On Manchester United, Moyes, Malky Mackay and Moody

What has happened to Manchester United?

I think the media have underplayed the amount of schadenfruede surrounding Manchester United’s humiliating, spectacular fall and crisis of confidence. They have become embarrassing; a couple of Manchester United fans I know have even started denying ever being so.  Most other fans gain an enormous amount of pleasure from United’s humbling, me included. At one level, it seems the reason for their decline is simple, Ferguson’s retirement. But at another level the root causes for such a precipitous decline are elusive. Poor quality sports journalism in the mainstream media doesn’t help us to understand much. I’m going to examine some of the reasons which have been put forward for Manchester United’s collapse below.

Reason 1. It is all David Moyes’ fault.

This reason seems plausible at first glance. Some journalists said that the job was ‘too big’ for Moyes and that he was ‘out of his depth’, but I don’t understand what that nonsense means. He didn’t have any more to think about, or any more work to do at Manchester United than at Everton. He had about the same number of players, and not too many more games. They seem like meaningless clichés to me.       

Moyes made a lot of mistakes (for example, the sale of Vidic, or the ‘crosses into the box’ tactic he used in some matches). But he was unlucky with some players’ terrible loss of form (e.g. Fellaini) and he was unlucky with injuries (e.g. van Persie). Manchester United’s core problems were not really tactical and the players seemed well-prepared for each game. It seems reductionist to blame it all on him.

Reason 2. The players aren’t trying hard enough.

This also seems quite plausible at first. Several players (e.g. Young, Carrick, Nani, Hernandez) were so poor last season that they were shadows of their former selves. But it seems extraordinary that a professional football player paid millions of pounds a year would put in any less than 100%. There is no evidence from the Prozone stats that players have been trying any less hard than under Ferguson. Surely Moyes or Van Gaal would just drop any player who wasn’t trying hard enough, their squad had and still has enough strength in depth and competition for places. The players have been trying their best, but I would just note that they lost their confidence very, very quickly after a few early defeats at the beginning of last season. They haven’t really recovered from there.

Reason 3. The squad weren’t that good to begin with.

Some professional journalists are seemingly almost psychotic in their belief that Moyes inherited a weak team. I have read things like Manchester United’s squad was ageing and was ‘in need of strengthening’ last summer. Again, I don’t understand what that means. Either they had a good enough squad or they did not; they had just won the league by eleven points and had plenty of young players coming through which strongly suggests that their squad was absolutely excellent. The addition of Fellaini should (on paper) have been enough for them to compete for the title again. This week, Eurosport claimed that ‘the rot of mediocrity set in with Alex Ferguson’s last couple of seasons’.  Another thing that I have read (in a serious news source) is that United were somehow ‘lucky’ to win the title in 2012/13. But how can you be a mediocre team and lucky to win the league when you win it by such a wide margin? It doesn’t make sense at all.

None of the reasons discussed appear to be very satisfactory in explaining what has gone wrong. Moyes inherited an absolutely excellent squad (so has Van Gaal) but perhaps the only criticism is that they are a bit mentally fragile. Maybe they were all so used to success that they don’t have enough resilience to deal a difficult moment?

Mackay and Moody

All these journalists saying that the Mackay and Moody affair shines a light on a wider malaise in English football are talking bollocks.

Mackay and Moody are bad apples; Mackay says he’s not a racist, sexist, homophobe or anti-semite, but he does a very convincing impression of one, doesn’t he? The fact that they waited until their comments became public knowledge before apologizing, and that Mackay didn’t come clean in an interview on August 22^nd about how many offensive messages he’d actually sent are greatly aggravating factors, in my view. I also suspect that they may have taken out an injunction against further texting revelations since we haven't heard anything more about it since Friday. They're trying their to avoid making a full apology and they're only sorry they've been caught. And this isn’t even the worst thing they've been accused of!

Deliberately overpaying agents with club money is a criminal offence. I predict Mackay and Moody will end up going to jail.

