Could United have won the league cup in 1998/99?

[tentan]

It was the only competition we didn't win that season, could we have done better?

The results were

R3 - United 2-0 Bury (AET)
R4 - United 2-1 Nottingham Forest
R5 - Tottenham 3-1 United

With the talk of a Man City quadruple it should've been us to do it first.

 

[deafepl]

Pep is not going to stay longer, he'll leave in a few seasons I think, City has to make most of the time they need to win quadruple trophies.

 

[Eric7C]

Ffs, the lads couldn't get past Tottenham?

 

[SaintMuppet]

Of course we could!!!!

But we didn’t

 

[MyOnlySolskjaer]

Pep is not going to stay longer, he'll leave in a few seasons I think, City has to make most of the time they need to win quadruple trophies.

Top manager but regardless the squad is in great shape for City, whoever takes over post-Pep is in a fantastic position. With the way City is run, I am sure they are eyeing up candidates like Poch, Zidane, Erik ten Hag for 5+ years after Pep already.

 

[antohan]

Getting the Treble in itself had us drawing on every reserve of energy and good luck available. I'd say the odds are higher that extending that LC campaign would have cost us one of the other three rather than land a quadruple.

I doubt there was one fan going into that season thinking about a treble, let alone a quadruple. At least my gut feel was our golden opportunity of a double had come and gone against Dortmund in 97 and we were coming off a season where we fell on our arses spectacularly at the business end and wound up with nothing.

There wasn't such a fixation with that sort of record as far as I can remember. The double sounded great but we just really wanted to win the CL and not lose the league to Arsenal. Spoilt!

 

[moodyred]

Time for us to stop looking back at past glories.

 

[MVBDX]

I doubt that many gave (or give) a feck about that tin TBH.

 

[Maverick red]

Ginola magic killed us, simple as that.

 

[deafepl]

Top manager but regardless the squad is in great shape for City, whoever takes over post-Pep is in a fantastic position. With the way City is run, I am sure they are eyeing up candidates like Poch, Zidane, Erik ten Hag for 5+ years after Pep already.

I can't see them appointing Zidane if City wants to appoint specific coaches who can play similar to Pep's style of play, Zidane doesn't have an identity of style and built on crossing. Erik ten Hag is the most ideal candidate if they are looking for new coaches.

 

[Bojan11]

No.

Let’s be honest we didn’t have the squad that City had. They have like two good players in every position.

Look at the champions league final with Keane and Scholes suspended.We had to play Beckham in centre midfield alongside Butt and Blomquist on the left. Besides our strikers, we didn’t really have great depth in our squad. Henning Berg and May didn’t play much that year. Wes Brown was just Young. Even Greening was in our champions league final bench.

What that core team did was unbelievable.

 

[TsuWave]

city won charity shield for fecks sake.

 

[Gopher Brown]

Yeah, our Treble is meaningless because we didn’t get the Worthington Cup.

Tear down that trophy room. Get those patches off the new kit. Get that medal back from Jonathan Greening.

 

[Rolandofgilead]

What bugs me a little bit is we could and should have done the domestic treble in ‘94 but we were awful against Villa in the league cup final.

Then again, Liverpool should have done it in ‘77 but we beat them in the FA Cup final! Didn’t they also win the European Cup that year?

No point dragging up would or could haves though, fair play to city. We just need to focus on ourselves.

 

[Needham]

Still rankles that we didn't get a bye to the final.

 

[Adam-Utd]

Once upon a time nobody cared about the league cup, now suddenly it’s important again.

 

[wolvored]

Of course we could!!!!

But we didn’t

I was going to say this

 

[cyril C]

Can't recall the League cup format back then, but IMO it is relatively easy to win the League Cup today compared with FA.

The problem with FA Cup is its scheduling conflict with CL and league games. For example,
4-Apr City - Cardiff (EPL)
7-Apr City - Brighton (FA)
10-Apr Spurs - City (CL)
14-Apr Palace - City (EPL)
18-Apr City - Spurs (CL)

Had we beaten Wolves we would have similar challenges. City has been lucky on their FA draw throughout the entire campaign until Final. Had they picked Wolves in Semi, do you think they could rest a few of their players? The PRIORITY question will be back to the manager - which is your priority, and I am sure it won't be FA.

It was once in a life time.

 

[Denis' cuff]

What bugs me a little bit is we could and should have done the domestic treble in ‘94 but we were awful against Villa in the league cup final.

Then again, Liverpool should have done it in ‘77 but we beat them in the FA Cup final! Didn’t they also win the European Cup that year?

No point dragging up would or could haves though, fair play to city. We just need to focus on ourselves.

“Fair play to City”?


Can’t be serious. They haven’t a clue or a care what the term means.

 

[AshRK]

City were extremely lucky with their draws. Yes you can only beat what is put in front of you but had they drawn chelsea away and arsenal away back to back things could have been different.

 

[el3mel]

Did anyone really care about this before City winning their domestic treble?

Our treble will always be the true and real treble.

 

[Casanova85]

The League Cup is a shit competition, a needless anachronism that the other top leagues wisely lack.

Community Shield is by far better.

 

[FootballHQ]

Man. united team that played that night at Spurs:

Van Der Gouw

John Curtis
Henning Berg
Ronny Johnsen
Michael Clegg

Jon Greening
Ryan Giggs
Nicky Butt
Phil Neville

Sheringham
OGS

Subs: Culkin (GK) Beckham Wallwork Alex Notman Blomquivst

Didn't Clegg become a fitness coach at Man. United after retirement and help Ronaldo?

 

[MoskvaRed]

We should have done the domestic treble in 94 but we played dreadfully against Villa at Wembley.

 

[Bojan11]

What bugs me a little bit is we could and should have done the domestic treble in ‘94 but we were awful against Villa in the league cup final.

Then again, Liverpool should have done it in ‘77 but we beat them in the FA Cup final! Didn’t they also win the European Cup that year?

No point dragging up would or could haves though, fair play to city. We just need to focus on ourselves.

What bugs me more is that Pompey game in 2008.

We should have won that easily. No idea how we managed to screw that up.

 

[Frank Grimes]

We could have done it in 2009 but Fergie played a b team against Everton in the semi final. Welbeck had a stone wall pen denied and lost on pens.

 

[Rolandofgilead]

“Fair play to City”?


Can’t be serious. They haven’t a clue or a care what the term means.

It was more of lazy sentiment. They have just done something no team have never done before. Like it or not sometimes you just have to show a touch of class and say, ok.

 

[Charlie Yu]

It is not an important cup, there is a reason why Fergie played heavily rotated teams in league cup. Mourinho is the first manager I think to fight every cup available.