Is This The End?

I am not going to write about how the match went. Everyone saw it and if you missed it, I am going to paste the link to the highlights of the match below so if you are interested, you can check that out.

My Desire To Hire A Manchester United Man

What I am going to write about is my feelings and thoughts about the situation Manchester United finds itself in. After the disarray and toxicity of the Louis Van Gaal and Jose Mourinho stints at the club, I wanted someone who was associated with this club; someone who understood what it meant to play for Manchester United, the ethos of the club and the playing style that made us successful. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was not the first name in my mind although I did struggle to think of the right name considering the less than impressive record of ex-United players turned managers. But Solskjaer it was and if anything, it could have been an interim appointment to stabilise the club before an elite manager of the right profile was available to take over. As it turned out, Solskjaer was appointed permanently and has been in the job for 3 years now.

End Of The Road

In these three years, Solskjaer has faced situations where he has found himself backed to the wall but he has always found a solution to get out of it which is part of the reason why he has survived longer than anyone in the post-Sir Alex Ferguson era. This season, pressure has mounted on him after a dismal spell of results and performances and that was capitulated by a historic 0-5 hammering at home by our bitter rivals, Liverpool. He survived the culling in the aftermath and was kept in the job by two varying results and performances; a dominant 3-0 win away to Tottenham Hotspur and a less than deserving late 2-2 draw against Atalanta. Yesterday’s scoreline might have read 0-2 but the performance was more of a trashing than the one against Liverpool. After showing the ability to turn things around when he is under pressure, Solskjaer appears to have reached the end of his repertoire of magic tricks.

Football Side Of The Club Lacking

I will be amazed if he survives the chop now but then again, Manchester United is not a serious football club so if they still stick to him, it would be like a marriage of convenience despite knowing that you have reached the end of the line with your partner. I am nothing but a fan seated miles away on a tiny island called Singapore, I know I am inconsequential in the grand scheme of things but all I ask for is for the club to feel the same way I and many others feel looking at our neighbours and arch-rivals doing so well. I want them to feel the same hurt, despair, humiliation and embarrassment we feel. But we know they don’t feel the way we do because they are not football people, they are not fans like us. All they care about is the finances of the club and as long as this attitude continues, we will continue struggling. The situation we find ourselves in extends beyond the players and managers. The football side of the club should have a direction that they want to go to and a style of football they want to play. It should not be just winging it in hope that it works. It feels that there is little attention and care given to this department which is why we find ourselves where we are today.

Club Caught On Their Toes

The club should always be ready for any eventuality regardless of the contract offered to the manager and the plans around it. Things can change very quickly in football and it appears now that the results have gone bad and Solskjaer is clueless on how to solve it, the club is caught on their toes as clueless as the manager on who to replace him with or what the plan is in terms of his succession. I do agree that at the moment, there is a dearth of elite managers especially one of the right profile to manage Manchester United but surely, there could be someone that you can employ on a short-term or interim basis until the season ends before hiring someone else. I feel we should hire an interim experienced manager and then hire someone permanently at the end of this season. Surely with the resources that the club should have, it wouldn’t be tough to get a shortlist of available managers and managers that are suited for the way we want to play and start interviewing them.