Manchester United can still give Erik ten Hag what he wants in midfield with bargain transfer

It's taken a while to get there but Manchester United look to have turned their summer around.

Things looked bleak at the end of June when no signings had been made at all in what was supposed to be a grand rebuild under new manager Erik ten Hag. New bodies finally did arrive but humiliating defeats to Brighton and Brentford made it crystal clear that they wouldn't be enough.

In the weeks since there has been a marked upturn in optimism around United. The new manager was able to arrest what looked to be a crisis by adapting his methods to get wins over Liverpool and Southampton and significant additions have been made. The desperately-needed defensive midfielder was finally added and a great one at that in serial Champions League winner Casemiro. After driving a hard bargain, Ajax have finally been convinced to sell Antony and back-up between the sticks in Martin Dubravka is on the way too.

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If a last-minute loan move for Sergino Dest also goes through, then United will have improved their options at right-back as well and will be sitting a lot more pretty than they were just a few weeks ago. That budding sense of hope could be well placed, for once.

But it still hasn't been the perfect window for Ten Hag as it's abundantly obvious that the player he wanted above any other was Frenkie de Jong. It's clear to see why, too. The Dutchman's guile and metronomic distribution is exactly what United are missing in the middle and what Ten Hag needs for his style to be a success. Even though United defeated Southampton on the weekend, the disconnect between the attack and midfield was a stifling problem.

There's no chance United can get De Jong at this point but that