Manchester United Chief Executive Ed Woodward has confirmed that the club are not actively looking for a new technical director at this moment in time.

Speaking in a conference call with shareholders after the Red Devils announced record revenues of £627.1m, he said that the club’s recruitment over the summer demonstrated there is no need to have a new man in place in charge of transfers:

“Regarding the speculation around the Head of Football, we are continually reviewing and looking at the potential to evolve our structure on the football side.”

“Much of the speculation around this type of role revolves around recruitment – an area that we’ve evolved in recent years. We feel the players we’ve signed in the summer demonstrate this approach is the right one.”

Considering United’s poor start to the season, such an explanation is unlikely to go down well with fans. It is true that the signings of Daniel James, Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Harry Maguire have all looked like good purchases so far, but the squad is wafer-thin in other areas.

The decision to offload both Romelu Lukaku and Alexis Sanchez without finding replacements has left manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer with very few options up front, and he has having to rely on youth players who are inexperienced at the highest level.