WE LAUGHED AT ARSENAL ... BUT NOW THE JOKE IS ON UNITED
Gunners used to celebrate fourth like they’d won trophy – Yorke and Cole reckon United are now in same position
MANCHESTER UNITED used to laugh at rivals Arsenal celebrating a top-four finish as if it were a trophy win.
But now the joke is on United, who have sunk so low they cannot even secure a topfour spot and with it a Champions League place.
United legends Dwight Yorke and
Andy Cole, heroes of the club’s historic 1999 treble triumph, are shocked at the depths to which their former club has plummeted.
As United prepare to meet title-chasing rivals Arsenal tomorrow, the irony of the respective positions of the two clubs is not lost on the former strike partners. Cole said: “Arsenal used to finish fourth and celebrate like they’d won the league, We used to laugh at them, but that’s where we are.
“Of course it’s hard. It’s hard because I never saw United being in this position.
“Ultimately, the team that I was involved in, we left a legacy for players who want to come to the club, try to emulate us and do the same thing.
“I look at the team now – and the teams previously – and you scratch your head, because you’ve got to understand what United is all about.
“It’s about winning, it’s about competing, it’s about being involved in, and pushing for, major honours, especially in the domestic game. But we’re so far away. When are United going to be involved in the title race again? Who knows?”
Yorke echoed his former team-mate, claiming the most shocking aspect of the team’s demise is the fact they cannot even make the Champions League. Yorke, who scored a combined 53 goals with Cole in the Treble-winning season, said: “It’s so far apart from the 1999 team, it’s not even close, to say the least. What’s more painful about it is that we can’t even qualify for the Champions League. For me, that’s the minimum.
“You can accept you aren’t close to winning the league, but when you aren’t even qualifying for the Champions League, that’s a whole new level. But that’s where we are, that’s the brutal thing. We should never even be thinking of fourth place.
“It’s crazy how the mindset has changed and to hear me even get into that sort of conversation – we aren’t even qualifying, we’re out of that.”
With the team sliding deeper into crisis and unable to offer Champions League football, Yorke said United are no longer a top draw for the world’s best players. “Is it losing the X Factor?” Yorke said. “Maybe a little bit, but that’s what it is.
“If you’re a player and you’ve got the likes of Liverpool and Manchester City after you, then United is in the second tier. I think that people now are second-guessing whether they want to join United. It never
‘It’s about winning and competing for major honours but we’re so far away’
‘Players are now second-guessing whether they want to join United’
used to be a club you contemplated coming to.
“United are in for you? You don’t think about it. Now players are thinking, ‘I’m not so sure’ – and that’s not a good sign.”
One of the most damning indictments of today’s United team is the negative goal difference, which stands at minus three, a statistic Cole just cannot fathom.
“It’s not United, is it?” Cole said. “For me, that’s an upsetting thing as well.
“Playing for Sir Alex Ferguson, you might concede a few, but we played the way United should play, and that’s attacking teams home and away.
“This counter-attacking football? No, there was none of that. You go for the jugular from minute one, home or away.”
99 is available exclusively on Prime Video on 17 May, when all three parts will drop globally