Better... but is LVG plan good enough?
Man United needs more quality players to take title
LOUIS VAN GAAL is almost halfway through his threeyear term at Old Trafford. The Dutch boss has stated he is “sure I will win a championship or a title” by its duration, but is he on the right path to silverware?
Here, Sportsmail gives Manchester United’s charismatic manager his midterm report so far. RESULTS – 7/10 THE primary goal of any manager. United have unquestionably improved under Van Gaal; seventh before he arrived, fourth last season, third this season. But whether they have improved enough given that the club have undergone an unprecedented £250 million spending spree in the last three transfer windows is open to serious debate.
Last season, United showed they could beat the top teams, defeating Arsenal, Manchester City and Liverpool. Yet they were inconsistent against smaller opposition.
The tone was set in the very opening fixture when Swansea City left Old Trafford with all three points. At the end of the season, West Brom did the same, so there was no real improvement.
This campaign has seen a U-turn in all respects. They have found greater consistency on a weekly basis and while it was difficult viewing, they beat West Brom 2-0 in their last home game.
On the other hand, they now look short against the top opposition. In fact, they were woefully short in their most difficult fixture of the season so far at Arsenal, when they were 3-0 down within 19 minutes. “Van Gaal was angry,” conceded Juan Mata.
Disappointingly, Van Gaal has not had a good run in cup competitions, suffering exits against MK Dons, Arsenal and Middlesbrough. Not disastrous in itself but when you are breaking British transfer records, not good enough. SIGNINGS – 6/10 VERY mixed, you’d have to say. From the dramatic £145m splurge in his first transfer window, the cheapest of his five cash signings, Daley Blind, has been the most effective.
Marcos Rojo and Ander Herrera have only fought their way into the United team belatedly, while Luke Shaw’s progress was halted by his horrible broken leg against PSV in September.
Ángel Di María, a player lauded by Van Gaal as having the pace required for team success, lasted just a season after his record £59.7m move from Real Madrid and there was feeling the Argentine hadn’t responded well to the manager’s tough love on the training pitch.
To replace Di Maria’s speed, LVG tapped into his Dutch contacts book and bought Memphis Depay from PSV in a £25m deal last summer. That hasn’t gone well either with the coach complaining Depay has to play for the team, rather than himself. He is currently warming the bench.
The other major signings from the last window Matteo Darmian, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Morgan Schneiderlin and Anthony Martial have performed well, though they didn’t come cheap. The decision to sign Martial rather then Pedro was criticised at the time but now looks very astute.
Overall, a very mixed bag and the fact that homegrown talent Jesse Lingard is getting a game ahead of Depay suggests Van Gaal is a normal manager who makes mistakes rather than carrying a magic wand in his briefcase. You wonder if he does have an overall strategy in mind, or if it’s a case of the Emperor’s New Clothes. STYLE – 5/10 VAN GAAL is very sure of himself. He is proud of his CV at Ajax, Barcelona, AZ Alkmaar, Bayern Munich and the Dutch national team, and why not.
So it has probably come as a bit of shock to his ego to hear United fans chanting “attack, attack, attack” at Old Trafford when he believes he is educating them about a new “philosophy”.
There are many ways to win football matches; Arsene Wenger and Jose Mourinho have both lifted multiple Premier League trophies in their own style. Jürgen Klopp will be different again.
Van Gaal is a preacher for the possession game. He uses keepball as a primarily defensive tactic, and is delighted when he restricts the opposition to one or two chances per game, because they have been starved of possession.
His problem at United is that the club’s entire brand is based on the “Theatre of Dreams” where high-risk, hightempo derring-do football is expected as part of the price on the ticket. Neither has it helped that his assistant Ryan Giggs and his mates in the media Gary Neville and Paul Scholes firmly believe in it.
