If you can remember back as far as last month, Manchester United travelled across their home town to face rivals Manchester City. United lost 3-1.
This was bad enough in that it left them 12 points shy of City after only 12 matches. Worse, though, was the gulf in quality and ambition.
This was a chastening experience for United fans, who saw their side make just five passes by the time City took the lead in 12 minutes. Jose Mourinho, however, decreed it “not a bad performance at all.” He would add he thought United were “improving”.
Fast forward to last Sunday and United travelled to their other great rivals, Liverpool. Again they lost 3-1 and again it was chastening, not just for fans but for the board members captured grimacing on television.
This defeat left United 19 points behind Liverpool – 19 – with a goal difference of zero, while Jurgen Klopp’s team’s is plus 30.
It turned out United were not improving and matters were so bad Mourinho was asked if the club was “broken”. His answers were sufficiently unconvincing for him to lose his job 36 hours later.
In a move than can only be described as unforeseen, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was called for and brought back from Norway to reconnect crossed wires and bring some peace and enjoyment to a disjointed squad and a rattled fanbase.
Superficially Solskjaer’s brief is happiness and stability. Fulfilling it would be no small achievement and it would surely make the Norwegian think long-term at Old Trafford.
Reform of the squad and its infrastructure will be harder than winning at newly-promoted Cardiff City tonight, though. And perhaps it is recognition of this which makes Mauricio Pochettino, it is said with authority, United’s first choice as manager next season.
Because Manchester United have problems. The one-man drama that is Mourinho means he obscures much, but even he could not camouflage the fact that United’s difficulties are deeper than the manager’s relationships with Paul Pogba and Luke Shaw.
While it is an alarming fact to supporters that United have conceded more goals than Huddersfield Town in the Premier League this season, it also disturbs many of them that Manchester United have an official “Global Mattress and Pillow Partner” in China.
That is not the set-up to a punchline about their football sending people to sleep – though it could be – it is a reflection of where the club is as 2019 approaches. There is the reality on the pitch and the reality in the accounts and these are out of sync.
Although the commercial arm of a corporation such as United is important, and complementary, it should not step in front of the team and it should not be its “core activity” – as chairman Martin Edwards once said of the football.
But it feels like United were making so much money, the focus on what they put on the pitch slipped. A boardroom more aware of that would not have given Mourinho a new contract last January and with it the message that he would drive their future.
Plenty of United’s football was tedious by then. But on they ploughed until Tuesday. The ornate football Pep Guardiola is overseeing at City and the vibrancy Klopp is behind at Liverpool must have been disconcerting for the United hierarchy. Then there is the steady progress at Tottenham, which intrigues them most of all. Yet in the midst of this United gave Chris Smalling a new contract.
That decision revealed the lack of football and business nous at the top of the club. Smalling is part of a defence that has kept two clean sheets in the league – against Burnley and Crystal Palace. He is part of the reason why goalkeeper David De Gea has become the most significant player – because he has been so busy.
Iron defending was meant to be a Mourinho fundamental yet United began last season with ageing converted wingers, Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young as their full-backs and Young is still in the team.
There is, obviously, talent in the squad. Some players are underperforming or underconfident, but some of them are over-rated. If Pochettino sits down and analyses the strengths of Tottenham’s squad versus United’s, he would not see some chasm.
Recruitment at Old Trafford has been haphazard at best, ill-judged at times. Spurs’ has not always been smooth – Moussa Sissoko cost £30m – but Pochettino knows the framework. What he does not know yet is how Spurs will react to United’s vacancy. It is an historic moment for Tottenham with their new White Hart Lane on the cusp of opening.
They will be seeking certainty. Liverpool have that currently, so do Manchester City. Manchester United do not. They are drifting, hoping Solskjaer can buy them time to get a plan together. It is unimpressive.
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