Manchester United have some big questions they need to answer as they wait in football purgatory for the rest of the season to be decided.

The promised land of Champions League football is within touching distance, but Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and his side understandably must wait for more pressing world events to unravel.

However, the next few weeks should give Solskjaer time to think about his United team for the rest of the season, and the role in which midfielder Paul Pogba will play.

News of a contract extension for Nemanja Matic was thoroughly deserved, but again poses questions of playing time going forward and which midfielders will form the core of the first-team squad.

For Pogba this news could be viewed as an incentive to fight for his place in the team, or further evidence of the club planning for his expected exit at the end of the season. In reality it is most likely a bit of both.

But, it is not only Solskjaer who Pogba must be eager to prove wrong, but current Chelsea manager Frank Lampard, who is still looking for the midfielder to establish himself as the standout playmaker in world football.

“I don’t know what Pogba is,” Lampard pondered back in 2018. “He makes bad decisions but then does fantastic things which must wreck Jose (Mourinho)’s head. Pogba is naturally more talented than I was, he would run all over me and has better feet, but there’s no point dribbling in your own half.

“All that ‘flick and roll of the studs,’ I’m not an advocate of that. A lot of young players see it on YouTube and think it’s amazing, but I don’t like it. He has delved to that side too much. His numbers are not good enough, he progressed at Juve but there’s another progression he has to do. He should be getting 15 goals a season and dominating games because he has everything.”

The sad truth is that two years on and much of his criticism still remains accurate, at club level at least.

Pogba was excellent as France won the World Cup in Russia two years ago, but his form has never been quite the same when playing at club level. It is fair to say United have never got the best out of Pogba, but likewise the French midfielder has rarely got the best out of himself. His form during the bewildering unbeaten start under Solskjaer was the peak of his personal standards at Old Trafford, but a year on from that the same problems persist.

What will surely irritate Solskjaer the most is the fact there have been glimmers of promise. Pogba was one of the best players during the pre-season tour last summer, while his cameo display against Watford back in December set the benchmark for what a United midfielder should do.

Following the January arrival of Bruno Fernandes there is added optimism about the role Pogba can play in the United team upon the return of football, and it is testament to the job Solskjaer is doing that there is argument against the France international going straight back into the line up.

Pogba remains the most naturally talented player at the club, but his performances will now only be further scrutinised in comparison to the displays we have seen from Fernandes in his short time in England. While Lampard might criticise Pogba for unnecessary flamboyance on the ball it is Fernandes who carefully balances the exuberant with effective simplicity.

For the first time in his United career Pogba will have to prove himself to not only be the best outfield player, but the best midfielder at the club. If he can rise to that challenge not only will United finally see the best from the Frenchman, but he might finally prove Lampard wrong, and it could come at the expense of his Chelsea side.