Man Utd’s nightmare boardroom situation means that while Alex Ferguson is trying to assemble a young team to conquer Barcelona, he’s in danger of losing out on the home front to the “noisy neighbours.”
For those of us who have grown to loathe Manchester United with a passion usually only reserved for the bloke you catch in bed with your wife or the boss who routinely make you work on Sundays rarely has a fortnight of football been quite so rewarding as the one we’ve just had. For those of us who have found United’s remorseless domination of the English game over the past two decades so monotonous and dispiriting that we’ve actually stopped watching their matches altogether, and started using their appearances on Match of the Day as a chance for a quick shower, rarely has the state of the club been of such huge interest.
You see it could be over. After 20 years of Terry Christian’s smug face toasting another title triumph we could finally, finally be in the end game for one of football’s most annoyingly enduring dynasties. United’s current situation can be summarised by looking back at four recent fixtures against two clubs – two Champions League finals with Barcelona, and two home league fixtures against Manchester City.
The first of those four games was at the end of the 2008/09 season when they lost 2-0 to Barcelona in the Champions League final in Rome. The Spanish champions are rightly lauded as one of the finest teams to have ever played the game but in truth they were lucky to win that game that night, United were the better team for long periods. I responded by hanging a Barcelona flag from the front of my house and drinking a magnum of champagne in the bath. Two seasons later they met again, in May this year at Wembley, at the same stage of the same competition and, without exaggerating, it was an embarrassingly one sided contest. United could not cope with, live with or play against Barcelona in any department. It looked at times like a village team had arranged a charity match against a Harlem Globe Trotters style side made up of the world’s finest footballers. It was a massacre, it could have been two or three times as bad as the 3-1 it eventually finished as. I played Barcelona by Queen so loudly for so long the neighbours called the police. More on why I’m this bitter and twisted about this lot to follow in the match preview.
Barcelona had moved to another level while United had regressed. Ferguson said before the match that a United win would “end all arguments” about his team. In the end a United defeat did just that - a rebuilding job was in order, and the sour faced Scot knew it.
So Ferguson set about the task, focusing on youth. Reasonably big money was spent on Phil Jones from Blackburn, David de Gea from Athletico Madrid, and Ashley Young from Aston Villa. Previously Chris Smalling had arrived from Fulham and Hernandez from his native Mexico (reference to him as Chicarito by commentators, stadium announcers or shirt manufacturers should be punishable by death by the way) and the new look United started to take shape.
The problem is, Barcelona aren’t the only issue here. Just across the city there is an unprecedented project underway at Manchester City. Ferguson initially dismissed them as “noisy neighbours” and United scored a typically late winner in a dramatic 4-3 home success against them two seasons ago just to reinforce the point. The way City have chucked money at their team under the watchful eye of the ever loathsome Gary Cook almost had the popular vote going Ferguson’s way. Almost. In the same way that Barcelona have accelerated away from United’s current standard, so City have now overtaken them. That 4-3 victory was well and truly avenged this season when Roberto Mancini’s side went to Old Trafford and won 6-1. I came oil.
Ferguson’s initial dismissal of City surprised me, because one thing he does know when he sees one is a game-changer. The longest serving manager in the country has developed a reputation as a no nonsense disciplinarian in his 25 years at Old Trafford – sycophantic commentators chortle at the “hairdryer treatment” catchphrase which has been flogged so hard now it’s not so much dead as a pile of ash on the floor. But it’s always been noticeable how Ferguson’s hairdryer is turned to a cooler setting, or left in the bathroom cupboard, when it’s one of his game-changers behaving like a prized moron.
Eric Cantona, for instance, would get himself sent off in ludicrous circumstances of his own making and sat out for nine months after diving over an advertising hoarding to karate kick a Crystal Palace supporter in the chest – any other player at any other club would have been banned for life incidentally. Ferguson never said a word against him, because he know how vital he was to his chances of winning.
Cristiano Ronaldo publicly courted Real Madrid for the best part of three years, behaved abysmally off the field, appeared in every smutty newspaper everyday of every week hanging out the back of whichever stupid Gemma Atkinson type slapper had come within fucking distance of him and even succeeded in getting his own team mate, Wayne Rooney, sent off in a crucial England match before winking at his manager in a “I told you he was a hot headed, thick, chav didn’t I?” sort of a way. But Ronaldo won matches, and trophies, for United so was tolerated.
