There is no surety that Zlatan will even play again, if he does it will be in 2018 and with no pre-season to gain match fitness will be a tall order and it may very well take another 3 months after recovery to get back to his normal levels, even for a rich club paying £350k per week for a whole season with no guarantee of goals could seriously dent their revenues.
Besides a player like Zlatan thrives on being the main man, Mou will have to bring in a striker who will probably lead to a radical change in the way United play, by the time anarudi atauma bench kama Rooney which surely wouldn’t please him at all. It is time for a change.
I think zlatan was gonna compromise as the manager said he was open to extend their stay this means they had a grasp on his long time in recovery.
Zlatan has had long stints of injuries and he is mature enough not to expect the same deal as the one he had before.
The main reason why United failed to renew Zlatan’s contract was his wages (around 360k a week) coupled with the fact that he won’t be able to play for them before Jan 2018 so I think it’s fair.
Where Zlatan’s hold up play is second to none, he doesn’t have the legs for counter attacks, which I feel is an area Mourinho would like to strengthen and use more often. I would say Rashford would’ve been the one to take that mantle, but his decision-making and finishing lately have not been the kind United can depend on. Martial is obviously not being considered as a striker, otherwise he’d get more opportunities there, but most of those have gone to Rashford. So get a player who can both run and score, so that even if Zlatan’s form dips, we’ve got someone there to say ‘you’re the man now’. And we can slowly move Zlatan on.