It might be assumed Manchester United will have nothing to play for when their postponed final game of the season against Bournemouth takes place on Tuesday but that is not quite true. Should they keep a clean sheet against the Cherries David de Gea shares the Golden Glove award for most in a season together with Petr Cech. And if United do keep Bournemouth at bay for the whole 90 minutes, they will finish the season on 34 goals conceded, the best defensive performance in the Premier League bar none, thanks to Tottenham Hotspur letting five in for fun at Newcastle United.
That hardly makes up for missing out on the Champions League – which they will do unless they win by a 19-goal margin – but come on, it has not all been bad news for Manchester United this season, has it? Louis van Gaal keeps banging on about needing more creativity in the team but, in addition to the meanest defence around, most people have been impressed with the emergence of Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford in attack. Wayne Rooney certainly has.
“The young lads have come in at a really difficult time for the team and they have been brilliant,” the United captain said. “They have been under huge pressure and they have performed. People forget how young Anthony Martial is. He is still learning and improving. It’s always great when you see young players coming through and credit to the manager for that.”
Geoffrey Boycott thinks the same. What’s it got to do with him? He has been a United supporter since 1962, when Denis Law came back from Torino. He first identified the Scot as a star of the future when he was a scrawny teenager at Huddersfield, so he knows a bit about the United tradition. “The first half of the season was disappointing but the best thing has been when we’ve had to play with the youngsters,” England’s favourite slow scorer said in an article in the match programme for the game against Bournemouth. “They have played positively, with exuberance and without fear. They run at the defence and that is what our sides of old have always done.”
Here’s the question then. If United have a miserly defence and exciting players in attack, how come their season has been such a damp squib, failing to make the Champions League for the second time in three years and setting all sorts of unwanted records for scoreless first halves and negligible totals of shots on target? If Van Gaal’s brief was to steady the ship after the David Moyes season and return United to their rightful place among the giants of Europe, then he has failed, surely?
Or at least he has got only half the job done. United are a steady, secure, risk-free operation these days, which is probably why Boycott still likes them, but they do not frighten the big names around Europe any longer. That was starting to be true at the end of Sir Alex Ferguson’s long reign. It was true last season when United qualified for the Champions League but were out of the competition by Christmas and it almost certainly would have been true had Manchester City slipped up at Swansea to allow their neighbours the chance to sneak into the top four this time.
Even Manchester United supporters do not much care for the brand of football that has been served up this season. Van Gaal does indeed deserve credit for reducing the age of the side, particularly in attack, and showing confidence in youngsters such as Martial and Rashford but he is right about the lack of creativity in midfield.
Between a solid defence and an attacking partnership that is going to get better United appear to have little to offer to hurt opponents or to bring spectators to their feet. They play a safety-first, possession-based game that often seems designed to bore opponents into submission rather than play them off the park. Martial and Rashford have been excellent at sticking away what few opportunities have come their way but just imagine what a plod United’s season would have been without them.
Ferguson’s teams at their best could hurt opponents all over the pitch. As the Burnley manager, Sean Dyche, put it a couple of years ago, they had a hundred different ways of winning a game. This United does not. Their football is one-dimensional, laboured and often predictable. That does not matter in itself – United fans have no God-given right to be served up entertaining football every week – but the current league table indicates failure. All United had to do in the second half of the season was get past an ailing Manchester City side that has been well below its best – and they could not manage it. All they had to do at West Ham United last week was hang on to a lead for the final 20 minutes – and they could not manage that either.
Van Gaal will doubtless maintain that he is only part-way through a three-year plan and that United are improving, both of which are just about true. But this is the Premier League. Improving at the pace of a snail is never going to be enough. Look at how much Leicester City improved over the course of the season. Look at the heights Spurs nearly reached under Mauricio Pochettino. Look at what Jürgen Klopp has already achieved at Liverpool and remember that Manchester City will shortly be under the supervision of Pep Guardiola.
Football at the top level in this country now moves far too quickly for anything as ponderous as a three-year plan. The best bit of business United did by far this season was swoop for Martial at the beginning. That, and having the courage to play Rashford, were the only two Van Gaal decisions that moved the team forward.
If plans are already advanced to spend another £60m or so in acquiring some speedy and skilful midfielders, then Van Gaal might be worth persevering with for another season but that would just be transfer business. There is no sense in regarding it as the completion of a three-year project.
Van Gaal has spent two years saying he wants more speed and creativity in the team but it is not as if his record with players such as Ángel Di María, Memphis Depay and Adnan Januzaj is impressive. On his own terms, because he said the target for this season was third place, Van Gaal’s three-year plan has to be judged a failure.
United are better than they were but nowhere near as good as they want or need to be. They could win the FA Cup this weekend, which will be good for Van Gaal’s CV and medal collection, although if they go into next season with the same coach they will probably reach the end of it no nearer to their ultimate goals. United seem not to know where to turn for their next manager, although they have surely seen enough of their present one to realise Champions League football might not be attained next season either.
What was considered an unfortunate blip when the Ferguson succession was first botched is now in danger of turning into something more permanent.
