At the start of the season, if you told most Manchester United fans that they would be heading into Christmas perfectly content with a centre-back partnership of Phil Jones and Marcos Rojo, they would have looked at you like you were an alien.
While Phil Jones is someone who was essentially written off as a player who's career had been decimated beyond repair due to injuries, Rojo was regarded as a wildly inconsistent defender and a liability in terms of his discipline.
Fast forward to the turn of the year, and Jones and Rojo, having been turned to after to injuries to Eric Bailly and Chris Smalling, have formed a partnership that has seen a defensive solidity sorely missed at Old Trafford in recent seasons. Four league wins on the bounce have seen just two goals conceded, and while Rojo should have been sent off for two wild challenges against Everton and Crystal Palace, he has otherwise been faultless.
For someone who was criticised heavily by fans and media alike as recently as October, Rojo has turned it around and shown that he is capable of defending well and with consistency, something Zlatan Ibrahimovic claims all who trained with him on a daily basis already knew.
Speaking to ESPN, Zlatan was asked how he gets on with Argentinian teammates Sergio Romero and Marcos Rojo, and he took time to hit out at the criticisms made over the defender, before praising him for being part of the team that Mourinho has identified can get results.
The world sees only the player, I see the person and the player. And I can say positive here, and positive there.
I think Rojo has done a fantastic half-year, even in the beginning he was not playing so much and then I think people were talking, which is nonsense, not important. And since he came in he has done a fantastic job.
Like we knew he could do, because we are seeing it every day in training.
But the coach is there to find the collective parts before the individual. Because when he has the collective, he can start playing with the individual, so he needs to find his base. And Rojo has been in that base, so I'm happy.
High praise from the Swede, and it certainly does seem that both Jones and Rojo have been able to prove that they belong at Manchester United, and can help the team going forward, something that was questioned, and understandably so, when the season began.
It will be interesting to see what happens when both Eric Bailly and Chris Smalling return to full fitness, as the Ivorian has become a big hit with the fans due to his performances in his first season at the club, while Smalling was one of the outstanding defenders in the league last season despite United's problems with consistency.
But for the moment, Rojo and Jones appear to be playing too well to be ousted from their starting positions.
