Donny van de Beek's situation at Manchester United is a bewildering one.When the Red Devils splashed out £35.7 million on the Ajax midfielder last summer, they looked to have secured one of the most promising young players in Europe.And while, yes, it perhaps seemed like overkill with Bruno Fernandes and Paul Pogba in the squad, nobody could possibly have anticipated that Van de Beek's United career would play out like this.

Van de Beek's Man Utd dilemma

If you were to tell someone that Van de Beek had started just four Premier League game in 12 months without any context, you'd think that he had suffered a major injury or created problems behind the scenes.

But alas, everything points towards the Dutchman having maintained a fantastic bill of health and worked hard at Carrington to thrust himself into Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's consideration to start.

However, Van de Beek's game time has been so few and far between on such a consistent basis that supporters are starting to wonder whether he has a future at the 'Theatre of Dreams' at all.

Van de Beek vs Villarreal

And that worrying trajectory certainly rang true when footage emerged of Van de Beek reacting to the fact that he wouldn't be appearing during the Champions League clash with Villarreal this week.

Entering the final 15 minutes with the scores at 1-1, Van de Beek looked like a fantastic option off the bench to provide that creative edge and energetic dynamism to carve out a late winner.

Nevertheless, Solskjaer instead opted to bring on Edinson Cavani, Fred and Jesse Lingard, which provoked an emotional reaction from the 24-year-old as he realised he wouldn't be entering the fray.

Extended footage of Van de Beek incident

Clips showed an angered Van de Beek being consoled by Eric Bailly and Dean Henderson upon Solskjaer using his final two substitutions, before duly throwing his chewing gum to the floor.

And now further footage has shown an extended version of the incident, which features Van de Beek frustratedly throwing his bib to the ground before making his way to the bench.

Uploaded to Twitter by @ManUnitedZone_, it offers an even more intimate angle from right behind the United bench and really serves to illustrate just how disheartened Van de Beek was feeling.

Be sure to check out the footage down below:

Poor Donny just can't catch a break, can he?

What now?

While it would be foolhardy to draw too many conclusions about what may or may not be happening behind the scenes, it's clear that Solskjaer doesn't favour the former Ajax man for whatever reason.

And frankly, it's impressive that Van de Beek has gone this long without showing his frustrations publicly with the throwing of his bib and gum against Villarreal largely being the first incident of note.

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According to the Telegraph, Van de Beek will now look for assurances of his situation at the club with their decision to keep hold of him over the summer now seeming more and more bizarre. 

Whatever is going on at Old Trafford, nobody is under any illusion that Van de Beek is anything less than a fantastic player and saying that he deserves more game time really is starting the obvious.

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