Harry Maguire pays tribute to Man Utd assistant Mike Phelan for giving him Premier League breakthrough

Harry Maguire has paid tribute to former Manchester United defenders Mike Phelan and Steve Bruce for helping him get his move to Old Trafford.

Phelan, who now serves as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s assistant manager, handed Maguire his chance to become a Hull City first-team regular back in 2016.

He went on to be voted the Tigers’ player of the season in a campaign that ended with their relegation back to the Championship.

The centre-half went onto join Leicester and has gone from strength-to-strength with his rise culminating in a £80m move to United – a world record fee for a defender.

Following confirmation of the move, Maguire praised Phelan’s impact on his career and explained he is relishing the prospect of working alongside him again.

Maguire told the United app: “He always gave me lots of tips and lots of pointers from the top players that he’d worked with in the past.

“He was the person who took over at Hull and gave me my chance in the Premier League and I started playing regularly, so I owe him a lot.

"I’m really excited to be working with him again, he’s a top coach, he’s helped me through the years and I’ve always been in contact with him so it is good that I get the chance to work with him again.”

Former United defender Bruce originally brought Maguire to Hull from Sheffield United back in 2014.

“I’ve been really lucky with managers, in the past I’ve had great experience with centre-backs especially, working under them,” Maguire continued.

“Steve was brilliant with me and Hull is a club I’ve got a lot to thank for what they did to me. I had special times there and obviously Mike and Steve were two ex-Manchester United players and I learned an awful lot from them.”