And Rooney himself, who smokes like a chimney and spends his time between games shagging prostitutes old enough to be his grandmother or rough enough for a good case to be put together to execute them for the public good, is mollycoddled as well. Even when he flagrantly tries to engineer a move to the sky blue side of the City, or a massive pay rise, by criticising team mates and stating his belief that United aren’t good enough to win trophies any more, Ferguson bows to his wishes – new contract in the bag, shares in Manchester’s seedier brothels rocket.
Yes, Ferguson knows a game-changer alright, which is why that “noisy neighbours” comment about City surprised me so much. They’re clearly so much more than that, and United now face the possibility of falling not only further behind Barcelona in Europe but also Bayern Munich and Real Madrid without even the pleasures of domestic triumph to tide them over with City potentially set to form a new dynasty at the top of the English game with their Arab billions.
While City’s board are happy to almost literally buy trophies for their club, United have ended up with one of those boardroom-from-hell type situations that we know quite well ourselves. While City have spent £600m on new players and their salaries, United have been saddled with roughly that much in debt by the Glazer family that borrowed heavily to buy the club and then immediately loaded that debt onto their new asset. The fit and proper person test is a laughable farce, but the fact that you can buy a football club that way is nothing short of a scandal.
Ferguson has since said his lack of activity in the transfer market, when compared to City and others, is because there is no value out there. When you see Fernando Torres go for £50m, Andy Carroll move for £35m and Jordan Henderson for £20m it’s hard to disagree with him – and when he then goes out and buys Phil Jones and Chris Smalling for more modest fees you can’t help but think he knows exactly what he’s doing. Look at the amount strikers that have moved into City, Liverpool and Chelsea and the money they cost and then consider that Ferguson went out and bought Javier Hernandez, who I would contest is arguably better than all of them, for somewhere between £6m and £7m you can’t help but doth your cap to the man.
And while pundits are queuing up to crown City champions already, it’s worth remembering that United can go top on Sunday with a win at Loftus Road. It seems people still fail to pick up on the “never write off United” lesson that has been remorselessly drummed into our skulls for the last 20 years.
But the cracks are definitely there. Manchester City’s reserve team would qualify for the Champions League – their second XI is almost as frightening as their first. Man Utd simply don’t have that strength in depth. The Scout Report that follows will address the specific issues within the United squad but their failure to qualify from the easiest group in this season’s Champions League, where they regularly rotated their squad with expensive consequences, coupled with a League Cup defeat against a half decent Championship side in Crystal Palace shows that the strength in depth simply isn’t there. It doesn’t need much for the Darron Gibson’s of this world to be pressed into action, while City can’t find a place for Adam Johnson.
City are so flush for cash that they can even afford to go out and buy players they neither need nor want, just to stop United having them – Samir Nasri for instance. Should United renew their interest in Dutchman Wesley Sneijder, correctly identified by Ferguson as exactly what they need, I’d expect City to fire a lazy counter offer and blow them out of the water.
Interesting times indeed. If they come out of this situation winning European Cups ahead of Barcelona and Premier Leagues ahead of Manchester City it will be not only Alex Ferguson’s greatest achievement , but the greatest achievement by any club team in the history of professional football.
It’s one of those London buses weeks for LFW this week where we wait for days for a response from an opposition supporter to our interview questions, and then three come along at once. So three for the price of one this week – another former team mate of mine Mike Glasgow, kind volunteer via Twitter Patrick Campbell and the Republik of Mancunia blog (click the banner to visit) give us the inside track on their club.
What have you made of United's start to the season?
PC - In terms of the Premier League, it's been pretty good to be honest - better than the media would have you believe. We've got more points at this stage of the season than we did last, and at the time of writing we're only two points off top so don't go writing us off just yet. Of course the injury to Nemanja Vidic is a massive problem. He's our rock, he compliments Rio very well and I don't trust Jonny Evans as far as I could throw him. He's not quick, and we've seen against certain pacey forwards (Torres) the ball over the top causes him problems, but on his day there's no other centre half in the world I'd rather have in my side. We've been linked with Gary Cahill but I'm not convinced. I'll be talking about the Champions League a bit later, but needless to say it was a kick in the teeth. I've never been too fussed about the Carling Cup - though I am disappointed we went out of it I thought Palace fully deserved their victory that night. In summary - we're doing alright, so far.
