Premier League Preview: Can Louis van Gaal Stop Manchester United Fans Yawning?
A dog-eared copy of the Leonard Cohen novel Beautiful Losers has stood unread on my bookshelf for years. The jacket of the book is a deep burnt orange, and every time its spine catches my eye, I can’t help but think of the brilliant Netherlands sides of the '70s.
No team fits the Beautiful Losers moniker more than that which beguiled en route to defeats in both the 1974 and ’78 World Cup finals.
Idly thumbing through it the other day, I stumbled upon a line that got me thinking of a Dutchman with a reverse of the problem that plagued his compatriots back in the '70s.
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"How can I begin anything new with all of yesterday in my mind?"
Louis van Gaal takes his Manchester United side to Leicester City on Saturday evening in the knowledge a win would see them supplant their hosts at the Premier League's summit. Victories this season have proved hollow, though, for a swell of United supporters long-since exasperated by a style of football prosaic to the point of being pedestrian. When you’re not going forward, the tendency is always to look backward.
With United winning ugly, some fans want an annulment after marrying on a false promise.
Reared on collar-up swagger and buccaneering chutzpah, which even in the relatively barren post-Sir Matt Busby and pre-Sir Alex Ferguson years never faded from view entirely, many fans have met that which has been dished up by Van Gaal with the relish usually reserved for a bowl of gruel.
The devil that adorns the club’s crest has had his pitchfork confiscated amid fears he may turn it on himself.
On Thursday, according to Metro, some supporters called for Van Gaal's head in light of the decision to send academy graduate James Wilson out on loan to Championship side Brighton and Hove Albion.
A man who once demonstrated he had the balls to bench any of Bayern Munich’s superstars by dropping his trousers in the dressing room to prove the point is unlikely to need counselling to deal with Twitter tantrums. That said, the tide is lapping at his feet.
If he continues to counter pleas of "attack, attack, attack" with a "possession, possession, possession" mantra, he may find himself an island before the turn of the year. You don’t have to be enthralled by the past, but it helps to respect it.
Amid the criticism, what Van Gaal unequivocally deserves praise for is the manner in which he has sorted out his side’s defence. Eight clean sheets have been procured to date, with six coming in the last seven games in all competitions. No Premier League side can boast lower than United’s nine in the goals-against column, but such stinginess has come at significant cost.
Just 19 goals have been plundered by those in red, with four goalless draws in United’s past seven matches telling their own grim tale. Romance and pragmatism rarely make for happy bedfellows.
Manchester United have always held a fascination beyond the circumference of those who consider themselves supporters, and perhaps never more so than this season. Not to put too fine a point on it, their boringness is riveting the whole nation and beyond.
Wednesday night’s goalless draw with PSV Eindhoven in the Champions League was, for many, the nadir of an annus horribilis for United. Those in the stands will have slept through a second half that may have scientific value as a study of inertia but offered less than zero as a spectacle.
In the boardroom, though, the possible sound of no tills ringing should United fail to see off Wolfsburg in their final group game in Germany will not have sat well with the moneymen. A place in the last 16 of Europe’s premier club competition money-making machine is a minimum requirement for an open-chequebook policy.
The Daily Telegraph’s Jason Burt has had the red side of Manchester playing a giant game of Guess Who? since Thursday, having relayed to the BBC (via the Manchester Evening News) that a disgruntled star has told him he is "half the player" he can be under Van Gaal’s management.
It’s unlikely non-United supporters will light a candle for those Old Trafford regulars currently afflicted given the 11 league titles, two European Cups, three FA Cups and three League Cups the club has won in the last 20 years. In the media, it’s another matter, with United alumni again being vocal in the aftermath of another anaemic performance.
Paul Scholes has lamented Bastian Schweinsteiger for being too negative and accused Anthony Martial of "not being bothered" about a goal drought and lacking a killer instinct.
"He doesn’t really look bothered if he misses a chance, not bothered if he scores a goal, whereas as a centre forward all you live for is scoring goals," Scholes complained on BT Sport (h/t the Independent).
"All you want to do is score goals, and he doesn’t look like that type of player to me. Maybe they need to go into the transfer market in January for one of them."
Wayne Rooney’s failure to register a shot on target against PSV did not sit well with former United captain Roy Keane. According to WhoScored.com, in 15 Premier League and Champions League games combined this season, United’s beleaguered captain has had just 12 shots on target. Domestically, he is yet to provide an assist, a feat achieved by some 134 other Premier League players, including each of United’s regular back four.
Juan Mata, who since his debut for Manchester United in January 2014 has been involved in more Premier League goals than any other player at the club, was given six minutes off the bench in midweek.
Rooney may argue his slap on WWE wrestler Wade Barrett earlier in November should count as a shot on target. Keane seems less enamored with the extra-curricular activities enjoyed by his former team-mate.
"I always question certain players what are they doing off the field. Last week I saw him slapping a wrestler and I'm thinking 'Why is he getting involved in all that nonsense?' There's no benefit to him," Keane told ITV (via the Independent).
"I'd have a look at that side of it."
Rio Ferdinand offered a more circumspect opinion. One of football’s less quotable but increasingly more measured pundits used a column in the Sun to remind everyone that United under Sir Alex Ferguson, particularly in the later years, weren’t always the swashbuckling side they are often painted as.
"When I was a player, my main aim was to win a trophy first and win it playing exciting football second, and that seems to be Van Gaal’s too," Ferdinand wrote.
