Review of Manchester United 2020–21 (Part 1)

It has been a disappointing end to the season for Manchester United. United have limped over the line, winning just one match in our last five, securing second place in the league standings. I will now break down our season separated into three parts; Domestic, European football and Players & Tactics.  

Domestic

United entered the season in a gloomy state with dark clouds around the club after another underwhelming transfer window. We were told we had no money to spent while we watched our rivals strengthen. The only signing we made then was that of Donny van de Beek. Later on deadline day, we panicked and squeezed in 4 signings, Alex Telles, Edinson Cavani, Facundo Pellistri and Amad Traore. The air of gloominess stretched to matters on the pitch as well. We started the season with a defeat to Crystal Palace at home and were struggling from the lack of proper pre-season due to a delayed start after having gone far in European competition the previous season.

We suffered a defeat that I would describe as season-defining as it shaped the way we would play in the coming months, a 1-6 mauling at the hands of Tottenham Hotspur at Old Trafford. Last season, we had found a stable axis of Nemanja Matic and Paul Pogba in central midfield, Mason Greenwood on the right, Bruno Fernandes as a playmaker, Marcus Rashford on the left and Anthony Martial as the striker. That worked well. But it was torn apart after that mauling.

The Matic and Pogba pairing was replaced by Scott McTominay and Fred due to injury, illness and poor form of the former two. United started playing cautiously in big games and had a dismal record in the league in those matches. In 10 matches against the so-called Big Six of Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal, we only won two matches, lost thrice and drew the rest 0-0. The common theme in these matches was cautiousness and not taking risks. The emphasis was on not conceding rather than taking the game to their opponents. In the two games, we did win, we played on the front foot especially in the return fixture against Tottenham.

It was a strange season in terms of performances as there were games where we played well in one half or in parts of the game to win it. It wasn’t often that we played well from the first minute to last. Last season, we had a remarkable statistic of keeping one of the most number of clean sheets in Europe’s Big 5 leagues. It was strange because it didn’t feel like the defence was water-tight and it didn’t look like it this season either. Going forward, we didn’t look too coherent and smooth either. We were feeding off the brilliance of individual players or capitalising on a mistake from the opposition.

The word, progress has been used a lot to describe this season and if you take into account the fact that Ole Gunnar Solksjaer has progressively got the team to finish higher in each season, then yes we have progressed. But we are still miles away from first place. The last time we finished second under Jose Mourinho in 2017-18, we finished it 19 points behind Manchester City. This season we did better to finish 12 points behind but 7 points worst off the points tally in 2017-18. It is also to our benefit that Liverpool had a major injury crisis wiping out most of their centre backs, causing them to drop a lot of points. Chelsea steadied themselves only after the sacking of Frank Lampard albeit in a pragmatic way. Tottenham beating United 6-1 was as good as it got for them as they had a dismal season and so did their crosstown rivals, Arsenal. In that sense, you can argue that we didn’t have the strongest of challenges.

At one stage in the season, we found ourselves top of the league but not for one moment, did I have faith in the team’s ability to maintain that position for long. I didn’t have faith in the quality and most importantly the consistency and mental strength of the squad. I left it to the team to prove me wrong but they didn’t. We ended the season unbeaten away from home for the first time in our history but lost 6 matches at home. In all, a useless statistic as it got us nothing. We showed a tendency to come from behind and win matches as well. It speaks well of our team spirit and tenacity but it has been a frequent occurrence as is the fact that we play better in the second half of matches.

In domestic competitions, we crashed out of the semi-finals of the League Cup again to the same opponent last season, Manchester City. In the FA Cup, we beat Liverpool in the 3^rd Round but exited the tournament a stage earlier than last season, at the quarter-final against Leicester City. Both times we were outclassed and outplayed.