Ugarte's strengths

Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro became João Palhinha's ‘successor’ at Sporting CP following his move to Fulham in 2021. Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro played in Rúben Amorim's 3-4-3 system before successfully attracting the attention of Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea, and Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro eventually moved to Paris Saint-Germain in 2023.

In an interview with the official Paris Saint-Germain website at the start of the 2023/2024 season, Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro said: ‘Whenever I win the ball back, I'm happy. But as the game progressed, I started to wish I had scored. I would say to myself that I wanted it to be a goal.’

Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro, a defensive midfielder and very confident in his defensive approach, showed not only great athleticism during the game, but also great defensive intensity when it came to tackles and interceptions.

A good partner for those scrummagers who excel at pushing forward, Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro always has his way to help his team regain possession. Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro is a nightmare for opponents who like to carry the ball around, and for attacking players who can't make the right judgement quickly enough, it's hard to keep the ball in Manuel Ugarte Ribeiro's defence.

Throughout his career, Ugarte has been more of a piano mover than a piano player. His core task in the game is to help his team regain possession and then, with a simple pass, put the ball at the feet of his more creative teammates. As far as attacking goes, scoring goals is probably more of a nice-to-have for Ugarte, who has rarely been a consistent goal threat in games and has only scored four goals in 200 senior club matches.

In any case, Ugarte doesn't see himself as a player who does hard work on the pitch, but rather as an energetic player who wants to be a warrior on the green and a hero to be admired by all.

In an interview, Ugarte said: ‘When we have the ball, it's a game. When we don't, it's a fight.’

What are Ugarte's weaknesses? Why is Paris Saint-Germain willing to sell him?

Ugarte joins Paris Saint-Germain at the same time Luis Enrique begins his change of heart at Paris Saint-Germain. The Spanish-born manager has worked with great defensive midfielders like Busquets and Rodri, and prefers a possession-based style of play - he'll require midfielders to be able to pass and receive the ball with ease despite heavy pressure.

Because of this, Ugarte's conservative passing style made him at odds with his manager's footballing ideas. In Ligue 1, Ugarte averaged 4.1 forward passes and 0.7 key passes in 90 minutes, well below the Ligue 1 midfielder average (5.4 forward passes and 1.2 key passes).

On top of that, his ‘see the ball, try to win it’ approach to defending means he often loses his defensive position, which is a headache for detail-oriented managers like Luis Enrique.

In an interview with 2023, Luis Enrique spoke about Ugarte. He said, ‘He still has a lot to improve. Every player can still improve. Ugarte has been a revelation to many. I've seen him do well in the past. He's a great signing by the club's owners, but he still has a lot of room for improvement both going forward and in defence.’

‘Ugarte is a player with character, which is very important for us and we need to be consistent in our formation. He was one of the surprises at the start of the season.’

Paris Saint-Germain's 1-2 Champions League Cup defeat to AC Milan in November 2023 was a good example of how Ugarte's defensive style is a clear mismatch with Luis Enrique's desired positional discipline and possession push.

Of the 15 confrontations in that game, Ugarte won only three and was shown a yellow card for a vicious charge on Theo Hernández. He was eventually replaced by Fabián Ruiz on the hour mark.

In the 2023-2024 season, Ugarte only played one Champions League match for Paris Saint-Germain, where Luis Enrique preferred to use Vitinha Ferreira, Warren Zaïre-Emery and Fabián Ruiz, a choice that ultimately helped Paris Saint-Germain reach the semi-finals.

Aside from the stylistic differences, there were similar doubts about Ugarte's ability to adapt to the higher intensity and tempo of the league.

His defensive stats in terms of tackling and timing against the ball seemed to suffer, and he would often have millisecond delays in stealing the ball, which ultimately resulted in some fouls. In most cases, he either leaves too much space for the defence or creates fouls when opposing attackers are limited in their advances.

This can also be seen in his statistics. Compared to his final season at Sporting Portugal, his shovelling success rate (54 per cent in 22/23, 48 per cent last season), tackle success (2.2 average 90 minutes in 22/23, 1.9 average 90 minutes last season), tackling success (9.4 average 90 minutes in 22/23, 8.4 average 90 minutes 8.4), and the success rate of overhead kicks (63% in 22/23, 54% last season) have all dipped.

Ugarte also looks less confident when the ball is at his feet, always turning sideways rather than moving forwards when confronting opponents. This has led to him losing possession easily and has led to increased pressure on Gianluigi Donnarumma.

What Ugarte can bring to Manchester United

Ugarte's possession style could see Erik ten Hag find his way into Manchester United's style of play for the 2022/2023 season.

The Uruguayan national team player has a proven ability to steal the ball and could go some way to alleviating Manchester United's reliance on Casemiro in defence in midfield (even though he is not as good at contesting and controlling the ball as Casemiro).

As Manchester United have struggled to find a suitable, all-round midfielder this summer, Ugarte could be seen as a temporary defensive midfielder and save the team some money in order to ‘raid’ for more desirable long-term targets. The signings of Joshua Zirkzee and Leny Yoro give reason to believe that Manchester United are looking to sign younger players (under 25's) this summer, who combine impressive technical ability with stronger physical skills.

By the end of this summer's transfer window, Manchester United could be higher up in the past, with more confident players, as well as a somewhat lower wage bill.

Ugarte will be a key figure at United in pressing and counter-pressing in midfield. The recent signings of Matthijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui mean that Erik ten Hag has more options to help the team control the ball and organise at the defensive end. In theory, a back four of Noussair Mazraoui, Lisandro Martínez and Diogo Dalot means that Ugarte only needs to focus on holding the ball and transitioning when in possession. In this case, his short passes will be an enabler rather than a hindrance in the attacking system.