MG - Patchy. Obviously we got off to a cracking start, but we've had two freak results. We weren't as good as 8-2 v Arsenal suggested and weren't as bad as 6-1 v City suggested. Apart from the first few games we haven't been good enough going forward; not creative or clinical enough. We still have the best defence in the league though. All feels a bit like a work in progress at the moment.
Rep - We're five points better off than we were after 15 games last season with a better goal difference too, so it's obviously not too shabby. To go from beating Arsenal 8-2 to losing 6-1 to City suggests our start of the season hasn't really been the norm. With the injuries we've had as well, I'm pleased with how we've done, but some of our performances have been pretty naff.
What are the hopes and ambitions for United fans this season, and going forward over the next few years?
Rep - To win the league. Our ambition every season has to be to win the league.
MG - Given City's obvious strength and our mounting injuries, I think this season winning the league would be a ridiculous achievement. I think second to sixth is very hard to predict, but hopefully we will still be challenging around March time. We have the foundations of a very strong squad and I would expect us to be challenging for the title and cups for the next few years. Hopefully the good cups... not just the League Cup.
PC - Those hopes and ambitions have been tempered by the Vidic injury, I fear. Going into the season we knew it would be a massive battle to retain the title and finish ahead of city, but I was confident we had the experience and just enough quality to do so. Now I'm not so sure. It's a case of "when" not "if" with City I think - sad but true. We just have to fight them as hard as we can. Last year's Champions League final showed us we were a long way behind Barca, and this year I couldn't see a way we could win it as Madrid and Bayern are also better teams than us right now. There's going to be a lot of changes over the next few seasons so we'll just have to wait and see what Ferguson does.
What do you make of Manchester City? Is there a fear that their spending power will see them overtake United and pull away over the next decade?
PC - I think "fear" is the wrong word, because the situation is what it is. Really, they should dominate football now, and whilst I don't like that I am a realist and know it is probable. Nevertheless, we saw with Chelsea that success built on money can be short lived. Mourinho's Chelsea sides looked unbeatable, like nobody would ever get near them, yet they won just two titles and never reached the Champions League final. It's one thing having the money, it's another thing going out there and doing it, and then keep on doing it.
Rep - As Chelsea have proven, you need a lot more than money to be the dominant force in English football. When Chelsea won that title in 2005 you had to think no one else would get a look in for years. As it turns out, we've won more league titles than them since Abramovich took over, and a European Cup, despite them having a sugar daddy and us having owners who have dragged us in to a ridiculous amount of debt. They have a great squad, no doubt, but with their players kicking the shit out of each other every week, others refusing to play, and their failure to get in to the Champions League, it's obvious this being successful malarkey isn't as easy as some would like to think.
MG - Absolutely. It’s difficult to see them sliding away unless the owners get bored or Uefa's new rules around financial fairplay hit them hard. I don't think they will be guaranteed titles, but I expect them to be challenging for them with the other regulars. Ferguson will no doubt retire whilst City are in the ascendency so it's going to be an impossible job for whoever replaces him.
Is it galling to have City spending and going the way they are while United are saddled with the Glazer's? What do you make of your club's owners?
MG - Glazers, I don't know. They might not give a shit about the club, but I'm sure they give a shit around their own money, so I'm hoping that they have plenty of reason to make things work. We're certainly at greater risk given the shitty economy and level of debt we have. They need us to maintain a fairly high level of success to protect their investment, so hopefully the money will be around to strengthen the squad in the future. It was this summer and I think we brought in some good players. I don't think City's spending is sustainable and certainly not a good model to follow, but that said I think we need to strengthen in the middle of the park, so it will be interesting to see if we have the money to do that next summer- and interesting to see if City buy our targets to spite us, like Nasri. I think that the stuff the supporters club have campaigned for to get more fan involvement is laudable and I definitely support that, but so far, my view is that the Glazers ownership hasn't been the disaster than some people suggest
PC - I fucking hate the Glazers, but the first part of your question is irrelevant. I don't want United to be like City. I don't want us to be a rich boy's plaything. All I want is for my club to run on its own volition, for Sir Alex to have money to spend which he's received because we're in profit and being run well. That's how it used to be before we were saddled with the debt. Now you get the feeling Ferguson has got his arms tied round his back - look at the central midfield situation: Carrick, Anderson, Giggs and Cleverley is all we have there, and Giggs is a pensioner and Anderson isn't exactly reliable. For one of the biggest clubs in the world, that's painful, and no matter how many times he says "The money is there but there's no value in the market/I don't need to spend" I don't believe him.
