Were LVG and Jose both past their prime? Or does the rot go deeper?

[AndyJ1985]

Everyone keeps trying to identify one single problem that is the cause for the mess we're in. There is no one single problem, there are many. Lack of player quality, poor coaching, bad man management, no long term plan from the executives at the club, wasting money on shit players. The list goes on. It's a pyramid; fix the problems at the lowest level and the rest should start to sort itself out. Woodward and Mourinho are currently the two biggest problems we have. Neither should be in charge of any football matters at our club.

 

[tenpoless]

Well, when Jose came here He was pretty much a broken man after Chelsea's disastrous season. Van Gaal did a decent job with Holland in the World Cup but He has always preferred pure possession football (remember when He shouted at Herrera for shooting from the outside of the box?) which didn't fit the club, He tried to change ManUnited and won't adapt at all, I personally have never considered him to be a top top manager as well so there's that.

But I do think the problem runs deeper than that. Jose and LvG are no SAF, They can't give the direction to the club. They're football managers - they manage players, try to win games and promote or buy whichever players They want. There's no real continuity in their plans, the amount of spending is not really a concern for them. The board need to think of a long term plan to make sure the club will always progress forward (or at least won't suffer too much when things don't go well, e.g losing certain players or the manager). Real Madrid managed to do this, so did Barca and Bayern. They're the owners, the club is their "asset" and it's future is their responsibility, it's what They're supposed to be doing.

Even more bizzare when They decided to extend Jose's contract, only to deny him of any sort of transfer activity. I have a feeling the club overall still don't have a clear plan. "Win a couple of trophies and sign good players that the manager wants" is not enough to be called a plan, at least not if you're the owners of the very rich and popular fecking football club. When Sir Alex left, We had zero plan and was relying on his advice. Several years later and We still look as clueless.

 

[Denis79]

We had a DOF in SAF and a chairman that shared that vision In Gil. Let's be honest about SAF, yes he was our manager but so much more than that. He was involved in all the footballing aspects of our club from the youth team to the seniors and wanted a say in all of them. I'm certain Gil and SAF had a vision going forward and when they left two key positions at the club were changed and all that planning and vision for the future was left for their successors to devise.

Woody was appointed and not being a football man he chose famous names like LVG and Mourinho to handle the footballing side of the club, not realizing or fully understanding the position SAF actually held at the club.

Now there's no plan behind it all at it's easy to see. We appoint a manager throw money at him and expect results. The manager doesn't deliver so we sack him and start over. And in this process of changing managers we change staff and players. I guess this would eventually bring a trophy or two but it's not a stable way of going forward.

We desperatly need a vision going forward, so no matter who the manager is our plan and staff stays similar. We can't rebuild the squad and staff every time a new manager joins, in all honesty it's just idiotic.

 

[JPRouve]

Mourinho could just be out of form, managers aren't constantly at their best and a change of scenery, a different context, new people can help them retrieve their old form. I would like to see in an Inter type of project where he has a short term objective with and no long term worries.

 

[Bobski]

Mourinho could just be out of form, managers aren't constantly at their best and a change of scenery, a different context, new people can help them retrieve their old form. I would like to see in an Inter type of project where he has a short term objective with and no long term worries.

He'll go to PSG, have unlimited cash to spend and fall out with Neymar because he won't track back.

 

[POF]

I certainly wouldn't tar Van Gaal and Mourinho with the same brush. Van Gaal was mad. His tactics were utterly crazy and lacked any logic.

Jose's biggest failure is his inability to identify with the modern player. Both failed for different reasons but I don't think either can blame the club too much for that.

There certainly is a bigger issue in relation to how the club is structured from a transfer perspective but it isn't to blame for either manager's lack of success. If anything, the club gives the manager too much input in the recruitment process.

The structure is to blame for the ludicrous idea to allow Van Gaal (a manager on a short term contract) to rebuild the squad and waste absolute fortunes on average players. Jose has spent just over 2 years doing his best to sell every LVG signing and has now signed the majority of the first team. If he leaves, the new manager starts again. This is very likely to keep happening with the existing structure

I really disagree with the insinuation that the club is happy to finish top 4 and keep the money rolling in. For a club like United that won't keep the money rolling in. The board have backed the managers and spent absolute fortunes. They have just done it under an outdated structure with zero long term planning.

 

[JPRouve]

He'll go to PSG, have unlimited cash to spend and fall out with Neymar because he won't track back.

