Which post-Fergie manager, given 5 years in charge, would have done the best?

Neil_Buchanan

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Van Gaal for sure. It would be Mourinho but it was far too toxic in his last few months, no way of turning that around.
 

TrustInJanuzaj

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:lol: Why? So he could bench them and play Rooney every match :lol:

The guy who sold a bunch of Utd’s best players and signed Schweinsteiger, Schneiderlin and Falcao… ffs, some of the utter muppet nonsense within your fanbase is SO deluded!
His biggest issue without doubt was his transfer record. That was easily the worst of any of our managers post Fergie. His actual play though was clearly a proper identity and I think football history shows possession football is far more effective when you have a couple of superstars to make it click. No guarantee with his signing record he’d have managed that of course but I think he we had stumbled on a couple it would have dramatically changed fans outlook on him as a manager.
 

roonster09

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15th or 17th
6th
2nd
6th
6th
7th
6th

Jose league finish after his league win, few seasons he was sacked before season was completed but there was reason for that.

Going by his record 2nd was a fluke than 6th.
 

phelans shorts

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The same one who DID DO the best - Mourinho.

Won 2 trophies, finished 2nd and wasn’t backed.

If your owners had backed him he’d have got rid of Pogba (for money), Martial and created a miserly, tough Utd that would’ve ground out a handful of trophies - possibly a CL imo.

Not that any of you will see it that way!
When has Mourinho been anywhere for even three years and not had the wheels come off? Is it only Porto out of the ten sides he’s managed?

If there’s a recurring theme around him, then it stops being a coincidence
 

MadDogg

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I often wondered if Jose sometimes tried to get himself fired but I hardly think he allowed poor players to stay: he was the one who wanted Martial and Pogba out - and, wow, was he right to want that.
Martial and Pogba were two of the better players under Mourinho, despite the narrative. Actually I can't remember when Mourinho wanted to sell Martial. If it was after his first season then it might have been fair enough, but if it was after his second then Martial had been comfortably our best player on the left that season, despite Mourinho obviously not liking him and trying to favour Rashford and Sanchez. That continued in Mourinho's final season, where Sanchez and Rashford were terrible and Mourinho was on the verge of being fired when he finally gave Martial another run of games on the left and he (alongside Pogba) kept him in the job for longer than he really should have been.

It was the likes of Lukaku and Matic who Mourinho played no matter what, despite the fact they were literally our worst two players in his last season here (and had both been poor for the 6 months before that as well).
 

Greck

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Jose by some margin, should have backed him in the market and sold Pogba like he wanted to.
Same guy that made Lukaku bigger than the squad. Jose giving players perks was part of the problem. People hinging his sack on Pogba/Martial can't be serious. If we want to be selective said players even replicated that mighty 2nd place finish that was the supposed pinnacle of Jose's career without him. Meanwhile Lukaku would prove a distraction at yet another english club and Jose would also get sacked at another english club.
 

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LvG the man who signed Di Maria, Falcao, Rojo, Valdes, Martial, Schneiderlind, Schweinsteiger, Depay, Darmian.

Really? :lol:

He's the biggest reason we are in this mess.
I love Van Gaal he had the personality befitting of the club..but yes I agree the transfers ins AND outs under his watch set us back years.

He gutted Fergies squad too soon imo. And to make things worse replaced them with absolute tosh...that fecking list :D

The football was boring as hell too, shame.
 

Mainoldo

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LVG - Had an identity

Moyes - Had a good plan. Club was too big

Jose - He literally last 3 years so here by default.

Rangnick - Builds clubs talks a good game. Rubbish manager. Would of brought a bunch of Leipzig level players and we all would revert back to we need £80m signings.

Ole - Pe Teacher. Yeah I said it.
 

Leftback99

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Anyone saying LVG :lol:. He ruined us.

Mourinho obviously.
 

GueRed

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With the right backing in terms of winning trophies easily Jose Mourinho for me would've done the best.

He had already won two trophies in two seasons with a squad teemed of squad players. More silverware than Ole, Van Gaal and Moyes combined.

The anti-Mourinho brigade alongside Pogba and Martial FC (our most toxic fans) deserve these barren years...
 

Revaulx

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Amazing isnt it :lol:
Well we did win two trophies and we did finish second. I enjoyed his first season and a half a lot more than I was expecting to.

It’s the “wasn't backed” stuff where it gets more complicated. If by it his fans mean “the club spent a great deal of money during Jose’s tenure, but much of it was on players that didn’t fit his style of play” then I’d agree.

