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Last season saw United struggling to field a full-strength defence on numerous occasions, and even before the start of the Premier League campaign it’s looking like this season might be the same. With the second pre-season tour starting next week, United are still struggling to fill in an experienced back line, despite the return of Phil Jones and Patrice Evra from their extended breaks following the European Championships.This makes the news that Nemanja Vidic will make his full return to match action during the tour even more exciting and important.
But regardless of the return of our captain, we still only have four experienced players to play at the back, Sir Alex confirmed earlier today. “Chris Smalling is out for 10 weeks with his metatarsal operation and Jonny Evans is still just in light training,” he said. “They’re big losses at the moment and they will miss the start of the season.”
But United’s problems are made worse by Rafael’s involvement with Brazil in the Olympics, even though he might be back ready for the start of the new season if Brazil don’t get too far.
The absence of his brother, Fabio, who is on loan with QPR, means we’re around four defenders down at the moment and Sir Alex is “[hoping] that we don’t get any more injuries as it would leave me a bit short.”
With Sir Alex worrying about the number of defenders, speculation over apparent moves for a left-back in the newspapers lately is likely to increase. If everybody’s fit then we’ve got a fairly solid back line but, especially with our recent luck, we can’t take anything for granted. I wouldn’t be too surprised to see a left-back bought in before the end of the transfer window but at the moment there’s so many names flying around that it would be hard to guess who.
Elsewhere, other big names will join the squad following their breaks after Euro 2012, including Wayne Rooney, Danny Welbeck, Nani and Patrice Evra.
