Manchester United when the team is trailing and the manager introduces a player he does not truly want.

Scott McTominay was available for transfer in the summer and United arrogantly rejected a £30million offer for West Ham. What luck for David Moyes. West Ham signed the productive James Ward-Prowse for the same fee and he has already tallied two goals and three assists in four Premier League games.

As for McTominay, he chased Jude Bellingham’s shadow at Hampden Park last week and then Tariq Lamptey at Old Trafford. The Scot was the only United player dropped to the bench in Munich, where he was summoned in the 69th minute.

Eleven minutes later, McTominay was dispossessed by Dayot Upamecano on the edge of the Bayern area. Upamecano sprinted away with the ball into United’s own area while McTominay jogged, like an amateur distance runner being lapped by one of the elite.

McTominay was described as a “Man United player through and through” by the idealistic Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in an interview published on Wednesday. A month into his permanent tenure as manager, Solskjaer was seething at United’s Easter Sunday burial by Everton. He said “no matter how much talent you have got, you run more than anyone”.

At the Allianz Arena, McTominay didn’t. It was out of character for one of the squad’s workhorses and a player whose association with United dates back to when he was five.

The beginning of the end of McTominay has started at United. The club have signed five central midfielders since Erik ten Hag took charge and, prior to the Brighton reverse, McTominay’s last five domestic starts had been in the absence of the suspended Casemiro.

Ten Hag has unintentionally demeaned McTominay in response to two questions this season. When asked if McTominay was a credible alternative to Casemiro in defensive midfield, Ten Hag offered a cursory acknowledgement and then rhapsodized about the 18-year-old and injured Kobbie Mainoo.

A week later, Ten Hag explained the incentive in recruiting Sofyan Amrabat is he is another No.6 and United had to make “compromises” playing other players there. Ie. McTominay.

Amrabat has not played a club game since the Europa Conference League final for Fiorentina on June 7 and it remains to be seen if he will be available for his United debut at Burnley on Saturday night. United remained in Munich overnight and trained in Bavaria on Thursday, so the only team training session Amrabat can be involved in is today.

It is not a flattering look for United to sign two players carrying injuries, never mind two players whose transfers coincided with their switch to the same agency that represents Ten Hag.

“My wife and I have a different meaning of the word ‘home’ these days,” Kees Vos wrote on Instagram, accompanied by a picture of him posing in front of the entrance to the home dressing room at Old Trafford. Perhaps too close to home.

Vos’s SEG International agency were quick to claim credit for “bringing” Amrabat to United in a glossy video, though it is understood SEG only negotiated Amrabat’s personal terms. Other intermediaries were involved in the agreement of the €10million loan fee that United eventually paid. The deal only happened with the assistance of another agency.

The SEG alliance will intensify the scrutiny on Amrabat, a popular signing among the United fanbase and already under pressure to plug the gaps in their open midfield. Ten Hag intends to pair him with Casemiro and that could happen sooner rather than later, with Christian Eriksen’s durability an issue and Mason Mount poised to shift to the right to fill the void left by Antony.

Figures in United’s recruitment department were sceptical of Amrabat but the club eventually relented on transfer deadline day after Wolves, Tottenham and Nottingham Forest steamrollered through their midfield. Ten Hag insisted four weeks ago that Mainoo “is ready to take that (defensive) role” and the 18-year-old has been promised ample exposure.

Mainoo and Amrabat both conducted individual training sessions in front of the cameras on Tuesday as Mount resumed team training. When all five are available, McTominay is unlikely to be summoned.