The thing is though that exactly the same is true of all our other post-SAF managers. Mata for Moyes - really? That’s just the first. And yet Jose is the only one allowed to use it as an excuse.
 

el3mel

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Believe me it’s not. When United aren’t playing I watch a non league team & I’ve seen them win a league title once in the 25+ years I’ve been watching them. In that season they had a manager with an incredibly basic - but effective - hoofball style of play. It was absolutely hideous to watch and while winning the league was a great day, when I look back I honestly have better memories of the season before in which they’d been relegated and had a 30 match winless run during the season. Winning is the most important thing, I agree, but style and enjoyment matters.
Play style is a means to an end. You play with a style because you think this will bring you success, teams playing attacking football play in that way because they believe this is what brings them success, not because they want to just entertain fans.

Also, fans opinions matter and all but let's be realistic, clubs sack managers because they fail to achieve the targets the club put for them, not because their style of play is boring.
 

roonster09

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Well we did win two trophies and we did finish second. I enjoyed his first season and a half a lot more than I was expecting to.

It’s the “wasn't backed” stuff where it gets more complicated. If by it his fans mean “the club spent a great deal of money during Jose’s tenure, but much of it was on players that didn’t fit his style of play” then I’d agree.

The thing is though that exactly the same is true of all our other post-SAF managers. Mata for Moyes - really? That’s just the first. And yet Jose is the only one allowed to use it as an excuse.
I don't know which player was signed whom Jose didn't want to. He wanted to sign Pogba for Chelsea.

I can't think of a single player who was signed without Jose wanting them.

We are not run by DoF, our targets are the one managers decide.
 
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ROFLUTION

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Seeing they mostly imploded after 2-3 years the last 2 years would been disastrous, so Carrick for me
 

frostbite

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None.

They all had failed long before they were sacked. If they had stayed longer they'd just create a bigger mess.
 
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simonhch

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The same one who DID DO the best - Mourinho.

Won 2 trophies, finished 2nd and wasn’t backed.

If your owners had backed him he’d have got rid of Pogba (for money), Martial and created a miserly, tough Utd that would’ve ground out a handful of trophies - possibly a CL imo.

Not that any of you will see it that way!
Not backed? He spent 400m in two seasons. About as backed as you can get.

He went because the environment was toxic. Just because he was right about certain things doesn’t mean he was good for the club.

Mourinho and his infamous third season syndrome is so ingrained now that the idea of him staying for 5 years is laughable. Should be automatically disqualified from this list.

I am grateful for the two trophies, but he was only ever a short term appointment.
 

hn4united

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Absolutely Mourinho in this case.

I don’t think the season he gets sacked is representative of his body of work. He doesn’t give in to player power nor the board and in our case, the bosses upstairs backed the players over him. He wasn’t going to carry on doing a good job. Nobody will. If you’re being honest with yourselves and your boss put you in a similar situation, you wouldn’t do a good job either.

The argument of him being to blame for signing players he then wants to get rid of is a reasonable one. However, you really don’t know how certain players fit in until you have them. If you have hired people for your business or for your team, sometimes, despite how good someone’s qualifications and skill sets look, they just don’t fit. Pep never had issues at City with buying the wrong players and then buying some more to replace them. His club backed him no matter what.
 

Revaulx

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I don't know which player was signed whom Jose didn't want to. He wanted to sign Pogba for Chelsea.

I can't think of a single player who was signed without Jose wanting them.

We are not run by DoF, our targets are the one managers decide.
Well I’m not convinced. I’m pretty certain that plenty of players were signed by Ed Woodward on the strength of “recommendations” from agents and selling clubs.
 

Abraxas

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I think LVG.

His signings were really bad but the way he got average players playing to his style was impressive. I can envisage a scenario where he gets a couple of real difference makers in the forward line and then his possession football becomes more potent as well as controlling.

Moyes didn't have the mentality, Mourinho was in too much of a mood to have 5 successful years. Ole had gone so downhill it was irreversible and he had a long time so no reason to expect anything else. I kinda landed on Louis by default because of these reasons rather than the probability being that LVG would have been great after 5 years.
 

JB7

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Play style is a means to an end. You play with a style because you think this will bring you success, teams playing attacking football play in that way because they believe this is what brings them success, not because they want to just entertain fans.

Also, fans opinions matter and all but let's be realistic, clubs sack managers because they fail to achieve the targets the club put for them, not because their style of play is boring.
Where did I say anything at all about managers playing a certain style to appease supporters? I just gave a real world view of a season where a team I watched achieved success playing a brand of football that was hideous to watch.
 

Leftback99

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LVG didn’t ruin us… Us not backing LVG ruined us…
He was heavily backed at a time we still had a big financial advantage. The guy turned down players like Kroos, sold decent players for next to nothing and replaced them with dross like Darmian and Rojo. The quality of the squad has never recovered from that spell.
 

el3mel

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Where did I say anything at all about managers playing a certain style to appease supporters? I just gave a real world view of a season where a team I watched achieved success playing a brand of football that was hideous to watch.
Real world view ? You gave your own personal and subjective opinion about this season you mentioned, mate.
 

