Erik ten Hag could be about to find his new ideal Manchester United centre-back pairing

Just like that, Manchester United are down to the bare bones in defence.

Despite spending about £230million on centre-backs and signing a new one in five of the last seven summer transfer windows, United now find themselves in a position of having only two available for Thursday's trip to Cyprus to face Nicosia and likely for Sunday's match at Everton.

Eric Bailly's loan move to Marseille left Erik ten Hag with four senior centre-backs but now two are sidelined. Captain Harry Maguire hasn't started since the 4-0 defeat at Brentford but picked up a knock during England's thrilling 3-3 draw with Germany in the international break. Raphael Varane had taken his place and has looked at his imperious best but was struck by injury once again in Sunday's shambolic derby defeat.

ALSO READ: Ten Hag might have to drop one of United's untouchables

The Frenchman suffered an ankle injury and was off the field when Erling Haaland was left unmarked to nod in the second goal. Varane battled on until United were 4-0 down but at that point could no longer continue. It appears his injury doesn't look to be serious as sources have described it as 'not bad.'

The club are rightly remaining cautious though with Varane's considerable injury struggles since arriving at Old Trafford. He missed 17 games last season with a variety of ailments.

This leaves Ten Hag with only his trustee Lisandro Martinez and Victor Lindelof, who has seen little action so far this season. The lack of minutes has perhaps been harsh on the Swede who stood out more than most last season of having a solid enough campaign as everything else crumbled around him.

Yet, it can't be argued that Martinez and Varane weren't developing a great partnership together before a