Luke Shaw insists that he is embracing the competition being provided by Tyrell Malacia at Manchester United.
Malacia was the first transfer of the Erik ten Hag era, joining in a £12.9million transfer from Feyenoord in July. The 23-year-old defender made a strong start at United, ousting Shaw as the first-choice left-back, but has been on the bench for the past four matches while the England international played.
Competition isn’t anything new for Shaw, who was rotated with Alex Telles last season by Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ralf Rangnick. And the 27-year-old, who is in his ninth season with the club, is not phased by the possibility of losing his place to Malacia.
"It's about keeping fit and keeping that high level consistently," he said when asked by the United Review about the competition. "Tyrell has obviously been playing as well and playing really well, and I think that's really good, for the manager to have competition in different positions, and both of us performing at a good level.
"I really like Ty. I sit next to him in the changing room and he's a really nice guy and an extremely good player. He’s still very young and we get on really well and, for both of us, it’s nice to get on well with someone who is in your position. That really helps because, when he plays, I want him to do the best for the team and I know he has the same feeling for me."
After making a slow start to the season, Shaw has hit a decent patch of form for United recently. He has started the past three Premier League matches, helping to keep clean sheets against Newcastle and Tottenham before providing the assist for Casemiro’s late header in the 1-1 draw at Chelsea on Saturday.
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His recent solid performances come at a good time, with the World Cup edging closer, and Shaw puts his improvement down to Ten Hag, who he says made a real impression right from the start through his training methods.
"His structure and the way he wants to play with the ball and without the ball – it was really impressive,” he said. “Things obviously take time, but I think we’re going in the right direction and I think it could be a really good next few months because I feel like we’re taking the right steps.
"I think there has been a massive improvement. The start of the season was obviously nowhere near good enough, we all knew that, but I think, since then, we’ve taken a lot of big strides [forward] and good strides, but I think there is still a lot more to come.
"We know we can do better – for example against Newcastle at home [earlier this month], we have to be winning those games and taking three points instead of one. But there has definitely been improvements and there is still a lot more to come."
