Hojlund arrived at Old Trafford in the summer of 2023 from Atalanta in a deal worth £72million after United failed to sign Harry Kane.
He scored 16 goals in his debut season in Manchester, hitting the 10 the following season. Only two of those came in the Premier League, however, with United sending him out on loan to Napoli in 2025. The deal was made permanent in June after a successful campaign back in Italy.
United replaced Hojlund with Benjamin Sesko, seeing off interest from a host of other clubs to sign him from RB Leipzig for a fee similar to the one laid out for the Denmark international six years ago.
Sesko has showed promise, averaging a goal every 85 minutes during the second-half of last season under Michael Carrick but the Slovenia international has been hamstrung by a shin injury over the last six months. United have not disclosed details on his latest issue with reports suggesting he could be sidelined until February.
The legendary goalkeeper accused United of replacing a ‘fantastic’ player with an injury-prone option in Sesko. Schmeichel also suggested Hojlund found himself in a dire situation in Manchester where many of his teammates ‘openly would not even pass to him’.
United sold Hojlund after just two seasons (Picture: Getty Images)
‘Rasmus Hojlund was a goal machine. And he will be a goal machine everywhere,’ Schmeichel said.
‘He’ll have periods where he doesn’t score but he will score a lot of goals. He’s young and from childhood, completely a Manchester United fan. He would do anything for this football club and he played in the period where he had no service.
‘He had players there who very openly would not even pass it to him. A young kid, who needed to be coached in order to maximise his great talent which I think he has, I see him playing for Denmark.
Hojlund has scored twice for Napoli this season (Picture: Shutterstock)
‘This is a fantastic player. What do we do? Well, we got the head of recruitment in from Red Bull [United’s director of recruitment, formerly technical director at RB Leipzig] and what does he do? He brings in his player.
‘So you’ve got Benjamin Sesko, who is a great player but is always injured. He doesn’t play. We have already gone two years down the road with a striker who has so much potential. Why did we feel the need to make a change there?’
Hojlund scored 16 goals in his first season back in Italy with Napoli. This term, he has scored two in 11 appearances, the same tally as Sesko despite seeing 600 more minutes of action than the Slovenian.
