We have much bigger "problems" than Mourinho at the club

Shaun Lawson

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I think the OP's spot on. I'm a complete neutral with no skin in this game - but United over the last decade? This is how I see it:

- United had the best squad I've ever seen in English football between 2007 and 2009. But sometime near the end of 08/9, they stopped playing with the fluency I'd always associated Ferguson's teams with (except in Europe, where the style noticeably changed significantly after Madrid did such a number on him in 2000).

- This obvious drop in quality, which owed not just to Ronaldo's departure, but to Saha's a few months earlier, intensified over the next couple of years: as Rooney, at his absolute brilliant peak, started carrying the team, and Ferguson did even more incredible work than before. That side had no right to get anywhere near the 2011 CL Final, but it did. It also had no right to end up losing out on the title only on goal difference, to a City side and squad whose personnel was streets ahead.

- But the problem was all this over-achievement under the greatest manager who ever walked this Earth was covering up more and more flaws: in United's style of play, recruitment, appalling ownership, and palpable lack of a long term plan. Ferguson walked the 2012/13 PL: testament to his brilliance, to the fear everyone else still had playing United, but also to the weakening at the top of the league which began in 2009 and peaked in 2016, with Leicester doing the impossible while everyone else was in shambles.

- From Moyes to Van Gaal to Mourinho. Where's the plan here? There isn't one. City, by contrast, have always had one under their owners. From Hughes to Mancini to Pellegrini to Guardiola, each new manager has been an upgrade, with each predecessor only sacked when it was plain they couldn't take the club any further. Only Pep has finally got them playing as a true team - hitherto, they'd been a mercurial set of egos - and maybe only Pep is capable of getting any club side playing this well. But...

- If United had a true long term vision, which crucially would restore their historic identity on the pitch, they should've appointed either Klopp or Pochettino. Very few managers in world football can create a legacy - but they, along with Guardiola, can. Instead, the club are just muddling on: under a manager who pretends he has a plan, but whose vanity won't allow him to rebuild the style of play and absorb the inevitable setbacks this would involve, and who leaves every club within three years: the last two, in a great big mess.

Mourinho is absolutely not the biggest problem at Manchester United. Far and away the worst issue is the club's owners: to whom the global brand is plainly far, far more important than on-pitch style and results. From those owners have stemmed poor recruitment, poor results, making it up as they go along in terms of managerial choices... and a palpable loss of identity. But that process started under Ferguson, 3-4 years after they took charge. They even left him managing almost with one hand tied behind his back... so imagine what it must've been like for his successors.
 

reddevil702

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The only club that's any different is City with having a DoF. Even then pep has completely overhauled the squad to suit his style. Not really following the Barca model since they buy players to suit their style regardless of the manager. I don't see how Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea are planning for the future and really are no different than we are. They've all made transfers to suit the current manager and a managerial change would be the same for them as for United.