"It wasn’t always exciting in my day at Old Trafford, either. Certainly during the final three seasons under Sir Alex it was more a case of us getting over the line than anything cavalier."
With West Ham United (h), Bournemouth (a), Norwich City (h) and Stoke City (a) completing United’s league fixtures for the calendar year, there’s a fair-to-middling chance Van Gaal will have his side top in January.
What a difference a point makes. Top of the pile with 28 points to United’s 27, Leicester have been nothing shy of a revelation.
Replacing Nigel Pearson with Claudio Ranieri over the summer was akin to sacking off a Navy Seal in favour of Sgt. Bilko, yet it’s proved an inspired decision on the part of the club’s owner, King Power. The affable Italian has managed to retain the never-say-die attitude that kept the club up last season—coming from two goals down on three separate occasions this term is testimony to that—while complementing spirit with a sense of gluttonous adventure.
Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger said in his press conference on Thursday, via the Daily Express, that you cannot rule Leicester out of the title race. His Foxes counterpart is a little too long in the tooth to believe even the most engaging of Premier League seasons won’t have found its natural rhythm come May.
Instead, Ranieri wears the expression of an average-looking man with a beautiful woman on his arm. He knows it won’t last forever, but boy is he going to enjoy it while it does. Think Lyle Lovett and Julia Roberts.
"Thank you to Arsene, but he's a joker. He knows the truth very well. The league is very strange and open, but our goal is 40 points," Ranieri said, as per BBC Sport.
"Our goal at the moment is this, but let me see the next two months and then maybe I change the goal."
With six of Leicester’s next eight games coming against sides that finished in the top nine last season, we’ll soon have a fair indication of just how serious to take the best feelgood story of the campaign to date.
If they are to trouble the European spots, they will almost certainly have to improve on a defensive record that has seen them concede more goals (20) than any other side in the top half.
Even those with a pebble for a heart will surely break into a smile should Jamie Vardy draw a line through Ruud van Nistelrooy’s name in the consecutive-game-scoring record books and replace it with his own.
The 28-year-old has troubled the scoresheet against Bournemouth (a), Aston Villa (h), Stoke City (a), Arsenal (h), Norwich City (a), Southampton (a), Crystal Palace (h), West Bromwich Albion (a), Watford (h) and Newcastle United (a). It would be somewhat fitting if he edged ahead of Van Nistelrooy with a goal against United.
"I sent him a message of support last weekend on social media and I really meant it," Van Nistelrooy told the Oxford Union on Tuesday, per MailOnline. "It would be fantastic for him. I really mean it. Records are there to be broken."
Vardy has history against United. His first Premier League start came against Van Gaal’s side last season, with the striker scoring once and playing his part in four other goals as Leicester romped to a 5-3 victory.
Given what has happened to date this season, don’t rule out a repeat.
Are Tottenham Serious Title Contenders?
There’s something odd going on at White Hart Lane. Rational people, the type of folk who never forget to put the bin out and take their sandwiches to work, have been reported to have had the strangest of thoughts.
Sightings of people in north London slowly mouthing the sentence "Tottenham Hotspur might just be good enough to win it" are becoming increasingly common by all accounts. This wasn’t supposed to happen.
When Spurs, in all their wisdom, kicked off the campaign with only Harry Kane as a recognized striker, the top four looked beyond them. The perfunctory performance that marked their opening-day defeat at Manchester United seemed to be a fair indication of how they might fare.
On the contrary, Mauricio Pochettino’s high-tempo pressing machine has not looked back, with an unbeaten run ever since taking them to within four points of leaders Leicester. A 4-1 defeat of Manchester City has been the highlight, and Sunday's repeat scoreline against West Ham United saw Kane revel in the type of form that has seen him score nine goals in his last six games for Tottenham.
Beating Chelsea is not rewarded with the badge of honour it once was. Nonetheless, a positive result for Spurs in Sunday’s midday kick-off against the champions would do little to quell a growing level of expectation. A victory would propel them—perhaps only for a few hours—into the top four for the first time since August 2014.
That Tottenham did not get back from their Europa League trip to Qarabag in Azerbaijan no earlier than 5 a.m. on Friday is unlikely do them any favours. Dele Alli’s absence because of the suspension he incurred with a booking last time out will be a further fillip to Jose Mourinho.
It's not going to make stopping Kane any easier though, Jose.
Kop Cheer for Klopp and Company?
Liverpool’s home defeat to Crystal Palace prior to the recent international break seems a long, long time ago.
Jurgen Klopp admitted he felt "pretty alone" when home supporters started to filter out before the end of that 2-1 defeat at Anfield. There weren’t many Liverpool fans who left the Etihad Stadium early in order to beat the post-match traffic on Saturday.
You tend to walk alone less often in the aftermath of 4-1 victories over Manchester City.
The German, who this week tried to learn Scouse in an endearing interview with a nine-year-old, is desperate for home comforts to match Liverpool’s impressive away form.
"I would love to win a game like this at Anfield," Klopp said after the City game, per the Guardian.
"That’s the next challenge. We have Swansea [City] coming, but I don’t know that much about them yet. We lost to Palace, so we have to find a solution and we will."
Having won five of their past six games in all competitions and not due to face an opponent in the top 11 of the Premier League until Boxing Day, when they play Leicester at Anfield, everything is in place for Klopp to propel his side up the table.
Sunday’s visit of a Swansea City side that has won just once in nine matches should provide the ideal opportunity for Liverpool to prove a high-pressing game isn’t just suited to big-game hunting away from Merseyside.
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