The problem is partly apathy based on success and partly the "day trippers" who make up a section of our support. Winning the league and reaching Champions League finals has given the Glazers a nice shield to hide behind - "everything's going alright isn't it lads?" and that success has stopped fans from wanting to vent their spleens. It's also meant that they know full well that when season ticket holders say "Fuck this" and stop going, a couple from Ireland or Japan will be in their places the next week with their Official Megastore bags bulging with tat and shirts they've bought for about £50. So what can you do? On that note, Old Trafford is so deathly quiet nowadays. We laugh at Arsenal fans, but OT is like a morgue at times. Again, apathy.
Rep - It's sickening. We're the most valuable "franchise" in the world yet are doing everything we can to save the pennies. The most costly money saving effort is trying to avoid paying out the big contracts, which is what has kept us from signing the special central midfielder we've been craving for. Our current squad doesn't need an awful lot doing to it but it's frustrating we can't spend as freely as our rivals in England and on the continent. I wouldn't want to see us bring in loads of superstars. I like us buying young players and bringing through our own, but it would be nice if there was the option to buy the odd world class player here or there. Just one of Yaya Toure, Silva or De Jong would do me.
How devastating was the early Champions League exit? What do you put it down to, the group looked relatively straightforward?
Rep - It was absolutely gutting on the night and the few days after but I guess you just have to get over it. After every goal we scored against Wolves at the weekend the Stretford End chanted "Thursday nights, Channel 5". If you don't laugh you'll cry, eh. Our home form let us down. There were some stupid results in there which should just never have happened, namely the Basle game. We were 2-0 up in no time and threw it away.
PC - It was devastating for me because I love the Champions League, it's the one tournament that excites me more than any other, to be honest. Even the league. As I said earlier, I didn't think we had a prayer trying to win the thing this year, but it is those Champions League nights at the knock-out stages which cause OT to stir and generate some noise. Reaching the final twice and not winning in recent years has made it more of an obsession for me, as well. For a club of our standing, we've won it three times but you can't help thinking that that should be a bigger number. The group? Piss easy. Again though, that's the apathy thing, even I'm guilty of it. People turn up to group stage matches thinking "Basle? Benfica? Galatei? Christ this is dull" and just assume we're going to top the group and that teams will roll over for us. When Basle came to OT and actually had a go, the crowd and the players were stunned. Failing to qualify was a mixture of complacency and perhaps some young players not being experienced enough to see the job through.
MG - Champions League exit is a shocker, but we didn't deserve to qualify. Just a horrible collection of individual errors, all round poor team performances and admittedly some bad luck. Very strange because very different to how we have played in Europe in the last few years. The group should have been a piece of piss. Benfica are a decent team, Basle are very mediocre/verging on shite and that Goulash team are one of the poorest to make it to the group stages in years. Hopefully it will stand us in good stead in the future, because we had a very young squad in Europe. Ferguson has always been very good at using that sort of experience to motivate and improve players, so let’s hope he does. It means that if we progress we have Thursday-Sunday football for a few months which is not ideal. Maybe a small consolation is that there are some big teams in the Europa this year, but it is a small consolation. Financially, if this became a habit, we would be fucked. Failing to qualify for the Champions League next year would be even worse and it could certainly happen if the London clubs continue their form into the New Year.
We know the obvious stars in the United squad, but who are the unsung heroes and who are the promising youngsters coming through the ranks?
