“It ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!”
Those inspirational quotes from Rocky Balboa have been bandied about excessively since the film’s release in 2006, but franchise creator and star Sylvester Stallone, one of Hollywood’s biggest Premier League fans, would probably agree that Harry Maguire is as close to the embodiment of those words as anyone.
Maguire has taken so many hits since his record-breaking move to Manchester United from Leicester City in August 2019. Most players would have stayed down in the face of seemingly endless setbacks and vitriol, or at the very least accepted that they are not cut out for the intensity and pressure of football at the highest level.
But that has never been an option for Maguire. Against all the odds, he’s kept moving forward, backing himself through the darkest periods to eventually emerge on the other side as a true winner. Maguire has silenced his critics, and is now playing a leading role in an exciting revolution under Ruben Amorim. It’s been a long road, but United’s unbreakable £80 million ($96m) man is finally living up to his price tag.