All the reporters close to PSG have stated numerous times that PSG do not want him, the king do not want him, there was one story about the king being vexed when people around him made fun of PSG's style under Ancelotti.

 

[UnofficialDevil]

How can a manager be past his prime? Does age come into it? And why didnt that apply for SAF?

 

[Neil_Buchanan]

We’ve been cursed. We should start with witch doctors, voodoo dolls, exorcists and some Santeria ceremonies. I’d happily lob the head of a few chickens and do a tribal dance around Old Trafford to help lift it.

 

[JPRouve]

How can a manager be past his prime? Does age come into it? And why didnt that apply for SAF?

When you look at all major sports, SAF is one of the rare managers that lasted a long time currently on the top of my head there is Popovic in the NBA and Belichick in the NFL. These people are exceptional, they have all the traits of prototypical managers, drive, adaptability, creativity, curiosity, man management and discipline. Most managers do not have all these traits, they rely a lot on one of them and when that traits isn't as sharp the wheels come off.

 

[bond19821982]

Stubbornness will not take you anywhere and you should be willing to adapt. Anyone who plays 5 man defence against a team who had their worst start deserves to be fecking fired - past the prime or not-.

 

[Ban]

According to Gary Neville our problems started when we sacked Moyes, thus going against values of our club......

 

[Treble]

The thought that PSG or some other top club are just waiting us to fire Jose and will immediately appoint him is beyond silly.

Some people think that reputation is forever. They must wonder why Benitez is managing Newcastle and not one of the top top clubs in Europe. His CV is still better than that of Klopp, let alone that of Barca's or PSG's or Bayern's or Real's manager.

 

[Fosu-Mens]

Everyone keeps trying to identify one single problem that is the cause for the mess we're in. There is no one single problem, there are many. Lack of player quality, poor coaching, bad man management, no long term plan from the executives at the club, wasting money on shit players. The list goes on. It's a pyramid; fix the problems at the lowest level and the rest should start to sort itself out. Woodward and Mourinho are currently the two biggest problems we have. Neither should be in charge of any football matters at our club.

I assume you mean highest level? In an organizational structure the lowest level would be the players, and the top level would be the Owners, then the CEO(Woodward) and then JM. Top level: highest authority/responsibility.
Other than that i completely agree with you.

 

[99withaflake]

Moyes - been crap everywhere since he got sacked here.

LVG - Where is he managing now?

I think it’s safe to say we have just made crap appointments.

Who’s in charge of making those appointments?

 

[Josep Dowling]

We've got major problems up and down Manchester United, not just the managers.

We have owners who judge success by dividends and profit margins.

We have a chairman who is more concerned with commercial success than success on the football pitch.

We have a manager who is a great manager but not a Manchester United manager hence the dismal displays on the pitch.

We have a bunch of players that signed for us for the size of the paycheck not the prestige of playing for the club.

We have a fan base that are impatient and only care about winning, anything less is a failure.

We're a rotten sinking ship.

Honestly, I think we have become Liverpool of Houlliers era.

To answer the op, LvG and Mourinho weren't past their best, they just aren't Manchester United managers.

I think the fan base has been more than patient considering the size of the club and prior success. Honestly I just want to watch us and actually be entertained. I haven't enjoyed our football for a long time now, even when we were winning games last season.

I think we are within our right to expect to fight for the title and Champions League. We are after one of the richest and biggest clubs in world football. Our squad is one of the most expensively assembled teams in the world with the second largest payroll in World football. If we are paying out all this money why do we not have the best? Why are we no where near the top clubs? If I was Woodward that would be the first question I would ask myself, but he’s too busy worrying about noodle sponsors.

 

[Fosu-Mens]

How can a manager be past his prime? Does age come into it? And why didnt that apply for SAF?

Football evolves over time. What was effective in relation to man management, playing style, tactics etc may not be effective in 5 years.
SAF was able to adapt to the changing environment to some degree, JM has not.

