Pundits are fond of describing a team's season in one word: Leicester have been "extraordinary", Spurs "impressive", and of course Chelsea would be "lol". For my team Manchester United, this season has been a resounding "meh". It's been another moderately successful (yet also fumingly frustrating) year for Man United and Louis Van Gaal.
Ahh, Van Gaal. As a person, I love him. Last year he was getting pissed at the end of season dinner and singing the praises of the saxophonist, and he's been similarly entertaining this year. Whether calling a journalist "fat man", demanding that his players be "horny" for a European match, or comparing hair-pulling to S&M, LVG has been great value for the LOLs.
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| Much as I loved this, it made me realise why he usually stays in his seat. |
Beyond the antics of LVG however, fans were left looking back at a largely tepid and underwhelming season: finishing the season in 5th (blowing our own chances of CL football with defeat at West Ham), and as finalists in the FA Cup. One minor plus was that we were much more defensively solid; indeed, we had the 2nd lowest number of goals conceded in the EPL. A number of players made their debuts for the club, which is always great to see.
In addition to the above players, Anthony Martial and Jesse Lingard have established themselves in the first team as reliable attacking options. Martial came with a huge price tag and a weight of expectation, but distinguished himself amongst a lackadaisical strike force. By contrast, Lingard was a Salford lad promoted through the ranks, yet has acquitted himself well (and scored some spectacular goals) along the way.
But many of the existing problems from last season remained. Van Gaal was still needlessly harsh in his treatment of the players. We'd pull out results against big teams, only to lose to the likes of Sunderland and Norwich. Perhaps worst of all, whilst David de Gea performed absolute heroics to keep out the opposition, at the other end we were painfully slow and plodding in front of goal. In a season where Leicester showed that a buccaneering and lightning-fast 4-4-2 could score bagloads of goals, Van Gaal's tactics seemed to be "keep the pace pedestrian, and the shots tame". What this meant was that our attacks often looked like this:
Now I'm only an idiot when it comes to tactics, but I saw this shape again and again in games- little wonder professional footballers learned how to defend against us. Every time, the play was the same:
In addition to the above players, Anthony Martial and Jesse Lingard have established themselves in the first team as reliable attacking options. Martial came with a huge price tag and a weight of expectation, but distinguished himself amongst a lackadaisical strike force. By contrast, Lingard was a Salford lad promoted through the ranks, yet has acquitted himself well (and scored some spectacular goals) along the way.
But many of the existing problems from last season remained. Van Gaal was still needlessly harsh in his treatment of the players. We'd pull out results against big teams, only to lose to the likes of Sunderland and Norwich. Perhaps worst of all, whilst David de Gea performed absolute heroics to keep out the opposition, at the other end we were painfully slow and plodding in front of goal. In a season where Leicester showed that a buccaneering and lightning-fast 4-4-2 could score bagloads of goals, Van Gaal's tactics seemed to be "keep the pace pedestrian, and the shots tame". What this meant was that our attacks often looked like this:
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| As I began to call it, the "Bermuda Hexagon", where goal-scoring chances disappear without a trace |
- Approach the enemy box. This was done slowly, so the opposition would run back and have two banks of four men in place by the time we were ready to attack the goal.
- The ball would be passed left and right across the line between the left, centre and right midfielders, each looking to thread in the perfect through-ball.
- The long awaited through-ball was then either lobbed harmlessly over the top for a goal kick, or else thumped clear by a center back who could have happily kept it up all day long.
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| You're welcome, United fans. |
Obviously, this approach might work reasonably well for grinding out the odd 1-0 victory, but it also comes with inherent risk (i.e. not actually winning). In a majority of games we wouldn't score in the first half, sometimes not at all. For a generation of fans raised on gung-ho, blitzkrieg football, this Mourinho-lite style was never going to be popular.
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| Even the cancellation of the final game was a cause for banter. #bombbantz |
It's not been confirmed yet whether Van Gaal will stay or go. Personally, whilst he's done some good at United (stabilising the team, bringing through youngsters), ultimately there's little more he can do whilst adhering so ardently to his notorious "philosophy". We missed out on the top four this season, but did we really deserve to be in Europe? We bombed out of the competition this year after a middling show in the group stages, and would probably have been picked apart later by better European teams in any case. I'd happily take a new manager in the summer, but we'll see how it goes. Never mind, it could've been a worse season...
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| More on which next time! |
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