Manchester United legend Rio Ferdinand has questioned Harry Maguire’s captaincy credentials after his comments following the club’s Premier League defeat to Arsenal.
Maguire felt United were complacent in Sunday’s defeat to Arsenal, after United had humbled last season’s Champions League semi-finalists RB Leipzig 5-0 last week, having also enjoyed a 2-1 win over Paris Saint-Germain in Group H.
United have collected just seven points from their six Premier League matches this campaign, their lowest tally at this stage since David Moyes’ short stint at the club in 2013-14, while they are now winless in their last six league home matches.
As a result of the defeat, the Red devils have failed to win any of their opening four league games at Old Trafford for the first time since 1972-73, a season in which they finished 18th.
Ferdinand has now called for captain Maguire to show more leadership at the club.
“We’re lacking confidence in certain areas. We gained a bit of confidence in midweek but do they get too overconfident?” he said via the Rio Ferdinand Presents FIVE YouTube channel.
“I saw Harry Maguire and a couple of his comments after the game saying maybe they were patting each other on the back too much. Get a hold of that team – he’s the captain.
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“I hope he’s getting in there and getting round people and telling people ‘listen, we aren’t the finished article, we’ve got loads to do, there is more from us to come, pull your socks up’.
“I don’t know if that’s going on. The captain of Man Utd. There’s always been leaders in that changing room who would be going round and drilling people, either one-to-one or in front of the group. Pulling people aside, having little conversations to get people up, to make sure they stay on their game.
“I remember Nani, I didn’t chat to him really, it was two or three words, ‘assists and goals’ or ‘shoot on sight’. Boom, that’s it. It doesn’t need an essay of words. Sometimes it’s short and sharp, punchy little things.
“Are these conversations going on? It isn’t just for the management to deal with that, sometimes the players in that dressing room need to stand up and put it on people.”
