Neville names one Man Utd transfer which should’ve been ‘vetoed’ as he uses Salford example
Man Utd legend Gary Neville thinks the signing of Casemiro “should have never gone through” at Old Trafford and insists there “should have been a veto”.
The Brazil international left Real Madrid for the Red Devils in the summer of 2022 in a deal worth a reported £70m.
Casemiro played well last season as Erik ten Hag got off to a good start at Old Trafford, leading Man Utd to an FA Cup final, League Cup silverware and a top-four finish in the Premier League.
However, the 31-year-old – who has been linked with a move elsewhere – has been underwhelming in his 12 appearances in all competitions this campaign with the Brazilian’s appearances limited due to injuries.
Casemiro, who has been missing since their League Cup defeat to Newcastle, has recently returned to training following a hamstring injury with a potential return on the cards when Man Utd face Tottenham later this week.
But Neville thinks the decision to bring Casemiro to the club at the age of 30 was a huge mistake and thinks someone at Man Utd should’ve vetoed the transfer.
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Neville told the Stick to Football podcast: “Coming in from an owner’s perspective, you employ a head of recruitment who you think is the best guy out there at spotting talent, that will bring value to your club. You’ve got a sporting director equally, who will be thinking the same way – their loyalty is to the club and to make sure we win games.
“A manager’s job is purely to think about the immediate short term and getting results for himself. Casemiro is perfect example of a short-term signing that is going to cost in the long term.
“That signing never should have gone through a good sporting director, a good owner, and a good head of recruitment. That signing should have never gone through, it should have been a veto.”
Neville is the co-owner of Salford City and he’s described the need for him, the sporting director and manager to be on the same page when it comes to transfers.
The Man Utd legend added: “You’ve got a head of recruitment, a sporting director, and a team of scouts who have probably watched between them a thousand games in a season, and they might have watched the players you’re trying to sign between 15 to 20 times live between them all.
“You have a coach and a manager who have literally been concentrating on getting results, coaching his players, assessing pre-match and post-match – fixed on results and everything that is going on in the media – he’s probably never even watched these players live.
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“You’re trusting that guy over another football guy, whose got a really good brain, to make a decision. The perfect scenario for me at Salford would have been, the owner and the chairman having a financial veto – if it didn’t fit the budget, it couldn’t come in, that’s a fact.
“The manager has a veto if he doesn’t want a player, but also the sporting director, on behalf of their recruitment, has a veto to say that this player isn’t right for us in the long-term.
“Everyone has a veto in essence and what you’d like as an owner is if the sporting director, the head of recruitment, and the manager are all on the same page.
“If they’re not, and this happened quite a bit [at Salford], you’ve got your sporting director and head of recruitment saying, ‘I’m not sure, we’ve watched him a lot,’ but then you’ve got the head coach who says that he used to have him at Grimsby, for example, and he wants him because he knows him – that’s the scenario that exists.”
