Ole Gunnar Solskjaer can usually rely on himself not to say anything memorable. On March 17, though, he broke his own rule. “Any cup competition can give you a trophy,” he told reporters at the press conference before the trip to AC Milan, “but sometimes it’s more of an ego thing from other managers and clubs to finally win something.” A better yardstick, he argued, was a team’s league position.
The second bit is true: a cup run can be random, shaped by the luck of the draw. But the other bit was the line that would be remembered, and it was misguided. Sports teams, at all levels, bust a gut to win a trophy and jump for joy when they do it. Jose Mourinho, whose pot-hunting may have inspired the remark, had no trouble shooting it down at his press conference on Friday. “I’m pretty sure,” Mourinho said of Solskjaer, “that his big boss, Sir Alex, has a different opinion about it.”
The big-boss bit was a boring Mourinho dig, but the rest was fair enough. Ferguson’s far-fetched collection of trophies began in a modest way, with an FA Cup, then a Cup Winners’ Cup, then a League Cup. He would love to see United win the Europa League. Hell, he’d love to see them win a semi-final.
Solskjaer wants that Europa vase too. A consolation prize is a lot better than an empty cabinet. Actions speak louder than press conferences, and his selection in Granada told us what he really feels. With a big league game 69 hours away, against opponents who had the midweek off, he opted not to rest Bruno Fernandes or Luke Shaw, Harry Maguire or Aaron Wan-Bissaka. He didn’t even give Marcus Rashford, who seems at most three-quarters fit, a well-earned week at home.
Rashford managed 65 minutes of alternate limping and sprinting, Shaw played the first half without sparkling as he has recently, and the other three stayed on for the whole game. Solskjaer clearly wanted goals in Granada more than a win at White Hart Lane (though, of course, he’d like both), and these debatable selections did deliver for him. United’s scorers, as per usual, were Rashford and Fernandes.
If cups are an ego thing, so are goals, and wins. All of them have an element of showing-off, but this is the acceptable side of egotism. If you don’t want them, you may as well go home. It was a silly thing to say. But still, it wasn’t half as bad as “Same coach, different players.” Solskjaer may sometimes park the bus, but he never throws his team under it.