Donny van de Beek is enjoying some time with his expanding family before reporting back for duty this summer, with his return to Carrington currently pencilled in for late in the first week of July.
The 27-year-old and his partner, Estelle Bergkamp, daughter of former Arsenal forward Dennis, welcomed their second child just over four months ago and with a clear summer they have been taking a break.
Van de Beek presumably tuned in to see the Netherlands end their Euro 2024 group stage campaign against Austria on Tuesday but he could be forgiven if he has decided to skip the tournament. A few years ago it would have been implausible for the midfielder not to be a key part of that squad.
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The reality is that the £35m man hasn’t played for his country in more than three years and at a time when he should be at his peak, he is instead at a career crossroads and in danger of going down the wrong path.
A January loan move to Eintracht Frankfurt that included an option to buy for around £9.5m didn’t provide the kickstart required to get him back on track. Van de Beek started just four times in the Bundesliga and made only eight appearances, never lasting beyond 66 minutes. It was clear early on that he would be returning to Manchester this summer, rather than remaining in Frankfurt.
A knee injury picked up midway through Erik ten Hag’s first season ended any chance of Van de Beek establishing himself at Old Trafford under his former Ajax manager and the last time he completed 90 minutes came in March 2022, in a 1-0 defeat for Everton against Wolves. He hasn’t managed more than 2,000 minutes in a season since his last for Ajax in 2019/20.
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Injuries have certainly played their part but the biggest contributor has been a consistent underperformance since swapping Ajax for United in October 2020. What looked like a shrewd bit of business at £35m has turned into a nightmare for the player and club.
It’s hard to believe now that Van de Beek was set to sign for Real Madrid in that window, only for the Spanish giants to pull out when Covid-19 ripped a hole in their balance sheet. United swooped in.
Unfortunately, they did so without a plan of how to use him and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer never found a way to get the best out of him, often playing him in a deeper midfield role. Ten Hag believes he is best closer to the opposition penalty area but even he barely played him, a sure sign the player was struggling given the loyalty of his former Ajax boss.
Van de Beek’s next move is anyone’s guess. There have been suggestions he has reunited with former agent Guido Albers, who was dumped in October 2021 after failing to secure him a move.
That came after Albers and Van de Beek trusted Solskjaer’s promise of more regular first-team football in the summer of 2021. A loan move to Everton had been agreed and signed off by the board that summer, only for the Norwegian to insist he would give the midfielder more opportunities. They never arrived.
Solskjaer told Albers he was "committed to showing staying at United was the right decision" and the United boss was understood to be conflicted about whether to sanction a move or back his own belief that it would come good in the end. There was a certain irony to Van de Beek scoring the last goal of the Solskjaer era, in the 4-1 defeat at Watford in November 2021. It also remains Van de Beek's last competitive goal for United.
Who knows whether he will get a chance for another? In Ten Hag's first six months at the club, he did hand Van de Beek opportunities, particularly as a back-up for Bruno Fernandes, but he now has Kobbie Mainoo as a midfield option and has to make a success of £55m man Mason Mount.
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United would like to offload Van de Beek permanently this summer and it is their last chance to do so, but his body of work in terms of form and fitness recently makes that a hard ask. Another loan is a possibility, or he might even end up stuck at his parent club.
Van de Beek has a year left on his contract and if he isn't sold this summer he will leave on a free transfer next year. It is now six seasons since Ajax's run to the Champions League semi-finals and Van de Beek's breakthrough in Amsterdam. Little has gone right for him since then.