If there is one position in the Manchester United starting XI that feels like it is up for grabs in pre-season, then it is almost certainly right-back. Diogo Dalot or Aaron Wan-Bissaka? It's a question that even Erik ten Hag seemed unsure of last season.
Dalot started 38 times last season and Wan-Bissaka 28, but their season was essentially split in two. Before the World Cup Wan-Bissaka managed just four minutes and Dalot started 20 successive games.
In November and early December, it looked a certainty that a new right-back was incoming, possibly as early as January. What nobody saw coming was Wan-Bissaka's revival.
The £45million signing earned an opportunity thanks to Dalot's injury and he took it. He ended the season as first-choice, while Dalot struggled to even get close to the form he had shown in the first half of the season.
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The changing of the guard felt like it was completed at Wembley in February, when Dalot was withdrawn at half-time, having been booked early on for a foul on Allan Saint-Maximin. When Wan-Bissaka came on he kept Newcastle's dangerous winger quiet with an outstanding defensive performance.
It is Wan-Bissaka who will return to Carrington earlier this pre-season as well, giving him the chance to press home his advantage in that battle. Dalot's season didn't finish until June 20 and 90 minutes against Iceland for Portugal.
The 24-year-old might feel like he will benefit from the break this summer. He looked a revelation under Ten Hag in the first half of the season but then lost his way as the campaign went on. If he can rediscover those standards then he might well return to being first-choice.
But if not then it might be Wan-Bissaka who continues his renaissance as a United player, although in truth you could say that neither player presents an ideal solution.
If there was a chance of a right-back being signed in January, then for most of the season it had appeared a certainty this summer. Now, it looks very unlikely.
That is less a case of the competition between Dalot and Wan-Bissaka forcing a rethink and more the fact that other positions have become a bigger priority. After the £60million signing of Mason Mount, United will turn their attention to signing a goalkeeper and a striker.
After that the budget is unlikely to stretch any further, meaning plans to sign a right-back are pushed further down the road. It's an imperfect solution, but that is what happens when you work with a transfer budget of around £120million, half of which has already been accounted for.
A delay in bringing someone in in that position will at least present an opportunity to Dalot and Wan-Bissaka. They will get the chance to battle it out for another season and impress Ten Hag.
Wan-Bissaka certainly deserves credit for the way he fought back last season. He didn't appear a natural fit for Ten Hag's style, especially when we saw Dalot moving so seamlessly into midfield, but he performed consistently in the second half of the season and improved his output in the final third.
It will take an excellent season from either one of them to make sure of a place in the side beyond next summer, or even January, and that will have to start with a pre-season in which one of them makes that position their own.
