Amadou Onana impressed as a centre-back for Belgium against Croatia this week, but he says he remains determined to fulfil his ambition of becoming one of the best midfielders in the world.
Rudi Garcia trialled a new system with the Red Devils on Tuesday night, deploying Onana in a back three alongside recognised centre-backs Nathan Ngoy and Arthur Theate.
The Aston Villa midfielder recorded the most defensive contributions in the match, which Belgium won 2-0. He also misplaced just one of the 49 passes he attempted during the 70 minutes he spent on the pitch.
"I felt good in that position," Onana said. "The partnership with Arthur and Nathan went quite well. They carried out their roles very effectively too. For a first full dress rehearsal, this was certainly not bad at all."
"I've played there a few times before. The team comes first. I'm a midfielder, that's my favourite position, but if they need me at the back, I'll do it. Even if the coach needs me up front as a striker, I'll play there."
"I feel most comfortable in midfield and I believe that one day I can be one of the very best players in the world in that position. I have that ambition, but the World Cup is the priority right now, and if I have to play in defence, I'll do it without complaining. I felt good there yesterday as well."
Belgium manager Garcia said: "Amadou has all the qualities to play there. The advantage, when he plays there, is that little by little we can become a hybrid team, defending with him with a three-man backline and attacking differently."
"This gives us more variety in our play, especially because we have many players who are versatile enough to operate in this system."
"Of course, there are still things that can be improved. But at least we now know that we can use this system to start a match or switch to it during a game and that we can also achieve results with it."
"Because he is naturally more of a midfielder, it gives us the option to move him around. We saw (against Croatia) that he has all the qualities needed to do this job successfully."
