A former Manchester United coach has revealed how the club used 'playground’ sessions to develop Paul Pogba.
United are reportedly in talks over a world-record £100 million deal to bring the midfielder back to Old Trafford from Juventus.
Pogba arrived as a 16-year-old but opted to leave for the Serie A champions having struggled to secure a regular role under Sir Alex Ferguson.
Pogba has since morphed into one of Europe's best talents and Paul McGuinness, who spent 24 years as an academy coach at United, has opened up about how the midfielder is now expressing the skills he learned at the Red Devils on the biggest stage.
"Paul was very popular," he told ESPN.
"He was like the Pied Piper with the younger lads who looked up to him. We worked with all the players on positional play. With Paul, it meant understanding the demands of his role in technical, tactical and team sessions. They were the staple diet of training.
"We encouraged the development of creative skills throughout and used 'playground' sessions once or twice a week to target the development of timing, disguise and creative skills. The likes of Pogba, [Adnan] Januzaj, [Jesse] Lingard and [Marcus] Rashford are showing them now.
"Paul had played in cages in France, which hone your skill. We'd like to think that we let him develop at United by letting him play freely, like he was in a playground.
"Rather than having a coach barking orders at them, it relaxed the players who were not afraid of making mistakes.
"Paul could carry on practising that flick he does over the head of a rival which you still see in his game. We also had sessions which were strong on tactics and Paul was involved in a more structured environment when he trained with the first team, but we felt our approach helped him develop the qualities he'd started developing as a street footballer."...
- Goal