FIVE ASIDES Premier League: Watford 4, United 1
It’s over. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer cannot be allowed to manage Manchester United again. He kept faith with the players who had let him down, and they let him down again. Harry Maguire can’t be captain any more either, after getting the red card that killed off United’s chances of a comeback.
United were so bad in the first half that they could have been playing at home. They were feckless and careless and hapless and clueless. Their away form had remained respectable, apart from a dire last ten minutes at Leicester: they went into today’s game ten points from five away games in the league. If they’d won at Watford, as all the experts expected, they would have been above Arsenal tonight. As it is, they have to go to Chelsea as a rabble. But first they have to get out of Villareal without being hammered again. If Edinson Cavani is fit, he has to play: he’s United’s best defender.
“How low,” Solskjaer was asked at the end of the post-match interview, “do you feel?”. “Well,” he said, and paused. Ole’s at a loss, I thought. Suddenly he looked like a car that had had four punctures at the same time. Finally, in a soft, defeated voice,, he said: “Very.” He’s a decent man, who should probably have done the decent thing after the Liverpool game, and certainly after the derby. But his mistakes here were so obvious: persisting with Aaron Wan-Bissaka, with Luke Shaw, with Scott McTominay, and with Maguire. The fans were right: United needed Donny van de Beek, who then produced his best performance in a United shirt – and made Solskjaer look even worse.
The answer is not Brendan Rodgers, whose team are below United, albeit playing better. There’s just too much risk of him being another David Moyes. (United Moyes, not West Ham Moyes.) The answer is probably not Zinedine Zidane either: he’s a galactico manager, used to galactico players, and although United have a few of them, including two of his old charges in Cristiano Ronaldo and Rafael Varane, that is unlikely to be the road to salvation. They need a manager who will make the team better while also bringing on the youthful talent that is overflowing at Carrington. Our vote, for what it’s worth, goes to Erik ten Hag of Ajax. And if we have to wait for him, that’s OK, because Ralf Rangnick could come in as caretaker for the rest of the season and be the director of football thereafter.
Oh, and we need a few more departures. The people who’ve been pulling the strings have been useless. Rather than succeed Ed Woodward, Richard Arnold needs to follow him out of the door. And rather than just create some new shares, the Glazers need to give the fans what they really want – and get out of English football.