 

[Handré1990]

I think that the whole thing runs deeper than that. It starts with Moyes. Inept as he was, deserved sacking as it was, it was still the first player power thing that got him fired alongside his obvious shrotcomings and ineptitude. Nonetheless, it was the first sign to the players that 'if you want to sack the manager, you can do it', something that obviously was not present at the club for the previous 26 years. After Moyes was gone, plenty of players have gone public with criticism of him, generally speaking the blame could've been and has been laid on Moyes. Everybody else was absolved of the responsibility. Players came and went, new managers popped up, so the first year under LVG we've done okay-ish - we've gotten ourselves 4th, it was better than the Moyes disaster. Meanwhile we've had some questionable transfers done, Rooney's contract extended, lots of talk about 'signing a galactico', so we've gotten di Maria who never really wanted to come here, crock Falcao, past it Schweinsteiger.

So after some time, even though our players were in awe of LVG's professionalism and honesty at first, those things became a problem. Being recorded and then analysed at Carrington became a problem. Our players were sent their performances analyses that they didn't even bother to watch because LVG's a dinosaur and how can he even question them. He was blunt with them, but honesty is only good when you're saying honest nice things about people, when shit goes sideways and it's criticism, honesty is good no more. So they got him sacked, we've won the FA so all the glory to the players but LVG goes. Situation is repeated, players go to the public, talk shit about the manager, general consensus is that it was LVG who's just way past it and new manager will get us going. Everybody else is absolved of the responsibility again.

Mou comes in. We take him in with all the baggage that he brings, the good and the bad. He knows that people like Schweinsteiger shouldn't be here so he tries to get rid of him but we then have got Bayern, half the media and big chunk of our fanbase berate Mourinho for behaving like he did with Scheweinsteiger, even though the problem was brought upon us by Woodward and LVG, he has to deal with this shit. We've still got way past it Rooney, again, problem brought upon us by Moyes and Woodward. He finally gets rid of him, so it's a problem less. But the players still know that there's this button that they can activate that deals with the problems once they are simply bored of the manager. We've got Zlatan in, apparently he's the problem for other players because he's slowing down the play and shit. We've got Pogba who always wanted to come back here but actually wants to feck off after two or three seasons. Martial for whatever the reason is sulking, Pogba is sulking (to be fair everybody knew that sooner or later he'd do that and he wouldn't be the player for the next 10 years or so, don't know if anybody seriously ever even considered that), Raiola's dragging the club through mud but it's not really a problem for Pogba as he's getting him a new contract. Meanwhile we get Sanchez in, who seems to be nothing other than a bust for us and another Schweinsteiger case.

Now don't get me wrong, I'd be deluded to say that Mourinho holds no responsibility for this shit, he's done plenty wrong and it's obvious here. For me, there's probably no coming back for him now so he'll have to walk. But some of the shit, including horrible mentality that runs through the veins of this club ever since SAF departed, is not on him. Players have seen the corruption ever since the Moyes times, some of the players are still here (which begs a question how clown like Jones can still be here after so many years), the same players that got Moyes and then LVG sacked. It could've been Martial's first year at the club, it could've been LVG who's brought him in, but he's seen that if you try hard enough, you can feck off the manager if you no longer favour him. Which is being the case now. Again.

It's like with a teacher and students. If the teacher shows the students that he falters in disciplining them once, they'll know it for years to come and exploit any possiblity to take shit on him once they want to. Woodward, who plays the principal in this analogy, has come to the class, let the students take a shit on their previous teachers and prenteded that everything will be fine with a new teacher. So some of the students graduated, some new students joined the class, but the rot and corruption is still within the class because the principal has let it slide once. Now it's not really him calling the shots. It's the students, even if some of them come and go.

You also have to ask questions of our medical staff how over the years we're still getting players like Rojo or Bailly in, who are constantly injured and unreliable. We've got Smalling, Lindelof, Jones, Rojo and Bailly as centre backs, three different managers have gotten them in and only Smalling and Lindelof are not injury prone, you can ask plenty of questions of their quality too. Honestly, how?

Pretty much. I don’t think there is a quick fix for our woes. We need to lay the ground work with a fresh manager, try to get some genuine good vibes going and take it from there.

 

[Ridge Racer]

Mourinho won the league 12 months before coming to United.

and almost relegated Chelsea 6 months before but everyone chose to forget that

 

[breakout67]

No, LVG and Mourinho performed at what you can expect, they just inherited a toxic situation.

Arsenal handled the succession of their long term manager far better. They revamped the scouting and recruitment a year before letting Wenger go. Only last season did we start doing the same thing, 4 years after SAF left.

