Mainoo is already one of the Premier League’s best midfielders – here’s how he can become a great

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Robin Bairner | Editor

Kobbie Mainoo has been set free by Michael Carrick but has another level to his game to unlock at Manchester United after signing a five-year deal.

Months of torment as a substitute under Ruben Amorim have been pushed to one side and Mainoo finds himself back in the Old Trafford spotlight.

So troubled was his time under the Portuguese, it appeared he might leave on loan. Certainly, there were grave doubts over a contract extension.

A new coach, though, has changed everything for Mainoo, who on Thursday signed a five-year deal.

The 21-year-old England star has so far justified the interim manager’s faith in a decision that is increasingly looking mutually beneficial. While Mainoo is back on the field and enjoying his football again, Carrick looks a shoo-in to become Man Utd’s next permanent manager. This could be the beginning of a long and fruitful partnership.

Mainoo is a potential world-leading talent

Despite Amorim’s misgivings over the academy product, Mainoo has been one of the best central midfielders in the Premier League this season, according to data analytics firm SciSports, which uses hundreds of in-game statistics to analyse the performance of players.

His ceiling is also awesome. SciSports, which gives each player a SciSkill based on their stats, calculates he has a potential rating of 121.4. Put into context, this would make him the second-best central midfielder in the world at this point of time.

Already regarded as a regular starter at Man Utd, but how can he attain the world-leading recognition that the experts’ model believes he is capable of?

Work to be done in transition

Mainoo’s super strength statistically, according to SciSports, is his defensive positioning. Of Premier League players who have hit the threshold of 900 minutes that the experts believe is necessary to gain an accurate measure of performance, only Tottenham’s Archie Gray performs better in this regard.

But there are defensive weaknesses to his game, which go some way to explaining why Amorim did not favour him in a 3-4-3 system. He rates among the bottom third of central midfielders in the Premier League when it comes to open-play disruption and also counter control. Given that these were two pillars of Amorim’s system, which relied heavily on effectiveness in transition, it could explain why he was not more trusted by the previous regime.

These defensive shortcomings are, therefore, an area of the 21-year-old’s game that can be improved.

Refine passing and become a goal threat

Offensively, Mainoo is a well-rounded figure yet there is one glaring statistical weakness in his game: it has been exactly 50 appearances since he scored a Premier League goal.

While he excels at ball retention and dribbling, SciSports’ analysis shows that he is deficient in terms of both his offensive positioning and his finishing. This combination is not a good mix when it comes to finding the net.

Digging deeper into Mainoo’s performance to address minor details that could elevate his game further, SciSports reports there are two areas of his passing game that can worked on.

Firstly, his deep completion rate is a weakness. Tidying this up would provide another very dangerous tool in his armoury that could only benefit his side, bringing another threat to United’s play and forcing opposing defences into rethinking how they tackle the challenge of the Old Trafford side.

A more fundamental issue, meanwhile, is his first pass after recovering possession. Again, this is an area where he falls into the bottom third of players. Bruno Fernandes, by contrast, rates around the level of Rodri in this capacity.

It’s all up to Mainoo

Mainoo is already playing to a spectacularly high standard for United, but now he’s entering a stage of his career that could be transformative. If he is to attain the world-class status that many at Old Trafford believe he is capable of, there are areas of improvement that can be made.

In particular, he can become a more potent attacking force by addressing his finishing and passing in certain circumstances, while working on his game in defensive transition will help United when they are going the other way.

Mainoo is on his way to becoming a great, it’s now up to him to make sure he achieves it.

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