Matthijs de Ligt’s Manchester United Pre-Season Struggles

Manchester United did not spend close to £60m to bring Matthijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui from Bayern Munich in 2024 just to watch the Dutch defender pace the touchline in a bib. Yet two summers on from that double deal, De Ligt’s pre-season story at Old Trafford is a jagged one: a whirlwind start, a full tour that promised stability, and now a frustrating standstill.

A blockbuster arrival, no pre-season

United’s reunion of De Ligt with his former Ajax manager Erik ten Hag was supposed to be a cornerstone move. At 26, with Ajax, Juventus and Bayern already on his CV, he arrived as a ready-made leader for a defence in need of authority.

He just didn’t arrive in time for pre-season.

Signed ahead of the 2024-25 Premier League campaign, De Ligt missed the entire 2024 summer tour. There was no gentle integration, no phased minutes in friendlies, no chance to learn his team-mates’ movements under low pressure. Instead, he was thrown straight into the deep end, making his United debut against Fulham only days after completing his move from Germany.

The message was clear: this was a defender United could not wait to use.

Injuries lurking in the background

Since then, De Ligt has been a key first-team presence when available. His profile – commanding in the air, aggressive in duels, comfortable stepping into midfield – has often given United’s back line a different edge.

But the same sentence keeps following him around: “when available.”

The Netherlands international’s injury record has repeatedly cut into that influence. Just as he appears ready to settle into a rhythm, the body intervenes. It has become a pattern that shadows his time at Old Trafford, and it now shapes his pre-season narrative as much as his performances do.

Amorim’s first summer: finally a full tour

The cleanest chapter in this story came last year. Under Ruben Amorim, ahead of the 2025-26 Premier League season, De Ligt finally enjoyed what every major signing is supposed to get: a full, uninterrupted pre-season.

He completed the entire 2025 summer tour, starting three of United’s five matches and logging 261 minutes. It was not just about numbers on a fitness sheet. Those games offered something De Ligt had been denied the previous year – time to build partnerships, to absorb a new manager’s demands, to step into the season with sharpness rather than catch-up work.

For a player whose United career has been punctured by knocks, that tour felt like a small breakthrough. The kind of base from which a centre-back can impose himself over nine gruelling months.

A World Cup missed, a tour on hold

This summer has ripped that optimism away.

De Ligt has not featured for a single minute in United’s 2026 tour. A back problem has kept him on an individual rehabilitation programme, away from the cut and thrust of match action. For a defender who relies on timing, positioning and physical dominance, every lost minute in pre-season matters.

The setback has already had international consequences. The Netherlands defender missed this summer’s World Cup, a major blow for a player in what should be his prime years. Now the same issue is threatening to eat into his club preparation as well.

He has at least travelled with the squad to the Republic of Ireland for Wednesday’s friendly against Leeds United in Dublin. That detail matters: it suggests he is close enough to the group to be involved, even if only on the fringes. Yet there is still no guarantee he will play a single minute before the new campaign begins.

A race against the calendar

United’s pre-season window is closing fast. After Leeds in Dublin comes AC Milan in Poland, the final stop before the Premier League returns.

Those two fixtures now double as a countdown for De Ligt. Can he step onto the pitch at all this summer? Can he avoid the unwanted symmetry of 2024 – a United player, a big investment, but no pre-season minutes to his name?

The contrast with last year is stark. From 261 minutes and three starts under Amorim in 2025 to zero so far in 2026, his preparation has swung from ideal to improvised. For a club building around expensive defensive pieces, that is not a trivial detail; it shapes tactical plans, selection debates, even transfer thinking.

United know what De Ligt looks like when he is fully fit and fully involved in a tour. The question now is whether his back will let them see that version again when the real games start – or whether another season begins with their marquee centre-back chasing fitness instead of setting the tone.