Matthijs de Ligt's Journey: From Instant Starter to Rehabilitation
Matthijs de Ligt’s curious United summers: from instant starter to rehab watch
Manchester United did not spend close to £60m on Matthijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui in 2024 to watch one of them pace the touchline in a tracksuit. Yet as the 2026 pre-season winds towards its conclusion, that is exactly the picture with De Ligt: a cornerstone defender, present but not playing, stuck in the limbo of an “individual rehabilitation programme.”
It is a sharp contrast to how this story began.
Thrown straight in
United moved aggressively in 2024, reuniting De Ligt with his former Ajax manager Erik ten Hag and prising both him and Mazraoui from Bayern Munich. The Dutchman arrived at Old Trafford at 26, with a heavy price tag and even heavier expectations.
There was no gentle bedding-in. De Ligt didn’t feature in the 2024 summer tour at all, the timing of his transfer leaving no room for a soft launch. Instead, he was hurled straight into the Premier League, making his United debut against Fulham just days after signing. No rhythm, no pre-season minutes, just the demand to anchor a new defence on the fly.
He coped. But the pattern that has followed him throughout his career also followed him to Manchester: when he plays, he looks like a mainstay. When he doesn’t, it is usually his body calling the shots.
Amorim’s summer workhorse
If 2024 was a scramble, 2025 looked like the reset. Under Ruben Amorim, De Ligt finally got what every centre-back craves before a long campaign: a proper pre-season.
The former Juventus and Bayern defender completed the full 2025 summer tour, emerging as one of Amorim’s most trusted pieces. He started three of United’s five matches and racked up 261 minutes, the kind of steady workload that builds understanding, sharpness and authority.
That stretch felt significant. De Ligt looked settled, part of the core rather than the new face. United had the version they thought they were buying: a first-team regular with the presence to organise, the experience to lead and the comfort of having worked with elite coaches across Europe.
For once, his summer told a reassuring story.
A World Cup missed, a tour in doubt
This year has ripped that script up.
A back problem has kept De Ligt off the pitch for the entire 2026 summer tour so far. Not a cameo, not a late run-out to feel the ball again. Nothing. For a player in his supposed peak years, that absence bites.
The injury has already cost him a place at this summer’s World Cup with the Netherlands. Now it threatens to leave him undercooked for United’s new season as well. While his team-mates build chemistry and fitness on the grass, De Ligt is working alone, following a tailored programme and waiting for clearance to rejoin the action.
He has at least travelled with the squad to the Republic of Ireland for Wednesday’s friendly, a small but notable step. He is around the group, in the meetings, in the rhythm of matchdays again. But as things stand, there is no guarantee he will play even a single minute on this tour.
That is the uncomfortable question hanging over United’s final two pre-season fixtures.
Clock ticking before Leeds and Milan
United close out their preparations with two serious tests: Leeds United in Dublin and AC Milan in Poland. Those games are not just commercial exercises; they are the last real chances to tune a back line before the Premier League kicks off.
For De Ligt, they represent something more basic: the opportunity to appear at all.
He has yet to log a second in the 2026 tour and risks finishing the summer with the same blank pre-season record he had in 2024. Back then, the lack of minutes was about timing. This time, it is about a body that has already cost him a World Cup.
United know what he can be when fit: a key first-team defender, a natural partner for whoever lines up beside him. They also know the other side of the equation, the one that has “often caught up with him” since he arrived.
The next few days will show which version they take into another season.