The United players are on-side with van Gaal’s “philosophy”. They were sick of losing under David Moyes. Chris Smalling is the best example of a player DAVID BECKHAM has urged Manchester United winger Memphis Depay to use the club’s famous “No 7” shirt as an inspiration to kickstart his floundering Red Devils career when he comes back into the team against Watford tomorrow.
Memphis joined United from PSV Eindhoven in the off-season as the Dutch league’s top-scorer with 22 goals and was handed the shirt worn by some of who has improved from Van Gaal’s coaching and the manager was democratic enough to listen to Wayne Rooney and other senior players to tinker with his methods when they felt the dressingroom was becoming a little frustrated.
The players’ support would have been enough 20 years ago, but nowadays with social media giving fans a voice, how exciting or boring the Red Devils are has become a hugely distracting topic for discussion. PERSONALITY – 6/10 THERE is little doubt that Van Gaal is a charismatic figure. The Manchester United suit fits him far better than it did the rather more timid Moyes.
He backs his arguments and isn’t afraid to speak out. His merrily stirring speech at the club’s end-of-season awards dinner, accompanied by cuffing Giggs on the back of the head, became cult viewing for fans.
He takes the big decisions – letting Javier Hernandez, Robin van Persie, Falcao and Di María leave in the same transfer window was the act of someone who embraces the big and potentially unpopular decisions.
Open and candid in front of the television cameras, he cuts a determined figure when he is knocking on Ed Woodward’s door to discuss ins and outs.
But sometimes you feel he sounds so convincing, he convinces himself. In August, he proclaimed that Marouane Fellaini “will play more as a No 9 or No 10 this season”, no doubt giving himself brownie points for working out the 1.93m Belgian carries a threat up front.
However, having seen Fellaini’s lack of movement fail to fit into his philosophy, he argued three months later he was a midfielder, rather than a forward. Who’d have guessed?
Van Gaal took on the FA about Shaw appearing at the European Under-21 championships and won. He is the one manager that Mourinho hasn’t dared to
FRIDAY NOVEMBER 20
2015 United’s most revered players, including George Best, Bryan Robson, Eric Cantona, Cristiano Ronaldo and Beckham.
Former England captain Beckham, part of United’s famous “class of 92”, urged Memphis to embrace the number.
“It was never my shirt. It was George Best’s, Bryan Robson’s, Eric Cantona’s.
“The only reason I wanted to wear the No 7 shirt was because of these players.” – Reuters try mind games on, having worked with him at Barça.
The one alarm bell for United fans was when he excused their recent League Cup exit against Middlesbrough on the basis that it was an improvement on being knocked out at MK Dons the previous season. Surely a lower benchmark than United fans could expect. TITLE-WINNING PROSPECTS – 4/10 UNITED have this season and next to win the Premier League to fulfil Van Gaal’s own target list. He has been backed in the transfer market and the unexpected collapse of Chelsea this season is a further boost to his ambitions. So can United do it?
The realistic prognosis has to be extremely unlikely, chiefly because of the team across town, City. Not many United players would feature in City’s starting XI, particularly in midfield and attack. In contrast, there are those sat on the City bench like Fabian Delph, Wilfried Bony, Jesus Navas and Samir Nasri that Van Gaal might like at his club.
In Van Gaal’s defence, City’s side has been established over a long period of time; David Silva, Sergio Aguero, Joe Hart, Yaya Toure and Vincent Kompany were all inherited by Manuel Pellegrini.
Van Gaal got Rooney and Michael Carrick, players that were outstanding at their peak but are now in their thirties. At the very elite level, Premier League title contenders need at least one world-class forward with dynamism and energy. City have Aguero and Kevin de Bruyne, Arsenal have Alexis Sanchez. United had Rooney and will have Martial.
But right now, they probably don’t have a creator or goal-scorer of sufficient title-winning standard, and no amount of impressive possession statistics from Van Gaal will alter that.
In the matches that matter, like Arsenal away, you fear they will just get blown away in both penalty areas. – Daily Mail