We are getting a copy of Mourinho's Madrid and Chelsea terms. Establishes the system in his first season, improves considerably in the 2nd season, players lose motivation to play for him in his 3rd season. The only difference is that Mourinho was expected to completely revamp the team at United, while at Chelsea and Madrid his squad was already at a good level and their recruitment and scouting was much better.

 

[youmeletsfly]

Jose has part of the fault in:
- being rubbish in the transfer market (Miki, Victor, Bailly, hell even Lukaku are bad buys)
- not replacing old players and getting rid of the deadwood
- playing a system that just doesn't suit the best players in the squad
- criticizing players in public (What is he thinking, that the players will just sit back and enjoy it? It's a work environment, a competition, they will fight back and it seems it's starting to happen)
- motivating some of his picks in the 1st eleven on media/fans requests - Well, this is not FIfa and the manager of one of the biggest brands in football can't say that in public even if it's cheap sarcasm. - For me this is 100% sackable, anytime.

Club has the other part of the fault :
- Not investing in real quality in certain positions of the field (But this is mostly an issue that relies in the club's lack of a football structure. If we would've had a DoF and some sporting advisors we wouldn't have bought Eric, Victor etc). Basically we went out and bought cheap in a market where's hard to get a class player under 80 mil.
- Not having a sporting structure inside the club (even if I'm convinced they have advisors and so on, we need a DoF and a chief to revamp the scouting structure)
- Appointing a manager that has no real connection with the club's sporting idea. (doing this after already failing with 2 others)
- Not sacking the manager post Sevilla (We need to let the old romantic Man Utd go away, it just doesn't work these days anymore. You need to be ruthless with your managers, it's a result based game. You need managers that can give you success after 1 season, especially with the way our fans are used to winning stuff - We've seen @Liverpool, City, even Chelsea to an extent and I'm also betting money on Arsenal doing good this season --> don't hit me with the fecking trophies here - most of us would kill to play the footie that Liverpool or hell even arsenal play)

One good thing the club does is focusing on the commercial aspect of things. People think it's wrong to do that, but no, it's completely normal, especially in the situation we're in. It would've been quite shi7 for the club to have bad results on the commercial side as well. The focus on the commercial side is what still keeps us relevant in today's market, every penny counts.

People are under the false impression that our shi7 football and squad were caused by the club's focus on revenue, well, if the club didn't focus on that we'd be even worse atm. And, most importantly, we'd be even harder to fix, considering that we lack serious quality&consistency in several areas of the pitch and those will need attention in winter/summer. People also don't see that this started in SAF's last 2-3 seasons at the helm.

Our issues are simple - wrong manager and not enough investment. We basically threw 3 quarters of a billion in the last 5 years on awful transfers and awful managers. We should pray that's recoverable in the long run and that won't ruin our ability to fix the lacking areas of the starting eleven in the upcoming seasons.

 

[stevoc]

How worse could it really get? The only thing we've got to aim for is the top 4 spot and its a three way race between us, spurs and arsenal and spurs definitely have better team than us so, we are huge underdogs for that 4th spot. So, all we are risking is a really slim chance for champions league qualification and that's a fair price to pay for the opportunity to hire the right manager instead of rushing into another failed appointment.

It can get way worse. It’s only september the seasons hardly over. If we get an experienced coach in now then a top 4 spot should be attainable.

We don’t need to give someone a 4 year deal mid season. A short term contract until may for someone experienced is a better bet than a guy who’s been coaching all of 8 weeks.

 

[Nytram Shakes]

i think its a lot of picking wrong managers at the wrong time, Mourinho probably would have been a good direct replacement for Fergie he likes working with experienced established stars and thats what we had then. Instead we Brought him after LVG who was trying to build a team of youngsters.

With LVG we had a manger who wanted to bring through youth and develop away of playing the problem was we hard a board who wanted to win now and throw money at it.

Our next manager needs to be a manger who can nit a team together who will work with them heavily on the traning ground to so we look like a coherent team. Some one in the mould of a Klopp a pochettino a pep a Sarri. Though we all know we are just gonna go for a big name and get some one like Zidane or Anchelotti some one good at handling ego's but not the training ground coach we need.

 

[Ether]

Mourinho was just the right man at the wrong time. I will always hold it against the board that they opted for Moyes instead of him, that decision led a slow descent down the world footballing hierarchy. People say that Fergie left the 13/14 squad in poor shape but I disagree, it was the perfect situation for Mourinho. He would've loved to have winners like Rafael/Rio/Vidic/Evra/Carrick/Nani/Rooney/RVP at his disposal instead of breaking up the squad in a short space of time like his predecessors. He would've done a much better job of phasing out experienced players while still getting enough use out of them. It would've kept us competitive in the short-term and also given us a chance to replace them slowly over a number of years.

