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Will he, won’t he? Adnan Januzaj is at a crossroads this season, but if he doesn’t he’ll become a free agent at the end of the campaign.
Following a tough start to the season, the 19-year-old has shone in the past couple of months, with 11 goals in 14 games in all competitions. This stunning run of form helped the Red Devils finish the Premier League season with a bang, and a place in the quarterfinals of the FA Cup, with victory over Millwall on Saturday.
His rise to the top has been rapid, coming through the ranks in Mancheser United’s youth team to become the club’s youngest ever player aged just 16 years and 243 days — the same age he is now.
After a run of fantastic performances, this has put him in the spotlight. What will happen next? Will he finally fulfill his potential at United?
Stats
Januzaj has quickly developed a reputation for causing problems down the left-hand side. According to statistics from Opta, his rate of touches down this flank per 90 minutes is more than double that of every other player in the United team, topped only by central defenders Eric Bailly (79.65) and Victor Lindelof (72.36).
He is also the team’s second most effective player in the air behind wingers Anthony Martial (63.49) and Marcus Rashford (55.67), and he still only averages 0.56 fouls committed per 90 minutes.
Former United boss Louis van Gaal revealed in a recent interview that he only played Januzaj at left-back. Van Gaal said: “At a couple of games I sent the academy coach down to the first team and he said that he was not very good as left back, so I said ‘Take him back and put him on the left wing.’ I thought it was better, because he has played a lot of games on the left wing.”
United left-back Luke Shaw played against Millwall on Saturday, while Paul Pogba and Antonio Valencia have both recently recovered from injuries.
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