Harry Maguire has a lot to live up to at Manchester United if he completes his proposed £80million move to Old Trafford, according to Adrian Durham.
The Leicester City centre-back is set to become a Red Devils player this week after the Premier League clubs agreed a record-breaking fee for the 26-year-old.
His £80m switch, confirmed by Foxes boss Brendan Rodgers on Friday, will make Maguire the most expensive defender in world football.
But, although he believes Maguire will improve United’s back-four, talkSPORT host Durham is ‘struggling with the logic’ of paying so much for the England international.
Comparing the deal with Liverpool’s £75m signing of Virgil van Dijk, Durham says any £80m player must ‘tick all the boxes’ and believes Maguire ‘needs to be Rio Ferdinand and Nemanja Vidic rolled into one’ to prove value for money at Old Trafford.
“It’s a signing Manchester United had to make,” said the Drivetime host on Friday. “They needed improvement at the back, and Harry Maguire does that.
“I know it’s the market at the moment, but just seems unthinkable… imagine just prior to the World Cup if somebody said to you ‘in a year’s time Harry Maguire will be going for £80m’.
“For £80m I’d want to tick all the boxes. I’d want him to instantly come in and be another contender for club captain, I’d want somebody to deliver all that.
“He’s being brought in for £80m in a key position, he has got to be Rio and Vidic rolled into one.
“He has got to be the man who grabs hold of Manchester United by the scruff of their neck and drag them up towards, not just the top four, but the title challenge.
“All this is on him, this is the reality. That’s what Pogba was signed for and he couldn’t do and it he’s getting slaughtered for it.
“I’m reluctant to do the Van Dijk comparison, but when Liverpool paid £75m for him we were all gasping, we couldn’t believe it.
“But he’s probably worth double that now, bearing in mind what he can do on the field and how much he’s improved Liverpool to the point where they’ve won the Champions League and were within a whisker of winning the Premier League title.
“Harry Maguire, do you think in 12 months’ time he would have doubled his value? Because I don’t, I don’t see that.”