So there seems to be a lot of anger on the forum right now directed at the manager, journalists being opportunistic and dependent on clicks tend to tap into those emotions and fuel them in a bit of a self-fulfilling cycle. The best article in this vein is one by Rob Smyth I’m sure you’ve all seen. In the summer of 2006 after 3 years of being in the wilderness as far as the title goes and Fergie was being written off by many, many people. I’ll link the article at the bottom because for people who haven’t seen it it’s well worth a read.
The article itself was ill-timed, as Man Utd’s form in the second half of the 05-06 season was very promising. Why I mention it is because of what came before that half season of relative brightness. In 2003 we won the title off the back of a good defence lead by our new signing Ferdinand and the goals of RvN and Scholes. We then sold Veron and David Beckham and had our worst and best transfer window ever. Kleberson, Howard, both Djemba twins and a French striker that wasn’t Thierry Henry. Oh and a show pony with a bad haircut, more on him later.
That season went poorly. We came third, while failing to score in just over a 5th of our league games. We score 64 goals in total that year, despite having Ruud Van Nistlerooy hitting 20. After an exciting début from our new number 7 things weren’t as easy and many called for the head of a manager with 8 League titles to his name because he’d failed to get the best out of a proven world class Argentine, sold our most marketable player and replaced him with a kid. To remedy this lack of goals, he went out and bought Louis Saha in January with Alan Smith, Gabriel Heinze and Wayne Rooney in the summer. This was make or break for the manager, in 5 years since the treble team he’d sold the England captain, star striker and defensive rock, failed to adapt his system to his expensive South American acquisition while making no real waves in Europe since and even failing in his bread and butter, the league.
Things dramatically improved the next season, oh no… hang on. No, that’s right, they got worse, my bad. Saha and Van Nistlerooy were ruined by injuries leaving a teenage Rooney to lead the line, a good cup run inexplicably ended with a defeat to Arsenal in the least deserving result in anything, sport or otherwise, ever. The knives were out, 58 goals! 58! Playing our recently acquired striker in midfield and relying on a truly useless, definitely never going to make it Darren Fletcher far too often. Since his last league title he’d spent £80m, not including breaking the British transfer record the year before and taken the team backwards. Failing to score in 10 of the 38 league games that season was the end for some. The man had lost it, he should have retired in 2002 like he said he would. The small mercy being he saved us from Sven Goran Eriksson but when it was known Mourinho was available we were foolish to let him go to Chelsea.
The 05-06 season started badly, lounging in 7th at the end of October and very shortly about to see our captain and club icon unceremoniously removed before Christmas, our only other senior midfielder going blind just in time for the Christmas festivities and failing to get out of the group stage of the CL. For extra good measure our star striker and major goal threat was dropped after falling out with the show pony. A move that validated SAF’s poor choice in horses to some, especially when the show pony had a falling out with our future star Rooney at the Euros and SAF went to lengths only shown to Beckham and Cantona previously to keep him. The club was literally falling apart according to most and the band aid? “A Pirlo when a Gattuso was needed”.
That just about brings us up to the article. While some Man Utd supporters had seen enough in the latter stages of the previous season to be hopeful, many weren’t. The events of the 2006-2007 season onwards should be fresh in the memory for most so I won’t bother with that, needless to say it wasn’t quite what Rob Smyth had in mind.
I’m not entirely sure why I felt the need to write all that out, but there have been plenty of criticisms of our attack and how little we create recently and people saying they’re on the verge of giving up on the team because it’s so boring maybe a little bit of perspective is required. Great teams take time and work, no matter how much money you spend and how many players you buy. For those saying this is the most boring United side they’ve ever seen, they didn’t watch us in 2004.
There is too much short-termism in football and even SAF, a manager who knew the league saw his way through some times with an attack more toothless even than this one. While the acknowledgement that Martial and Depay aren’t going to carry us to glory this season might be hard to take given how much it looks there for the taking might be galling (and I don’t think we’re going to get a Cantona-esque signing to invigorate us in January) it doesn’t mean the team cannot improve under the current manager. Young players take time to develop and while LvG isn’t SAF, he is a very good manager.
The team isn’t falling apart like it was under Moyes, the urge to chop managers at a difficult moment was something that the fan base was almost unanimous in wanting to avoid. For those so eager to see us oust a manager less than 18 months into his time here because we aren’t as fluid as we’d like I just thought I’d highlight a second time where being patient with a manager who has a proven track record of success despite some less than ideal results and performances with young players has shown dividends. Who knows what the club would look like if we’d written off SAF back in 2004? Sometimes despite it seeming like you're impossibly far away from where you want to be the smallest thing or the least inspiring signing can be all that separates you from massive success. Sacking a manager is the biggest change you can make at a club and should be done with extreme caution and when there is no other option. I don't think we're there yet.