People forget that a big reason why Mourinho's 2nd stint at Chelsea went sour was because of their board's refusal to back him in the market. He knew that team needed strengthening to retain the PL and go far in Europe, but they gave him scraps like Falcao and Djilobodji. A lot of the players he targeted at Chelsea were linked with United when Moyes was here, imagine if he'd been given the money that LVG and Moyes had available as well as the time to complete the evolution of the squad, he could've built a strong PL/CL contender. Imagine going into the 2016/17 season with a side like this:

De Gea
Rafael Smalling Stones Shaw
Fabregas Matic Pogba
Willian Diego Costa Reus

​

Instead we had Moyes and LVG wasting resources and setting the club back years.

 

[Amir]

We have a bunch of players that signed for us for the size of the paycheck not the prestige of playing for the club.

Does that happen only to United?...

 

[Redphantom]

First of all I have to say what a brilliant forum this is and yes dark days for Manchester United Football club, but as a Life long Liverpool supporter I've witnessed a lot of this throughout the last 30 years and we still haven't won the bloody title, so I'm not posting just to be smug that all is rosy at our end.

What I've noticed from the beginning of Klopp's tenure was a methodology and building approach, i.e. he analysed what players were going to be useful for the 'team philosophy' no crazy spending spree right at the start. It's only now that the team framework is in place to challenge and yes he's spent heavily and quite rightly too. Its taken a few years and we still might not win the damn Premier league.

Maybe a manager and who knows who that may be, will come in and take a long look at your side and gradually build a great team' hell Fergie didn't do it overnight. What I'm trying to say is any manager that come's in throwing money around at the problem will be doomed. It's a gradual process.

We now live in a very knee jerk world where we equate spending lots of money equals success (overnight), sure Manchester City have spent a kings ransom on their current squad but its been built over a number of years and not overnight.

I think there is always key games prior to today that the downward spiral began. I'm a Liverpool supporter and when we got beat by Palace in the FAC 4-3 and the Everton 4-4 cup game I realised that something had gone. Looking at that 1-6 home defeat against City you could also see that something had gone. That air of invincibility, people no longer fear you. Trust me it happened to us.

God I hated that Fergie team but by god you played some great football.

 

[TwoSheds]

I find it strange people going on about poor buys. In the end, at CB we took a punt on 2 young £30m players and it looks like they won't develop like we thought. But that isn't serious money these days and, certainly with Bailly, I absolutely would have made the same call again as he has bags of ability. The problem at CB came when the cheap punts didn't work so we needed to go big and the board refused to back Mourinho up.

In saying that, I'm baffled that we haven't managed to acquire a proper right winger in the last few years. Maybe Perisic was supposed to be the guy, but given that we couldn't get him for some reason, why did we not get anyone else? Felipe Anderson was available for around the £40m mark for the last 3 years just as an example. It's doubly baffling that we actually have a guy in the squad who's been a world class right winger and is either refusing to play there or is not being picked there.

For my money the problems come from a combination of jumped up players, failures of the manager, and a half arsed CEO making football decisions over coffee and croissants when he probably doesn't even know the offside rule.

 

[Henrik Larsson]

Personally I think it's clear Mourinho's still a fine manager, people are just delusional and very bitter because of the current negativity and malaise.

Last couple of years in England he wins the league, months later makes a mess and gets the sack. Starts a new job at United immediately winning the Europa League and League Cup. Second year gets United a second place finish plus FA Cup final. Under any reasonable standard this does not equate to having lost his 'magic', plenty of coaches can only dream of such success. In the meanwhile Sarri, Pocchettino, Klopp are wonder doctors now despite winning even a simple trophy.

It's also very clear Mourinho's time is up at United by the way, not arguing against that. In terms of tactics he's a bit of a coward and a control freak, maybe this doesn't suit United particularly well. In terms of style, quite literally the only thing he cares about is optimizing results, which is why he holds all those perfect records. Perfectly illustrated by the tactics for the European final against a much more inferior Ajax. It's worked reasonably well here for two seasons, much better than Moyes and Van Gaal, but it's not been grand and things are looking to go tits up. Gigantic pressure is being built up to a point where even if we would win ten games on the bounce now, it would explode the moment one bad result would follow.