PC - It's difficult for United to have "unsung heroes" really isn't it, what with the scrutiny and exposure of playing for United. I would probably say Ji Sung Park and Anders Lindegaard. Park is never going to win World Footballer of the Year, but his workrate is fantastic and he can play across the midfield. Lindegaard is number two goalie but he's not put a foot wrong so far. Promising youngsters - Ravel Morrison is the obvious one. All the talent in the world, but his brains are in his boots, if you follow me. If he can keep on the straight and narrow, he's got a serious chance. Paul Pogba is another one - a massive presence in the middle of the park. Due to Glazernomics and injuries, we may be seeing him a few times this season. Larnell Cole is a few years off yet but I really like him - small but quick with a good footballing brain.
Rep - Michael Carrick has been on the receiving end of a lot of stick for a while now (from some fans, since he signed) but he's been really important over the past few weeks. Danny Welbeck adds a lot to the side when he's fit. There's far more energy in our attack when he's on the pitch. As for the youngsters, Ravel Morrison is an incredible player who really has the potential to make it in the first team, if he can get his head right. Will Keane is another good player but he hasn't been given a chance in the first team yet. Paul Pogba is all over the papers at the moment after reportedly turning down our latest contract offer. He's a beast in the Reserves but has been disappointing in the limited opportunities he's had in the first team.
MG - De Gea has been very good so far this season – a few early mistakes and a couple against Basle, which is a shame because he was looking very good. Obviously Jones has been quality and Jonny Evans- apart from a few very blatant and well publicised fuck ups has been fairly strong. I suppose it's telling that I resort to Evans, no one really stands out. Young is going in reverse, Nani has only very recently remembered he can be half decent if he stops being a twat, none of the strikers apart from Hernandez have done much and now he's out until spring. Welbeck has looked good in fits and spurts and is probably the best of the youngsters - he will get more game time if he can stay fit over the next couple of months. In terms of promising youngsters, we could conceivably have a back five of De Gea, Fabio, Rafael, Smalling and Jones once Ferdinand and Vidic move on. In midfield, Paul Pogba, Ravel Morrison and Ryan Tunnicliffe all looked quality at youth level so will be interesting to see how much time they get. Of course there's the saviour, Tom Cleverley, who looked sharp until he was injured. He looks like he could be very good, but I think the furore around him has got more to do with our established midfielders being wank than him being brilliant. Welbeck, Rooney and Hernandez have got a lot of years left in them up front and we've got a youth team striker called Will Keane who has already played for England U21s and looks good.
In Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger at Arsenal we’re seeing the last of an almost extinct breed of manager in our sport playing out their final days. There will never be another pair like them, given 25 and 12 years respectively, to manage their teams.
Ferguson was appointed at Old Trafford in 1986 and has since won (pause for breath) 12 league titles, five FA Cups, four League Cups, ten Charity Shields, two European Cups, one Cup Winners Cup, one Super Cup, one Intercontinental Cup and one World Club Cup. But he didn’t win anything at all until 1990 and in the modern game he’d probably have been sacked somewhere around the 1988 mark of his tenure. The Mark Robins goal in the FA Cup at Nottingham Forest is the oft quoted “saved his job” moment but the chairman at the time Martin Edwards has recently laughed off the suggestion that Ferguson would have been sacked had he lost that game. He’s right, he probably wouldn’t, and they’ve reaped unbelievable rewards for sticking with him. In the modern era he’d have been sacked long, long, long before that goal and game at the City Ground. We will never see his like again.
It’s odd, having just reeled off that unprecedented honours list, but to be honest I always look at his achievements at Aberdeen as the mark of what a good manager Alex Ferguson is. He won three Scottish league titles at Pittodrie, four Scottish FA Cups and one Scottish League Cup. Look at how embarrassingly awful Aberdeen have been since he left 25 years ago, and how Rangers and Celtic dominated that tin pot set up north of the border before and since. Christ 25 years on and Ferguson remains the last man to win a Scottish league title without managing one of the Old Firm. That’s how good this man is. It makes me physically sick, but he’s utterly brilliant at what he does. Arguably the greatest of all time in this country.