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2006/jul/31/sport.comment
The article, since all you miserable bastards need something to smile about.
The article itself was ill-timed, as Man Utd’s form in the second half of the 05-06 season was very promising. Why I mention it is because of what came before that half season of relative brightness. In 2003 we won the title off the back of a good defence lead by our new signing Ferdinand and the goals of RvN and Scholes. We then sold Veron and David Beckham and had our worst and best transfer window ever. Kleberson, Howard, both Djemba twins and a French striker that wasn’t Thierry Henry. Oh and a show pony with a bad haircut, more on him later.
That season went poorly. We came third, while failing to score in just over a 5th of our league games. We score 64 goals in total that year, despite having Ruud Van Nistlerooy hitting 20. After an exciting début from our new number 7 things weren’t as easy and many called for the head of a manager with 8 League titles to his name because he’d failed to get the best out of a proven world class Argentine, sold our most marketable player and replaced him with a kid. To remedy this lack of goals, he went out and bought Louis Saha in January with Alan Smith, Gabriel Heinze and Wayne Rooney in the summer. This was make or break for the manager, in 5 years since the treble team he’d sold the England captain, star striker and defensive rock, failed to adapt his system to his expensive South American acquisition while making no real waves in Europe since and even failing in his bread and butter, the league.
Things dramatically improved the next season, oh no… hang on. No, that’s right, they got worse, my bad. Saha and Van Nistlerooy were ruined by injuries leaving a teenage Rooney to lead the line, a good cup run inexplicably ended with a defeat to Arsenal in the least deserving result in anything, sport or otherwise, ever. The knives were out, 58 goals! 58! Playing our recently acquired striker in midfield and relying on a truly useless, definitely never going to make it Darren Fletcher far too often. Since his last league title he’d spent £80m, not including breaking the British transfer record the year before and taken the team backwards. Failing to score in 10 of the 38 league games that season was the end for some. The man had lost it, he should have retired in 2002 like he said he would. The small mercy being he saved us from Sven Goran Eriksson but when it was known Mourinho was available we were foolish to let him go to Chelsea.
The 05-06 season started badly, lounging in 7th at the end of October and very shortly about to see our captain and club icon unceremoniously removed before Christmas, our only other senior midfielder going blind just in time for the Christmas festivities and failing to get out of the group stage of the CL. For extra good measure our star striker and major goal threat was dropped after falling out with the show pony. A move that validated SAF’s poor choice in horses to some, especially when the show pony had a falling out with our future star Rooney at the Euros and SAF went to lengths only shown to Beckham and Cantona previously to keep him. The club was literally falling apart according to most and the band aid? “A Pirlo when a Gattuso was needed”.
That just about brings us up to the article. While some Man Utd supporters had seen enough in the latter stages of the previous season to be hopeful, many weren’t. The events of the 2006-2007 season onwards should be fresh in the memory for most so I won’t bother with that, needless to say it wasn’t quite what Rob Smyth had in mind.
I’m not entirely sure why I felt the need to write all that out, but there have been plenty of criticisms of our attack and how little we create recently and people saying they’re on the verge of giving up on the team because it’s so boring maybe a little bit of perspective is required. Great teams take time and work, no matter how much money you spend and how many players you buy. For those saying this is the most boring United side they’ve ever seen, they didn’t watch us in 2004.
There is too much short-termism in football and even SAF, a manager who knew the league saw his way through some times with an attack more toothless even than this one. While the acknowledgement that Martial and Depay aren’t going to carry us to glory this season might be hard to take given how much it looks there for the taking might be galling (and I don’t think we’re going to get a Cantona-esque signing to invigorate us in January) it doesn’t mean the team cannot improve under the current manager. Young players take time to develop and while LvG isn’t SAF, he is a very good manager.
The team isn’t falling apart like it was under Moyes, the urge to chop managers at a difficult moment was something that the fan base was almost unanimous in wanting to avoid. For those so eager to see us oust a manager less than 18 months into his time here because we aren’t as fluid as we’d like I just thought I’d highlight a second time where being patient with a manager who has a proven track record of success despite some less than ideal results and performances with young players has shown dividends. Who knows what the club would look like if we’d written off SAF back in 2004? Sometimes despite it seeming like you're impossibly far away from where you want to be the smallest thing or the least inspiring signing can be all that separates you from massive success. Sacking a manager is the biggest change you can make at a club and should be done with extreme caution and when there is no other option. I don't think we're there yet.
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2006/jul/31/sport.comment
The article, since all you miserable bastards need something to smile about.
