That's the two years at Eredivisie I mentioned. I'm not talking about his early Ajax days, I'm talking about post Barcelona first stint.
The Bayern stint is overrated. The first year of course was great, but second year they completely collapsed and were about to miss on CL qualification to the point they sacked him before the season ended.
Away from that, he started his career at the top with Ajax followed by Barca's first stint, then he missed on World Cup qualification with Netherlands, and since then his career has been mostly very mediocre. He had to return to Eredivisie at one point to re-discover himself and after that had one good year at Bayern. That's it, these are about 3 or so good years since leaving Barcelona in 2000 up till him leaving United in 2016.
This isn't revising his history. This is actually his career. He started as an elite then went downhill very, very quickly. The Ajax period was his peak and that was at the start of his career. Since then he has been mostly a mediocre manager but extremely overrated by himself more than any fan. He won 20 trophies in his career, 15 of them came during the 1991-1999 period at Ajax and Barcelona. After that he only managed to win 5 trophies since his club retirement in 2016. That indicates a huge and fast decline that came way too early too.
I have zero empathy for someone who actually forced me at one point to stop watching United out of boredom and just follow results for 2-3 months at the end of his tenure. He ruined the club more than it was actually ruined anyway.
I don’t care if you like or empathize with Van Gaal, that’s personal stuff.
When you write about a ‘underwhelming majority’ of his carreer, of course you are talking about the Ajax years and Barca years implicitly, both since they make up the so called minority that makes the majority a majority, and since your label of underwhelming is based on comparing him to himself. If he’d done his carreer backwards with exactly the same results, you’d probably be forced to accept his carreer as majorly overwhelming. That’s really more a drama assesment than a footballing assesment, though.
Truth is, you won’t find many managers with a better and longer list of coaching achievements.
Clubs exceptional:
- Winning CL with Ajax when it was no longer feasible really. Reaching CL final next year. Won UEFA Cup. Three league titles and two cups. UEFA Super Cup and World club cup.
- Breaking up the big three in The Netherlands, winning with AZ Alkmaar. Almost impossible. Add to that a secand and a third place and a cup final. Rinus Michels best coach award twice.
Clubs - top class:
- Winning the Double with Bayern, taking them to the CL final. Voted German coach of the Year.
- Barcelona first stint: Two leagues, one cup, one UEFA Super cup in three seasons.
Clubs - not so good:
- Man Utd: FA Cup, 3rd, 5th (par for the course last ten years).
Clubs - bad:
- Barca, second spell. Sacked after six months. Mid table. Ten out of ten wins in CL though.
National Teams:
Excellent:
The Netherlands, second stint: World cup bronze medal in impressive fashion. Penalty shoot out away from final. Dutch Sports Coach of the year.
Very good:
The Netherlands, third stint: A penalty shoot-out against the winners from a SF. 70% win rate, unbeaten.
Bad:
The Netherlands, first stint. Behind Ireland and Portugal in qualification and went out.
Maybe most importantly: His thoughts about football had been the most important and influential among coaches between Johann Cruyff and Pep Guardiola.
The only real down Van Gaal has had, is the period from 2001-2004, where his arrogance tipped over the edge leading to conflicts.
Labelling his carreer since 2005 as ‘terrible’, and ‘mediocre’ is not only revisionism, it’s pretty ludicrous.