Arrogant Pulis was in the wrong

Confidentiality agreements signed by clubs and employees alike mean that we rarely hear what really goes on inside top football clubs. All we know about the Palace situation is that Pulis and Steve Parish (Crystal Palace co-chairman) disagreed over transfer strategy and targets. But I want to argue here that Pulis has behaved arrogantly, has missed the point spectacularly and has let Palace down badly.

Firstly, I’m not sure that Tony Pulis is quite as good a manager as has been made out, despite winning manager of the year last season. He is very good at keeping unfashionable clubs safe from relegation in the Premier League, but specializes in setting up teams to play unaesthetic, physically aggressive hoofball. He has never won any team silverware as a manager, not even in the lower leagues, and would never be considered for a job at really big club. One of Pulis’ fundamental misunderstandings is that football is not only a results business but an entertainment business too. That’s why he was forced out of Stoke and why Allardyce is so unpopular at West Ham, fans want to see short passing and aesthetic touches as well as good results (a side note: an American friend of mine watching a football match for the very first time remarked on how he likes it when they pass it around quickly, tiki-taka, pass-and-move football is intrinsically pleasing on the eye, I believe).

Another thing Pulis doesn’t seem to get is that professional football is a business and that Premier League clubs need to make a profit. Pulis and Parish reportedly fell out over transfer policy, Pullis wanted to buy older, experienced players like Peter Crouch, Parish wanted to invest in young players like Wilfried Zaha. I’m not sure what’s wrong with Parish’s logic there? Not only is Zaha is a more exciting and easy to watch than functional, big-target-man Crouch, but Crouch is 33 and has no resale value, Zaha is only 21, has huge potential and would have considerable possible resale value. Pulis should have accepted that it is in the long-term interests of the club to try to play attractive football and to invest in young players. In my place of work (as in the case of many people’s workplaces) I may not always agree with my boss’ decisions, but I get on with my job regardless because that’s life. We don’t always get what we want, why should Tony Pulis be any different?

Lastly, Pulis could hardly have left at a worse time, now the new manager will have very little time to work with the players (realistically, any new manager needs a full pre-season to get his ideas across properly) and only a week or two of the transfer window left. So, he’s really dropped Crystal Palace in it, and for all the wrong reasons too. In any case, many fans (me included) will be hoping that Pulis-and-Allardyce style football is on the way out of the Premier League for good.

Who will win the title?

Who will win the title?

This is pretty uncontroversial, but I think Manchester City will win the Premier League again this season. And I hate to say it, but I think that despite the Financial Fair Play rules Manchester City will continue building towards a sustained dominance of English football this season and for many more season to come.

The signings of Mangala and Sagna bolster the defence, and in attack City are absolutely brutal. They were actually a bit unlucky last season with the injuries to Aguero, if he stays fit and if Demichelis continues his improvement (or is replaced in the team by Mangala) I think City could run away with it.

Of the other contenders, I think Liverpool will fall away quite badly this season. They were very, very lucky with injuries in 2013/14 (i.e. they had none to speak of). That won't last. They will also have the Champions League games which place a considerable extra burden on the squad. And although they had a good record during the games Suarez was banned, they will still miss him badly, any team would. Arsenal will be competitive, but still don't quite have the resources to challenge for the title. They haven't ever since they let Viera go. As for Manchester United, I'm not sure it's possible to come back from 7^th to win the title. They had an air of desperation about them last season, and I think that could return if things go badly again this season.

I think the only club that could challenge City will be Chelsea. Fabregas and Costa are very strong additions to the team who challenged very strongly last year. But I just think that City have too much strength in depth. Chelsea also have the problem of Mourinho sometimes making some strange decisions, getting rid of the old and faithful Cole (33 year old) and Lampard (36), but bringing back Drogba (36) when Ba and Lukaku were also available, for example. If Mourinho's stubbornness and ego start getting in the way, Chelsea could have big problems.

I hope I'm wrong, but I can really see City running away with the league this season and starting to dominate English football in a manner which is unhealthy.

Anyway, I'll be blogging about the Premier League every single Thursday throughout the season. I hope you enjoy reading.