Former Manchester United defender Paul Parker has made a startling claim about caretaker boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
The Norwegian has been placed in interim charge at Old Trafford following Jose Mourinho’s exit and it seems executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward has already set his mind on who he wants to take charge long term.
Wednesday night’s 2-0 win at Newcastle extended Solskjaer’s perfect start and made him, in some supporters’ eyes, the leading candidate to take the job permanently.
However, Parker doubts Solskjaer’s ability to attract top players, telling talkSPORT: “Ole’s a lovely fella.
“He’s come in, he’s brought a smile into the place, everyone’s feeling happy. You’ll get the best out of anybody when they’re happy and they’re doing their work.
“Long-term, I don’t think so. As good as it can be this season I think you have to look at the long-term.
“Look at Manchester United, they need that little bit more, someone who’s really going to go out and attract the right players.
“Can Ole Gunnar get the right top players to come to Manchester United?
“I have to say with his lack of experience, players are not going to come there.
“Agents are not really going to come there. You’ll get players who want to play for United, no doubt now.
“But you’re not going to get the players that Manchester United should be getting because they haven’t got a manager of the calibre that players and agent are going to want their man to come to.”
He added: “One of the names that has been mentioned is Laurent Blanc.
“Someone said to me he’s been a national team manager, he managed PSG, oh but that’s easy because they win everything.
“It wasn’t so much about it was easy for him but he managed top quality players.
“He managed [Zlatan] Ibrahimovic. Ibrahimovic never had a go at him, Ibrahimovic says good things about him.
“So he managed top quality players and he can attract good top players now because they see and hear the name and they go ‘I want to be around him’.”