Acheron

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Hard question as no one really deserved to last that long, that being said the worst options are Moyes and Ole. In fact I'm surprised Ole was given that much time and resources whereas with Moyes he wasn't even a full season.

I want to say LVG and Ragnick had more of a clear football identity but I'm not sure if backing them for that long would had yield better results. In practice the best manager has been Mourinho and I think he was not fully backed in Manchester United when he tried to change the culture in the dressing room, think that was a big mistake and it got out hand after him. Ideally Mourinho should had been appointed right after SAF and he would had done better but even then it's unlikely he would had lasted more than 3 seasons.
 

JB7

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Real world view ? You gave your own personal and subjective opinion about this season you mentioned, mate.
It was a real world view because it was a pretty commonly held opinion about a season that happened in the real world. If you’d be happy watching United play like that then all power to you but it wouldn’t be popular at Old Trafford.
 

MackRobinson

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Moyes or LVG.

Mourinho was a trash man-manager, coached United to play dire football, wasted large sums of money of utter dross, and was utterly delusional in thinking he had a blank check to correct is mistakes in the transfer market. Not even going to entertain any revisionist history of him being a positive for the club despite his two mickey mouse trophy wins.
 
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dannyrhinos89

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Jose by far.

The poor attitude players would've been out the door. We'd be in the champions league every year consisyant top 3 finishes and won another trophy or 2 by now.

The football wouldn’t be pretty but We'd be going way better than we have.
 

MackRobinson

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15th or 17th
6th
2nd
6th
6th
7th
6th

Jose league finish after his league win, few seasons he was sacked before season was completed but there was reason for that.

Going by his record 2nd was a fluke than 6th.
Shhhhh we don't want facts when discussing the special one. If you can't see he is special you just don't know football :lol:
 

Fortitude

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:lol: Why? So he could bench them and play Rooney every match :lol:

The guy who sold a bunch of Utd’s best players and signed Schweinsteiger, Schneiderlin and Falcao… ffs, some of the utter muppet nonsense within your fanbase is SO deluded!
Who do you support?
 

m1tch

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Giggs or Carrick.

Out of the others, maybe Ole would have had the best chance of getting the team back on side enough to get results. It wouldn't have bought success but probably higher finishes than the others.

The squad overhaul under LVG was disastrous and set us back long after we got rid of his awful style of football. He's lucky he was sacked before the squad turned against him.

Jose being around for 5 years would be ludicrous, even the canteen staff would have downed tools if he stayed that long.

I don't think Moyes could have got the players back on side, probably more chance of better success than LVG and Mourinho though.

Rangnick could have delivered us a league title in a 5 year spell, the Championship potentially, failing that a playoff win.
 

el3mel

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It was a real world view because it was a pretty commonly held opinion about a season that happened in the real world. If you’d be happy watching United play like that then all power to you but it wouldn’t be popular at Old Trafford.
These opinions are personal and subjective, and this also includes my own opinion. Sports is a results oriented industry, that what determines if players and managers stay in their place or not. Fans enjoying the brand of football or not is each to his own, but clubs aren't going to sack a successful manager who wins the club trophies because his football is awful to watch, meanwhile they'll sack the shit out of a manager who plays entertaining football if his football brought the club no success.
 

JB7

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These opinions are personal and subjective, and this also includes my own opinion. Sports is a results oriented industry, that what determines if players and managers stay in their place or not. Fans enjoying the brand of football or not is each to his own, but clubs aren't going to sack a successful manager who wins the club trophies because his football is awful to watch, meanwhile they'll sack the shit out of a manager who plays entertaining football if his football brought the club no success.
Again, I’ve literally only commented from a supporter enjoyment factor of a “successful” season done in a style of football that was hideous to watch. I’m well aware a successful manager isn’t getting sacked because of their football not being pretty.
 

RVN1991

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LVG and Ralph simply because I trust their eye for squad building more than the rest. Neither were good enough to begin with but Mourinho wouldn't have lasted the five years regardless of our incompetent board. The rest were amateurs and Moyes who was clueless in every sense of the word
 

RVN1991

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LvG the man who signed Di Maria, Falcao, Rojo, Valdes, Martial, Schneiderlind, Schweinsteiger, Depay, Darmian.

Really? :lol:

He's the biggest reason we are in this mess.
It's always unfair to judge a manager off signings since we don't know exactly what role the manager had in signing said players or how many were alternative rather than first choice signings.

This exercise really highlights how bad our managers have been in the last decade. 2 past it and the rest nowhere near good enough to begin with.