The problem United have, apart from the debt and subsequent inability to compete in the transfer market, is that sooner or later he’s going to need replacing. He tried to retire at the end of the 2001/02 season, amazing to think back to that now considering what he’s achieved since, and at the head of the queue back then was England manager Sven Goran Eriksson. God, so near and yet so far from pure and utter hilarity.
A succession of his former key players have ventured into management clutching a “he played for Alex Ferguson, maybe some of it rubbed off on him” ticket and have, by and large, been a complete failure. Steve Bruce has had some success with Birmingham and Wigan but has just been justifiably sacked by Sunderland, Mark Hughes might stand half a chance if he does as well with his next club as he did with Fulham and Blackburn, Bryan Robson is so bad I find myself chuckling about him on the tube into work, Roy Keane is obviously mentally unhinged and so it goes on.
For me, you want to be the man replacing the man who replaces Alex Ferguson. Whoever comes in first will fail, it’s inevitable. Look how United reacted when Ferguson said he was going to retire but was still in charge. Sadly I fear that may be David Moyes, who really should move on from Everton right now and actually start winning things at a better equipped club but seems set to just sit there, underfunded and doing an unbelievable job for no reward, until Ferguson finally hangs up his stopwatch.
There is only one man that could come into Old Trafford after Ferguson and continue the success. And f they got him, I fear that success would continue for another decade or more if they could persuade him to stay for that long. Jose Mourinho. The Glazer’s have done nothing positive for United whatsoever but if they somehow managed to snare Mourinho as Ferguson’s replacement then those of us who’ve suffered through 20 years of red dominance would probably have to settle down for at least another ten years of the same.
QPR’s task this weekend is surprisingly simple when you consider who the opposition are. We need to pick the same team we picked against Man City, in the same formation, with the same attacking attitude. If we do, and we perform at the same level, we will win this game.
Like Man City, Man Utd arrive at Loftus Road recently shorn of their best centre half. Mancini had to deal with a suspension for Vincent Kompany at Loftus Road and selected Stefan Savic in his place who was given an absolutely torrid time by Jay Bothroyd and Heidar Helguson who both should have finished the game with a brace of goals. United come to us on Sunday reeling from the news that Nemanja Vidic is out for the season.
This is their key weakness this weekend. I thought in the summer that Chris Smalling and Phil Jones were being lined up to be the Man Utd centre half partnership for the next half dozen seasons at least, and that may still be the case. But United’s prudence with the cash means Jones has been pushed forward to play in the centre of midfield where they are in desperate need of a world class player while Smalling is proving a very adept replacement for the retired Gary Neville. What the board should have done is greenlit a midfield and right back signing so that Smalling and Jones could indeed slide in to replace Rio Ferdinand and Vidic – they haven’t, and so we’re likely to face Ferdinand whose body is failing him and Johnny Evans who simply isn’t good enough.
In the middle of midfield meanwhile Michael Carrick has shown recent twitching that he might be about to return to the form he showed at Tottenham that persuaded United to pay £18m for him in 2006. Since then he’s been dreadful, but just lately there have been signs of improvement. Still, we should stand a chance against a central midfield of him and one from Antonio Valencia (winger), Ryan Giggs (old winger), Ji Sung Park or Phil Jones (centre back).
Everywhere else though we’re going to have problems, particularly down our left. Last week at Liverpool Stuart Downing, out of form and increasingly criticised, looked like a world beater playing on the opposite flank to the one he usually roams. The reason for that was QPPR picking a very attacking left back in Armand Traore, and Tommy Smith at left wing who cannot and will not defend. If Warnock goes with that pair down that flank again on Sunday then we’re in trouble because Nani is three times the player Stuart Downing is and he’ll have an absolute field day. Picking Traore and Smith against Nani is the equivalent to dropping your trousers and bending over next to a sign that says “gang rape enthusiasts help yourself.”
Similarly at centre back we’re now dreadfully weak, with Anton Ferdinand ruled out and our resident bulimic Fitz Hall favourite to replace him next to Danny Gabbidon. If Wayne Rooney is played up front rather than the strange midfield roles he seems to be employed in these days then we could well be in trouble.
We’ll also be in trouble if the defensive, containment attitude we adopted at Liverpool is employed again. The problem is we don’t have a defence to contain anything, especially not United. We should just attack as often and with as many numbers as possible.
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