Lisandro Martinez has already had an impact on Erik ten Hag's Manchester United

28.07.2022 - 10:37 / manchestereveningnews.co.uk

Manchester United officially announced the signing of Lisandro Martinez on Wednesday afternoon. After beating Arsenal to the 24-year-old's signature, United will add him to their squad ahead of the new Premier League season.

Erik ten Hag has worked with Martinez at Ajax for the past few years. He knows his strengths and weaknesses and will now begin to integrate him into his team throughout the remainder of pre-season.

In fact, there is enough evidence to suggest the Dutch coach started to make adjustments for the Argentine weeks ago. Before Martinez had even agreed to sign, Ten Hag seemed to be opening up a space for him.

READ MORE: Erik ten Hag is already changing David de Gea's style at Manchester United

For most of his career at Old Trafford, Harry Maguire has been deployed on the left of a two-man centre-back pairing, despite having a preference to use his right foot. The English defender didn't experience the strongest campaign last season, with Ten Hag even questioned following his arrival in Manchester whether Maguire would retain the captaincy.

Upon inspection of the United during the summer, Ten Hag's analysis identified how the team lacked balance and structure in certain departments - and he's stated as much on a number of occasions - with many of those issues stemming from the lack of left-footed options in the team.

United's centre-back options prior to Martinez's arrival - Maguire, Victor Lindelof, Raphael Varane, Phil Jones and Eric Bailly - were all right-footed. Nemanja Matic and Juan Mata were two left-footed players further forward, but both departed the club this summer.

Excluding Martinez, the only established 'lefties' in the current United squad are Alex Telles, Luke Shaw, Fred and Amad. Some