Luke Shaw says Manchester United are heading into their first league game of the new season with a mood he has not felt often in his time there. With the Premier League season due to start tomorrow afternoon away to Hull in the early kick-off, Shaw said he feels “really, really positive” about what is coming next.
The defender, who is about to begin his 13th season at Old Trafford, said the atmosphere around the squad is among the best he has known at the club. He described the group as the most positive, happiest and probably talented he has seen there, pointing to the manager as part of the reason the feeling has sharpened before the opener.
That matters because Shaw is not speaking as a newcomer trying to sell hope. He has spent more than a decade inside a club that has gone through different groups, different atmospheres and plenty of ups and downs, and he said that experience makes him a reliable judge of what a good camp looks like. In his view, the mood around the place is not just a passing lift before a match. It is genuine.
He also said that carrying that message to newer players is now part of his job. Shaw said he has learned how hard it can be for fresh arrivals to settle at Manchester United, even if outsiders assume it is simple. Because of that, he said it is important to give his own experience to others and help them adapt quickly to the club.
There is a small friction in that message, and it is what gives it weight. Shaw talks about an extremely positive environment, yet he also says coming to Manchester United is not always as easy as people think. The club can feel welcoming and difficult at the same time, and he has lived long enough through both sides of it to know that one good pre-season mood does not remove the pressure that comes with the badge.
Still, he said the players who have come in so far have fitted into the group really well. They have brought good energy on and off the pitch, settled in quickly and, in his words, been great around the lads. For Shaw, that early integration matters because it keeps the group stable before the season begins in earnest.
The result is a straightforward but telling message from one of the squad’s most experienced figures: Manchester United go into the new campaign feeling lighter, stronger and more settled than Shaw has known for a while. Tomorrow’s opener away to Hull will not answer every question, but it will show whether that mood can survive once the season starts for real.
