If you haven’t heard the news…Manchester United have signed Henrik Larsson (of Celtic and Barcelona fame) on loan from his Swedish club Helsingborgs. Larsson, 35, will play for Manchester United from January 1 to March 12, when he will go back to his club.
From the news release:
“Larsson will fly into Manchester on the morning of the West Ham game on 17 December before training with the players that week. He will then return to Sweden for Christmas and come back to be available to play in January.”
I doubt that there will be a situation where the loan deal could be extended – unless Larsson sparkles here and goes on goal-scoring rampage. With Rossi returning, I doubt that Manchester United would need him, although he would be quite useful in April against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
People are saying that Manchester United should have moved for Torres this winter instead of a stop-gap, has-been like Larsson. For my money that’s absolute bollocks. Torres is a quality striker, no doubt, but he’s not a clinical finisher like Ruud, Eto’o or Klose. He’s more Podolski or Rooney – and while he would be a fantastic addition to the Manchester United squad, I’d hope that Ferguson looks around and at least has 2-3 other options apart from Torres.
Larsson, on the other hand, is perfect as a stop-gap measure. He can play in Europe (although he’ll only be here for the second round games), could be a massive help as backup to Saha (the man he’s coming to support) and will give us an opportunity to change things around on the pitch when things aren’t going our way. Right now, United can’t throw on a spare striker and hope for a big change – Larsson will give us that, despite the fact that he’s probably as slow as Solskjaer and 2 years older than him.
As far as January is concerened, Larsson is far better than Torres – we save money, we get a good striker, and we can now focus on getting a midfielder (what other options are there to Hargreaves?) this winter (we’ll definitely need one).
What do you guys think?
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