FIVE ASIDES FA Cup, semi-final: United 3, Coventry 3 (4-2 on pens)
It was a victory that felt like a defeat. How can you cruise into a 3-0 lead, then collapse so badly that you need to be saved by the VAR? Just by being Manchester United in 2024.
They keep doing this. Their last six games have finished 4-3, 1-1, 3-4, 2-2, 2-2 and 3-3: lotteries, the lot of them. Against Coventry, even after managing to control the game for the first 70 minutes, United collapsed in the last 20. This year’s MUFC bingo card was back in business. Conceding twice in quick succession? Tick. Giving away a penalty? Tick. Allowing a lower-ranked team to play through them? Tick. Suddenly resembling a shambles? Tick. They did pick themselves up to be the better team in extra time with 11 shots to Coventry’s five, but it wasn’t United who got the ball in the net in the 121st minute. For their spirit, their refusal to roll over, and Mark Robins’ smart substitutions, Coventry surely deserved to win. By the end they had every neutral on their side and a few United fans too. You could certainly argue that it would have been preferable to fall to Coventry than to go through and get taken apart by City for the third time this season.
Erik ten Hag did get some things right. In the first half he played his part in United’s successes, as Tyrone Marshall showed in the Manchester Evening News. Diogo Dalot’s powerful run and cross for the first goal came after a word from Ten Hag. The corner that brought the second goal was won by a fine shot from Marcus Rashford, who had just swapped wings with Alejandro Garnacho. But Ten Hag, like his team, lost his way after half-time. His first two substitutions removed Garnacho and Kobbie Mainoo, depriving United of vital energy. He did give Christian Eriksen a proper go for once, but if that wasn’t so rare, Eriksen would been less rusty. Ten Hag ended up using only four of the six possible subs when United needed fresh legs. A more assured manager might have seen the chance to send on a teenage debutant for an FA Cup fairytale.
Some of the players did well. Dalot was mostly excellent at both ends of the pitch. Bruno Fernandes has found his scoring touch just when United need it, with Rasmus Højlund labouring again. (And all three took fearless penalties.) Harry Maguire bossed it in both boxes. Casemiro managed as a makeshift centre-back and took the chance to play several lofted through balls of the kind Victor Lindelöf attempts once a season. (Casemiro’s penalty was a shocker, but at least it was the first one, like his old mate Luka Modric’s miss for Real against City.) Scott McTominay showed that he can still be Frank Lampard even when he’s having to fill in for Casemiro. Rashford was sharper than he had been lately, finding space and taking five shots, the most by anybody in normal time. Amad was busy, composed and far more useful than Antony, whose ear-cupping antics at the end were grim. If Rashford’s injury keeps him out, Amad deserves a run on the right, with Garnacho moving back to the left.
United’s next two games are relatively easy ones, on paper. They’re at home to the bottom two in the Premier League, Sheffield United and Burnley. These are nana skins that Ten Hag’s United are quite capable of stepping on, especially as they now have no fit centre-backs and Casemiro is likely to be joined by either Scott McTominay (who’s used to defending for Scotland, albeit in a back three) or Louis Jackson from the Academy. But this is still a chance to change gear, to calm down, to play it sane. Can they take it? That’s anyone’s guess.
Tim de Lisle is the editor of United Writing and a sportswriter for The Guardian, where he covered this saga as it unfolded.