Trying to find the positives when you support Manchester United
If you feel like you're going insane you're not alone.
Apathy.
That’s what I’ve mostly felt watching Manchester United this season. A dullness of my senses while I wait for the dawn to break.
With the announcement that Sir Jim Ratcliffe and Ineos have taken over the sporting side of United, this season seems like a write-off; the purgatory we have to suffer in while we wait for things to start being done right under the new regime.
Yes, United currently sit just outside the Champions League places and still have a chance of qualifying next season so on paper, this campaign is not actually a write-off, but as a war cry, ‘Let’s get 4th’ isn’t evocative nor does it get the people going.
It’s an awful position to be in as a football fan. Though sports writers often have a reputation for being cold and analytical rather than emotionally invested, underneath our professional exteriors beats the heart of an ultra.
We care, often too much, that’s why we write. United though, have made it hard to write.
As you’ve probably noticed, I’ve not posted on Played on Paper since October last year. Part of that is I’ve been busy with work, but the other reason is I’ve not had the spark to write about the football I’ve been able to watch.
The majority of that watch time has been dominated by Erik ten Hag’s Manchester United, a team that is so devoid of identity it might as well start calling itself Jason Bourne.
Win or lose, the team plays badly - That’s the sum total of my analysis of the side this season so you can tell why I find it difficult to write an entire newsletter.
Watching United try and get control of a game is like watching an old man with arthritis trying to get a hold of a wet bar of soap, no matter how hard they try they just can’t get a grip.
I could continue down this line and go into my thoughts on Ten Hag, but why should I? A lot of what I think has already been said and if I’m right and next season marks a new dawn, spending this newsletter writing about a manager I don’t see being a part of it would just be a waste of characters.
So instead I’m going to employ a sharp tonal shift and talk about the bright lights shining out in the dark.
Alejandro Garnacho, Rasmus Hojlund and Kobbie Mainoo are the future of Manchester United, and I’m going to talk about them.
Alejandro Garnacho
When Garnacho first broke out of La Carrington and into the first team, I wrote this article for Scouted Football about the youngster.
In that article I wrote that one of his major weaknesses was decision making… this is still the case.
I will admit that he is getting better at making the right decisions and a lot of this has been aided by his deployment on the right-hand side. The extra seconds that it takes him to work out angles and his feet seem to give him clarity over what is the right thing to do.
That doesn’t mean that he still doesn’t waste possession with errant shots, but it does mean he does it less than he used to.
However, if you completely beat that instinct out of him, you won’t get moments like his overhead kick against Everton, so I think we can all allow him a slight speculative streak from time to time with his efforts.
Something that I am happy to report is that Garnacho has added a defensive side to his game that he lacked when I wrote that initial profile.
Whether he will maintain this throughout his United career we will have to see, as part of the reason it has become so necessary for him to drop deep and support the defense is due to the team’s lack of structure out of possession, but for now it is an admirable quality.
However, Garnacho’s defensive work rate has already been discussed and lauded by fans multiple times over, as qualities that fall into the ‘Desire and Pashun’ demographic often do.
Something that hasn’t been discussed in detail however is the fact that Garnacho is one of those players who receives the ball and progresses reliably or to put it another way, the boy eats up ground.
FBref states that he averages 6 progressive carries per 90 minutes played which ranks him in the 95th percentile for his position and with United struggling to get the ball from back to front, I believe this work has gone unappreciated.
I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that without it, the team would be in a much worse position than it already is.
Of the three players we’ll be discussing today, Garnacho is probably the least key to United’s future.
He could desire a return to Spain and there is a chance he won’t continue to develop over the next few seasons. If that happens, there is an abundance of young talented wingers that United could choose to sign in his place.
But we’re trying to be positive and if he does remain at Old Trafford and develops into the player that many expect him to, the young Argentinian will be a key part of the squad for years to come.
Rasmus Hojlund
For all those who were worrying about whether United had wasted their money on the Danish striker, I want to say I told you so.
Rasmus Hojlund has been a revelation in the second half of the season, scoring a hatful of goals and leading United to several important wins in the hunt for that all-important *checks notes* 4th place.
Yes, the fact that he didn’t score in the Premier League goal until December was worrying, but his goal-scoring form in the Champions League should have pointed to the drought being partly due to factors outside of his control.
While I want to be wholly positive here, we can’t escape the fact that United are a mess and to ignore it would be like ignoring the oven being on fire because the meal in front of you is delicious. It still needs to be addressed.
On Christmas Eve (I mean seriously don’t you guys have families, why are you compiling data on the 24th December), the following post landed on Twitter:
Now there’s a lot of context missing from this tweet (as there always is when you just list numbers on a page), but I can tell you from watching that Hojlund was feeding on scraps.
It was clear that the 21-year-old was aware of this as well so when he was presented with an opportunity, he had a penchant to snatch at it and therefore waste it. This did not help the narrative that was forming at the time.
Fast forward to today though it’s clear Hojlund has *it*.
He has an instinct for finding space that you can’t teach; his runs into the box are always dangerous and often lead to him getting a shot on goal. It’s just up to the rest of the team to find him.
He also refuses to give up; constantly pressing the opponent and making runs which makes him a constant threat in and out of possession.
My stance on Hojlund hasn’t changed. He is the man who can lead the line for United for years to come and he will remain a crucial piece of the puzzle under INEOs reign.
They just need to get him some service.
Kobbie Mainoo
“The picture is only iconic if we go on to do great things for this club.”
That was Kobbie Mainoo’s reply when asked about the now ‘iconic’ image of him, Garnacho, and Hojlund that graces the top of this article.
I’m running out of words to explain how lucky United are to have Mainoo. His mentality, his ability, his potential… the club have stumbled onto a special player who has already become a key part of the first team at 18 years old.
I would even go so far as to say that given United’s problems in the centre of midfield, he is one of the most important players at Old Trafford right now.
He is one of the only players in Ten Hag’s side who enjoys having the ball at his feet; a trait he shares with Hojlund and Garnacho unsurprisingly. He can pick the ball off the defenders and carry it forward and also dictate the tempo of the game (though this is difficult when United’s other midfielders treat the ball like a bomb).
It’s imperative that United spend part of their budget in the summer to get Mainoo a midfield partner who is comfortable in possession and can do the lion’s share of the defensive work and then finally United fans may be able to see a balanced midfield core for the first time in over a decade.
It is still important that United manage his development carefully over the next few years as he grows into his body and his role, but if all goes to plan United will have one of the best midfielders in the Premier League and they will have got him for free…
Anyway, that’s all the positivity I have in me for now about Manchester United and with the derby fast approaching it is likely all I’ll have in me for a while unless Ten Hag manages to mastermind the unthinkable.
But I would argue that to keep your head when all around you are losing their’s, think about the bigger picture and long-term plan, think about the future of United with Garnacho, Hojlund, and Mainoo, and try to think about life after the 5-0 thumping we are about to receive at 3:30 pm.