By: Kevin Kemboi
Malacia is a top class young player who’s elite technically, near impossible to impress, lightening quick, and incredibly dynamic whilst being aggressive defensively and mentally. That’s a dream signing from ten Hag in a position United needed depth in. £15.7m is a steal.
Malacia is a crazy technician. His speed and technical combination means he possesses a very rare skillset, a bit like Marcelo, formerly of Real Madrid.
Combination wise, Marcelo is arguably the best fullback to ever do it, and Malacia is similar in that sense.
Malacia can receive the ball at any angle. If he has his back to goal and he’s being pressed he can comfortably turn inside or outside to buy himself time to pick out a pass. He’s one of those players who’s near impossible to press which makes him a cheat code in the build-up.
For a typical pressing trigger such as a fullback, that’s an invaluable trait to have as Malacia will regularly be pressed but he has the turning radius and technique to evade pressure at all angles.
His ability to turn fluidly means he’s an incredible dribbler and ball carrier too.
This means that Malacia can single handedly evade pressure and carry the ball up the pitch himself thanks to his close control dribbling and comfortability in dribbling in any direction.
His passing is similarly exceptional. He fizzes the ball with speed & accuracy like Timber.
Lisandro Martinez is just like that too so it’s clear ten Hag has a ‘type’. Players who play crisp passes in the manner that Malacia does are so, so valuable. Their passing profile is effective, progressive & crucially efficient. He’s also comfortable using his right foot to pass
If ever there were two clips side-by-side to sum up Tyrell Malacia, it’s these two. They might not seem like much, but look how comfortable he is at turning and look at the accuracy and fizz on his passing. He’s like this all over the park.
The guy is crazy press resistant.
The aforementioned description fits the bill for Lisandro Martinez and Timber but what separates Malacia from those two is his speed. The guy is lightening quick – 90+ pace on FIFA quick. This means that not only does he have the skillset to combine, but he has off-ball runs too.
With Frenkie de Jong looking increasingly likely, I can’t help but think of United’s left-hand side and how ridiculous the combination play is going to be. Frenkie and Malacia are ridiculously press resistant, Rashford or Sancho are excellent combiners, Ronaldo or Bruno will drift across.
The technical level amongst that lot combined with the combination of ball carrying, interchangeability position-wise, the ability for all of them to receive & be effective in numerous areas, their tendency towards playing short passes but also the penetration to complement that.
This left-hand side will be crazy creatively. The interchangeability and combination play will be off the charts. Good luck dealing with Shaw and Malacia’s runs from deep along with the insane technical level and quick feet of Rashford, Frenkie, Sancho, Ronaldo and Bruno.
Malacia has the quality and profile to make penetrative runs from deep, combine effectively, receive in central or wide areas, be dynamic with his dribbling and ball carrying along with having the technical quality to deliver top quality crosses/pullbacks into the box.
Luke Shaw is a top fullback but he’s very injury prone so United badly needed a player in the mould of a Tyrell Malacia to replace the clearly not good enough A. Telles. A guy like that is crippling to team dynamics considering the drop off in quality.
That’s no longer an issue
With Malacia, United now have two top class options at fullback and the team dynamics will remain when Shaw AND Malacia play. That’s key to every top team – maintenance of profiles in terms of depth across the park so team dynamics aren’t effected every time there’s an injury.
Defensively, Malacia is lightening quick as previously mentioned so that’s incredibly useful. He’s also a tenacious and aggressive defender who likes the physical side of the game.
That right there points towards a determined character who loves the gritty side of the sport.
That’s incredibly encouraging because that aggression would suggest he has the required mental profile to add determinism and necessary character to the United dressing room. Malacia’s only flaw might be his height (5’7) and light stature, but his pace or aggression makes up for it.
Ten Hag has a fetish for a certain profile, and that’s small defenders with a low centre of gravity who excel technically (Timber, Lisandro Martinez, and Malacia). These guys are all ridiculous at turning fluidly in any direction & being elite technicians.
John Kariuki