WHY SAY ANYTHING?

Manchester United have given Louis van Gaal more than enough rope to hang himself. In fact, they have given him sufficient to ensure that his feet are able to reach the floor.

According to the Guardian’s Jamie Jackson, Louis van Gaal’s performance as a manager is to be reviewed on a match-by-match basis. The article is here, if you wish to read it.

Yesterday I wrote about the fact that the Manchester United Circus is being run by the head clown. Today, I wish to revise that opinion. It is now a pantomime being run by the Dame. How else can this ludicrous decision be explained?

Van Gaal’s record speaks for itself in it’s level of failure. Even van Gaal himself has finally admitted that he is failing and doesn’t know what to do.

If the press is to be believed he has offered to resign at least once, an offer which should have been welcomed by United, because it may not come again. A resignation would have meant that United didn’t have to pay the remainder of van Gaal’s contract which the, now inevitable, sacking or mutual termination means they will.

Still, for a man who has managed to waste the millions that Woodward has managed to waste over the last three years, this is only a minor detail.

I am not going to repeat the lists of unwanted records broken by van Gaal, I will leave that to others. Suffice to say that, after eighteen months in the job and having spent £258 million, Manchester United currently lie in fifth position in the Premier League. They are ten points behind the leaders, Leicester City, and five points behind fourth placed Tottenham Hotspur.

They are no longer participating in the Champion’s League and will now have to make do with playing on Thursdays and Sundays thanks to their demotion to the Europa League. This is now a competition they need to take seriously as it offers a Champion’s League place to the winner. Finishing in the top four in the Premier League is looking a more and more remote possibility as the days go by.

Manchester United, under the much maligned, (sometimes rightly, sometimes not), David Moyes, reached the quarter finals of the Champion’s League where they lost out to Bayern Munich, and finished seventh in the title race, only two positions below where they are now. The difference was that Moyes managed to spend about £200 million less than van Gaal in achieving his ‘failure’.

A reason given for van Gaal retaining his job at present is the lack of viable alternatives. Well again, as I have previously mentioned, what is wrong with Ryan Giggs aided and abetted by Sir Alex Ferguson and maybe even Paul Scholes? What is wrong with Mourinho who is currently out of work?

The press speculate that there are senior figures at Old Trafford who don’t want Mourinho. So who are they? If they are known they should be named. I am not surprised that Sir Bobby Charlton is thought to be one of the detractors. Somebody who played his football under Sir Matt Busby is likely to have some of the same puritanical traits, but who are the others?

Why is Mourinho “not right” for Manchester United? This, of course, assumes that David Moyes and Louis van Gaal WERE right for United. The board would rather have losers than winners!

Jose Mourinho is a serial winner. Again, I am not going to list his achievements just to fill some space but his CV is better than van Gaal’s and Moyes doesn’t have one to be able to make a comparison.

There was talk that Moyes had lost the dressing room shortly before he left. There is talk that van Gaal has lost the dressing room, hopefully, shortly before he leaves. So both are capable of upsetting the players. Well so is Mourinho.

The self-styled “Special One” is charged with playing boring football and winning games 1-0. Moyes and van Gaal play boring football and LOSE games, not always by only one goal. In fact, van Gaal has his team playing the most boring football I have ever seen and the board refuse to sack him, so he must be producing what they want from a manager.

What exactly has Mourinho done to be overlooked in the way he is being by Manchester United? The fans and myself would appreciate an answer.

The situation is a strange one. Had this been Real Madrid, Manchester City or Chelsea, van Gaal would have been history long ago and Mourinho would be in charge now.

Quite what Ryan Giggs is thinking as he sits next to the Dutchman in the dugout must be interesting. He is assistant manager and, while United are going through this period, he is doing himself no favours by being associated with van Gaal. His stock is certainly not rising and, if he is waiting for the boot to be administered, there must be a limit to his patience.

So Louis goes on, day-by-day, match-by-match. Win a game and he is marvellous, lose a game and he is fired, except that he isn’t, which makes the whole sordid affair the stuff from which pantomimes are made.