He did well on the selling part and I don't disagree with any players he sold.
However his recruitment was absolutely terrible and failed in replacing the deadwood, more like he replaced them with new deadwood that will need to be shipped.
By the end of his reign, as I said, our 2 best players were 2 inconsistent youngsters (Rash and Martial). Our midfield was non existent (Morgan, Bastian and fecking Rooney shoehorned into it). Our defenders were underwhelming, our attack had no wingers at all and no top strikers to score goals consistently.
That was our Fa cup final team :
De Gea
Valencia - Smalling - Blind - Rojo
Carrick
Rooney - Fellaini
Mata - Rashford - Martial
Fast forward 3 years from his reign how many of these players any relevant now ? De Gea, Rashford and Martial.
Was that team any different from the team Moyes left in terms of strength ? His recruitment in midfield and offense was absolutely terrible bar Martial.
The team he left needed an entire new midfield, 2 top class forwards to cover for those youngsters, 1 or 2 defenders and at least one fullback. How is that a good rebuild ?
Considering the midfield issue was present prior to his appointment and his signing made the matter even worse (Morgan and Bastian).
As
@Aloysius's Back 3 stated already his midfield was dreadful and he couldn't possibly address all issues immediately within 2 seasons.
No manager could not even Ferguson. Ferguson often took at least 3-4 years to rebuild sides each time, sometimes longer. It took Ferguson 4 seasons to win a cup, 6 to win the league. When he rebuilt the team from 93-94 we didn't have another truly great side until 1999 with the treble 5 years later.
In the early 2000's he had a woeful run again and didn't have another truly great side until his CL winning side of 08, that was another 4 year turn around. From 2008-13 Ferguson basically let the side rot, Moyes did nowt to address that and LVG came in and started to rebuild for a new generation.
On a side note, Bastian & Falcao were both were the punt. Dirt cheap, heaps of experience and folks were delighted at the time. Quite a few clubs around Europe are making use of the 2 year loan type transfer, Juve being the masters of it!
Anyway to address that Cup Final Team:
Defence
Smalling and
Blind were very good at CB! Need I mention that Blind is now in a CL Semi Final and having a cracking season?
Rojo was only playing due to
Shaw's broken leg remember? Prior to that leg break he was absolutely superb early in that season. Rojo wasn't made for LB, but he done well at CB. If not for his injuries he would probably be a regular in our back line, It's a pity but he should definitely be sold.
Valencia was still performing to a very high level at this point, but Varela was being introduced to the side at this point.
Jose shipped out Blind & Verala, fell out with Shaw.
Midfield
Rooney would of been replaced or phased out similarly to how Jose done it I'm sure.
Carrick retired that season, it was announced whilst LVG was still in charge.
Jose gave us Pogba, Matic and still relied consistently on Fellaini. Which is fair enough, no complaints there. We'll never know how LVG would of dealt with the MF issue.
Attack
The front 3 is actually are 3 top scoring players post Ferguson still, believe it or not. Lukaku is 4th.
Jose phased out
Martial, Pushed
Rashford from CF to RW and he went on nearly a 30 game run without a goal under Jose then.
Mata became bit part and a sub. He brought in Lukaku & Zlatan.
Martial is still scoring more consistently than Lukaku. No complaints about Zlatan but he was a quick fix and it hurt Rashford / Martial developing in reality but folks at the time were giving it loads about how they'd learn from them, did they feck!
Our youth side was starting to decline as well prior to LVG showing up and more recently we are starting to see an improvement again due to his work over his 2 years. Chong, Gomes, Garner, TFM & Tuanzebe all signed or started to make improvements during LVG's tenure.
At a guess I'd like to think if LVG was given a 3rd year our team would of continued to develop and improve.
DDG
Valencia / Varela Smalling Blind Shaw
Herrera / Carrick Replaced (no idea with who)
New Signing / & New Signing / Rooney
Memphis Rashford Martial
Introduced Chong, TFM & Tuanzebe more consistently. Transfers are very difficult to say who he would of signed as it was 3 years ago and his focus was never on superstars more so youth with a hunger to prove themselves.
Kinda funny, that's exactly what Ole is saying he wants now in new signings and hell I'm bored of reading supporters saying it too now and saying Ole will fix us. LVG was saying the same thing 3 years ago!