09 August 2023 , 16:04
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Harry Maguire's imminent £30 million move to West Ham is a new twist in the rise and fall of the world's most expensive defender.
When he's pulled on the Three Lions of England, Maguire has been a colossus, largely blameless when football was coming home at the last two major tournaments before the holy grail turned out to be a mirage in the desert. By common consent, in the words of his national team manager Gareth Southgate, he has not let England down.
But in his 18 months at Manchester United, who paid £80 million for him four years ago, the centre-back cheerfully nicknamed 'Slabhead' by his former team-mate Jamie Vardy became an accident-prone fall-guy.
Even when it wasn't his fault – like the stoppage-time own goal against Sevilla which undermined United's Europa League campaign – Maguire became an expedient scapegoat. In the heat of battle, he was as courageous as Frank Bruno. But when the judges' scores were in, increasingly he was lampooned and harpooned like Frank Spencer.
A change of scenery, from the goldfish bowl of English football's stumbling giants to the bubbles and soap opera ablutions of less censorious Eastenders, might be his salvation.
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If the Hammers complete a deal for Maguire which preserves his £180,000-a-week wages, his robust style should suit a team who tend to sit deep and face the oncoming traffic. At face value Maguire, 30, should be an upgrade on Kurt Zouma, Angelo Ogbonna and Nayef Aguerd at the Taxpayers Stadium.
And if Manchester City follow up their initial £70m bid for West Ham's Brazilian playmaker Lucas Paqueta, Maguire's projected switch may not be the last piece of transfer business between the cobbles of Coronation Street and flea market of Albert Square.
But since his move to Old Trafford from Leicester in 2019, nobody on the planet has paid more for a defender – and that has been Maguire's millstone.
It is not his fault that United's perpetual strength has been dragged down by the slowest takeover since Starbucks first infiltrated our high streets. It is not his fault that City's completion of an inevitable Treble in June removed the Red Devils' last comfort blanket of supremacy.
Harry Maguire responded to his Man Utd axe with the utmost class (Getty Images)