Talking about Van Gaal, he is not a bad coach but specifically clueless when it comes to making transfers. And more importantly, for a variety of reasons he's completely unsuited to be given free reign at a club like United. The results and performances under him despite his 'positive' intentions speak for themselves. Just like the incredible amount of money wasted, in two seasons he seemed to have spend nearly as much as Mourinho did in his first two years, in a much more less inflated market and other than Shaw, Martial we hardly have anything to show for it.

Squad to me clearly isn't good enough in terms of quality, plenty of the players don't have the bottle the play for United either which is actually even more concerning.

Edward Woodward has pretty much only made a shiteload of funds available. Don't even think he was deliberately undermining Mourinho this summer, it was just the consequence of ridiculous spending since SAF left in combination with not recuperating any money. Because other than City every club, even Real Madrid, has flogged off players for big chunks of cash in order to reinvest. Nothing about him suggests he has the inventivity or talent for this job.

 

[Theonas]

I think what we keep forgetting is that Mourinho's first two seasons with us were almost carbon copy to his first seasons with Chelsea (2nd stint). Respectable return in terms of CL qualification first season and a high point tally achieved through consistent if far from spectacular displays. The two teams were built the same way and achieved very similar targets in the PL. Both teams were clearly however not top sides. They were functional, capable of grinding out results and possessed few individuals who can win games on their own, Hazard in particular. Their limitations were obvious in the sense of being far from fluid or coherent going forward which was exposed mostly in Europe where there was enough attacking quality to unlock his defensive setup. The only difference between those two stints is the emergence of Pep's City. If we are being serious, even his Real needed Barcelona to drop their level before they could win the title. The point is Mourinho's level has been the same. The quality of sides he produces has a ceiling however and that ceiling can be surpassed by more teams nowadays than few years ago.

 

[nore1975]

I think the rot set in in Ferguson's last season. Yes he won the league but it was probably his worst side to do so. You could argue that Ferguson only signed two top players DDG and RVP since 2009 when Ronaldo went for the 80m. Ferdinand, Vidic, Evra, Carrick, and RVP were 30/+ in 2013. Rooney, Valencia, Young were 28. That's 8/11 of the 2012-13 were 28/+ when David Moyes took over.

Moyes should never have been appointed. He was out of his depth and far too deferential to Ferguson to begin to overhaul the squad as was required. He was never going to command the respect of the squad having won nothing as a manager. It sounds bonkers to think they appointed him.

LVG had the pedigree to manage United but the opportunity came probably 10 years too late. He was a winner and he did over haul the squad with varying success. He was not a good man manager and his style of playing was too rigid.

Mourinho came with the expectation of drama. He is a one man circus but like LVG was a winner. He too though has man management issues. He is not renowned for trusting flair players and this is not good at a club where the fans love cavalier football.

All the managers have been backed generously. Player recruitment is generally the make or break for any manager. When Souness took over from Dalglish at Liverpool in 1991 he took over an ageing side. He failed miserably though in rebuilding the side. Class players left to be replaced by absolute dross. It has taken us decades to be a serious contender again for the Premier League. United did finish second last year but really they were like the rest of the league miles behind City.

It will take Mourinho and Pogba to leave for Utd to move forward. Pogba is going to cause problems for the manager no matter who he is. For all those saying Mourinho is not getting the best out of Pogba. How about Pogba getting the best out of himself!

 

[Aloysius's Back 3]

Should have been SAF - Jose - LVG - Homegrown manager

 

[bosnian_red]

A bit of everything. Also the fact that not all managers can just replicate the same styles at every club to the same degree of success. Different clubs need different styles, different personalities, different expectations, etc.. Mourinho is still a great manager and will go down in history, but he isn't suited to United at all. Simeone is a fantastic manager, would be awful at United and the same shit would arise. Just like he would be awful at Barcelona. It's not a case of manager A won trophies therefore he is a top manager and would succeed anywhere. Complete lack of understanding of the role if you think like that.

 

[Hugh Jass]

This is not like germany or italy or france, where you have one team head and shoulders above the rest. You have six teams going for one position, which means five teams have to lose out.

 

[Sparky Rhiwabon]

I think what you’re saying is a big part of the problem. Both were great managers in their day but football moved on and they failed to adapt, meaning that by the time we got them they were in decline. With Jose, the clues were certainly there before he came to us (not sure about LVG, I didn’t really follow him).

