haven’t done it now. And I can’t see Aston Villa wanting to let him go unless they’ve got somebody in the ranks that they believe can step in straight away, and they get a lot of money for him.’

Ruben Amorim threw Lammens in at the deep end for the first time by against Sunderland, with the side desperately seeking a positive performance after an immensely disappointing start to the new season.

Replacing Altay Bayindir between the sticks, Lammens more than stood up to the challenge and his assured showing even had United supporters singing, ‘Are you [Peter] Schmeichel in disguise?’, at the Theatre of Dreams.

Schmeichel himself was mightily impressed by what he saw from Lammens, applauding the 23-year-old on what he described as a ‘really good and solid goalkeeping performance’.

But the great Dane called on United’s fanbase to be patient and realistic with their expectations for Lammens while he adjusts to life in a new league and environment.

‘You think about the goalkeepers that we’ve had over these last couple of years and how many goals we’ve conceded from errors… nine errors already this season? That’s a lot. It’s too much,’ Schmeichel told BBC Radio 5 Live.

‘I go back to when I played, my instruction was and it was the same with Edwin [van der Sar] and David de Gea, we had to save the team ten points a season, not give them away and that’s what we’ve got used to in the last couple of years, goalkeepers giving goals away and therefore losing points.

‘First of all, it’s nice to see a clean sheet, then a really good and solid goalkeeping performance.

‘It’s what you see, you see this young lad, he didn’t really have much to do for a long, long time, he literally only had the ball at his feet and he did quite well.

‘You’d expect that from any young goalkeeper these days – as that’s how they’re brought up – so there was some resemblance to Edwin, a couple of long balls, he had that first save down to his left, which you expect him to save, but once he’s done that, he’s a goalkeeper now, he’s saving balls.

‘From that, I think his confidence grew, you could see from the first cross, Matthijs de Ligt’s reaction was fantastic, defenders want that when they’re under the cosh to take some of that pressure off.

‘It’s not happened at Manchester United for a bit and of course, the defenders were happy about it. It’s far too early to talk about it, how good this guy is, he’s only young, he’s hardly played any competitive football, he’s most certainly not at Manchester United.’

Schmeichel, a five-time Premier League winner with United, added: ‘Unfortunately we’ve seen over the years, great players come into the club and the pressure is relentless – then they can’t deal with that. It would be silly for someone like me to put more pressure on him.

‘He did well, he’s got an international break now then the next game he’s got to do the same.

‘Then we see how he develops, all goalkeepers make mistakes, that’s when we find out how good people are, in how do they react to those mistakes? It was nice, clean and positive, things that we haven’t been used to.’

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