Watching Louis van Gaal in the dugout and at press conferences is like watching someone digging their own grave. It's thoroughly depressing. A bit like watching his team play. Everyone knows that Mourinho wants to be in his seat and so does van Gaal. The likelihood is that he won't be, Guardiola will be. Either way, Louis van Gaal is a dead man walking.
Some of the Man Utd fans who stood behind Moyes are now taking the view that van Gaal is an improvement. Statistically, they'd be wrong. In fact, thanks to van Gaal's Abramovich-esque attitude towards spending money, United have spent £261.7m on players under him. This equates to a little over £2.5m per Premier League point attained by Man Utd since the summer of 2014. Compare that with the surprisingly miserly £64.6m spent by Moyes which adds up to only £1.1m per PL point accrued and it seems that van Gaal is putting in more effort for the same result. van Gaal has won exactly half of his matches in charge, whereas Moyes won nearly 53%. Not much of a difference, but again look at the money spent by both and the time available to both.
Many United fans aren't happy in general though. They aren't playing attractive football nor are they winning trophies. Two details that the fans got used to under Ferguson. van Gaal hasn't endeared himself to the media either. He says that it's all the media's fault that he is under pressure. He blames the media for rumours regarding his job. Ok, I'll admit, there has been rather a lot of artistic license used by the media in relation to goings on at Old Trafford, but he is still, effectively, blaming the media for United's poor performances on the pitch.
Which, blatantly, isn't the case. The reason for the poor performances on the pitch is rooted in the style of play that van Gaal is determined to impose on the Man Utd squad. This style is the Tony Pulis lump-the-ball-up-to-Fellaini-and-hope-he-does-something kind of drivel that has no place in the League system of England. Leave that to the Conference please. Last night, Untied played against Newcastle United. A game, considering how badly Newcastle are doing right now, that the Red Devils should have won with ease. Indeed, van Gaal said afterwards that his side could have scored six goals. Maybe if you had been playing normal tactics, Louis. As it was, they could only score three. Interestingly, so could Newcastle. So even a defensive, boring set of tactics still leaked three goals and with them three points turned into one.
How someone who has been in football for so long, and clearly has passion for the game, can stifle creative and intelligent players like Juan Mata and Angel di Maria and shackle them into route one football is difficult to comprehend. Ultimately, di Maria walked away after just one season. I can understand why he does it. It's his philosophy. He has won trophies nearly everywhere he has managed and comes with a reputation for being tough on underperforming players (Robin van Persie comes to mind). He also has a reputation of playing the kind of football that doesn't sit well with the Old Trafford faithful, especially when he's not actually winning trophies.
The impending arrival of Pep Guardiola into the Premier League has left many managers (particularly in Manchester) wondering just how safe their job is. As an Arsenal fan, I would love to see Wenger win one final Premier League title in May, move to his director's position and Guardiola come in to replace him. Unlikely, but that would be heaven for me. I think that Guardiola is likely to head towards the North of England to rekindle his rivalry with Jurgen Klopp at one of the Manchester clubs. I doubt either van Gaal or Manuel Pellegrini will be staying in England much beyond this summer with Mourinho taking over at Old Trafford, three years later than he intended to.
No comments:
Post a Comment