Look at Jose now - he’s a mess - plays a different team, tactics / system almost every game, falls out with players, throws them under the bus after bad results, etc.

There are other issues as well though - Woody getting involved in football decisions?? Stick to getting sponsors mate. We need a DoF. Also, sheer lack of investment compared to some of our major rivals over a number of years. And the money we have spent has largely been spent poorly, in a scattergun fashion.

 

[tony54]

So the moot question is this-Did we just appoint two great managers who were on the decline and who were past their prime?Or is the situation a lot more complex than that?[/QUOTE]

I think you may have hit the nail on the head with this analysis, but then how does that equate to Sir Alex
who ruled with a whip hand getting the most out of an ever increasing mediocrity of players.
Although a top manager is highly paid the stress must be very high so it's understandable that
a manager could burn out. Far better to reign back than continue to ill health through excess stress.
I also think being seperated from ones family is unsettling so this is not helping.

 

[Messigician]

Van Gaal was mad. His tactics were utterly crazy and lacked any logic.

I think this is very harsh, LVG he had an obvious philosophy it just didn't always work out too well. When it worked it was nice like that Tottenham game.

 

[Nikelesh Reddy]

While I do think Mourinho should go, it is telling that United are the first big club he managed where he failed to deliver a title.

His first two seasons with Chelsea were great. A CL semi, a CL quarter and a Premier League. Also a legend for preventing Liverpool from winning it.

So, to answer the question, I do feel that whoever is brought in will also fail.

Why?Why do you think that whoever is brought in will also fail?

 

[Irwin99]

The rot slowly started happening post Ronaldo. We were (rightly) feared as one of the great teams in Europe but our recruitment was dire and little warning signs were creeping in every successive season. Players that we or the management thought were going to replace club legends and maintain the standard of success just failed badly. Evans, Smalling and Jones were meant to be our defensive foundation for years to come and look how that's turned out. Add the likes Valenica and Young staying for many years despite some mixed form and it just feels like bad decisions have been made at every turn. This club used to be so ruthless when getting rid of players that more often that not still had a lot to offer; e.g Ince, Hughes, Stam (ok, a big mistake) Beckham, Sheringham. Now it seems like we can't get rid of some them at all.

Interesting that Moyes, LVG and Jose have all expressed dissatisfaction with Woodwood's recruitment despite spending hundreds of millions. Is it just deflecting from their own shortcomings? Perhaps. But I think there's some rotten stuff at the club that goes beyond the manager.

 

[Nikelesh Reddy]

It runs through the entire strategy of the club spending crazy amounts of money on players who've done nothing and are being used as marketing pawns.

Listen to the first 10 minutes of this QnA with Rio Ferdinand. Talking about legitimate, real hunger and desire. The comment he makes about "we didn't have social media, we only cared about what was happening on match day" is so poignant of the direction the club is going at the moment.

The whole QnA really he just drips of the charisma and the leadership needed to make it at a top club. Inspire your team mates, drive them on and drive yourself on. I see barely any of that in our current squad.

edit: Just the whole thing is a great listen. The club under Ferguson was an absolute phenomenon. People will look back at his regin in generations to come and say "What? Fook off, he never finished lower than 3rd in the PL era? Yer mad."

Aren’t Man City players active on social media?Just look at the social media pages of the Liverpool squad...They are exactly like our players.But look at the hunger and the desire with which they play...

 

[Nikelesh Reddy]

In my view the rot had started two years prior to SAF leaving. When David Gill left seemed to be the beginning. A huge change in direction, with the choice seemingly made to chase as much sponsorship as possible while not recognising the importance of winning.

I’m not blaming this solely on Woodward, LVG or Jose, or the players. Something has definately gone wrong with our club.

And it is a rot by the way. Our crown is dusting away.

My biggest concern is not actually winning / losing beleive it or not but DDG aside, I find myself looking at the team i have supported for about 33 years and wondering which player I actually like.

Where are my heroes? My Robson? My Keane? My Irwin? At the moment, it is simply the badge I love, not the team and definately not the football. Worrying.

Good point....Who do we actually “like” in this squad?Even up until 10 years ago,we loved Rooney,Ronaldo,Evra,Rio,Giggs etc...Apart from De Gea,I don’t personally like any of our players...