Manchester United’s recruitment department is reported to be under “increasing scrutiny” as the club’s new sporting hierarchy gets deeper into the job at hand.

Since Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s minority buy-in and takeover of football and some other operations was agreed, United have appointed a new chief executive, a new technical director, an interim recruitment director and a first-ever sporting director, in addition to appointing key INEOS figures Jean-Claude Blanc and Sir Dave Brailsford as directors on the sporting side of the club.

But the club has continued to struggle on the pitch, with Sunday’s embarrassing 3-0 home defeat to Tottenham Hotspur putting fresh pressure back on manager Erik ten Hag, having previously survived a review at the end of last season to keep his job.

Criticism is quickly turning towards the summer recruits, for whom there was much optimism when they arrived. Now, Jamie Carragher has slated Matthijs de Ligt’s positioning live on Sky Sports, Noussair Mazraoui and Manuel Ugarte have come under fire for performances against Tottenham, and detractors are asking why Joshua Zirkzee only has one goal involvement in eight appearances.

The Manchester Evening News has reported that, amid a new “stricter operation” at Old Trafford, recruitment staff are “on tenterhooks” and “working in fear”. Since the end of the summer transfer window, sporting director Dan Ashworth is described as performing a “deep dive” into how the club works and has already noticed “shortcomings in certain areas”.

United’s longer-term record of recruitment has generally been poor since Sir Alex Ferguson retired in 2013 and the club underwent significant hierarchical changes.

Expensive flops like Paul Pogba, Angel Di Maria, Romelu Lukaku and Alexis Sanchez have come and gone. Other less high-profile signings including Fred, Ander Herrera, Marcos Rojo and Eric Bailly also haven’’t managed to push the club on, while nearly all players sold have brought a financial loss.

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