Manchester United: Odion Ighalo is a sign of better things to come

The deadline day arrival of Odion Ighalo at Manchester United is further reinforcement of the club’s shifting transfer policy.

Marcus Rashford‘s long term injury meant that Manchester United had to scramble to sign a replacement for the 22-year-old before the transfer window slammed shut.

Bruno Fernandes had already arrived in a £46 million move from Sporting Lisbon. With Paul Pogba and Scott McTominay out for the foreseeable future, Manchester United needed a new midfielder as well.

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And while their two winter signings were partly influenced by the alarming injury crisis at the club, Ed Woodward and Ole Gunnar Solskjær have also managed to keep the club’s long-term interests in mind.

January was off to a bad start for United. Erling Haaland completed a shock move to Borussia Dortmund in the wake of interest from Juventus and United, and the Norwegian teenager is off to a flying start in the Bundesliga.

Solskjær’s policy of signing young, hungry players meant that Haaland was naturally a top priority, with the club being short on strikers since Romelu Lukaku and Alexis Sanchez left for Inter Milan in the summer.

With the former Salzburg forward gone, Manchester United shifted their focus to Sporting’s Fernandes. The Portuguese powerhouse has been linked to an Old Trafford move since the summer, but nothing concrete ever materialized.

Sporting were desperate for funds, and Woodward knew that. For once, United’s Chief Executive refused to be held ransom and managed to drive the asking price down from the initial €85 million that Sporting demanded.

For too long, United have carried a reputation for overpaying for players, with Angel Di Maria, Lukaku and Sanchez being good examples. Every time a player is linked to the club, his market value shoots up.

It isn’t going to be easy for Woodward and United to break that image, but Fernandes is a good first step. Fans would have understandably been furious if the deal had fallen through, but the fact that it didn’t seems to suggest that Woodward is slowly beginning to learn from his past mistakes.

There’s been rumors of a new sporting director as well. Luis Campos and Antero Henrique seem to be front-runners, and a resolution to this long-running saga seems to be close.

The fact that the club has no director of football has long been a sore spot for United fans. Recent reports have suggested that Woodward has been waiting for over 18 months to shortlist an ideal candidate, which is again a sign of progress.

But perhaps the biggest positive is the loan signing of Ighalo from Shanghai Shenhua.

United have always been against loan deals. The last high-profile name to have signed on loan was Radamel Falcao from Monaco.

But at this point in time, a loan move makes sense, and Ighalo is a perfectly good stop-gap solution.

The reason for this is that with Haaland off the table, United will need more time to shortlist candidates to fill the number 9 role.

It would have been easy to make a panic bid for other strikers on the market. Olivier Giroud, Dries Mertens and Edinson Cavani are all close to leaving their respective clubs, and the Woodward of old would have made a reflex move for one of them. Again, remember Sanchez?

All three are high-profile forwards who have proven themselves repeatedly in the biggest competitions of Europe. But none of them fit the profile that United are looking for.

Ighalo is a childhood United fan who has Premier League experience. His move will probably not be made permanent at the end of 6 months, and he’s certainly set to cost the club much less than the other options.

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The 30-year-old Nigerian buys the club some time. A striker, a defensive midfielder and a winger might be enough for the Red Devils to start competing for titles once again, and hopefully, the summer will bring some joy for the fans.

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