It’s only another of these long weekends that have become characteristic of the FA Cup, but for Manchester United it will feel like a month of old-fashioned Sundays, after the defeat in Denmark that threatens their slim chance of qualifying for next season’s Champions League through success in the lesser competition.
Not until Monday night will United have an opportunity to lift sagging morale, at Shrewsbury, where the League One club and their supporters must secretly fancy themselves for a famous victory. The stumbling giants of the Premier League are ravaged by injury and all but managerless, given the widespread assumption that Louis van Gaal will go at the end of the season, if he lasts that long.
The Dutchman has started to talk as if demob-happy. No more does he worry about reports of his forthcoming replacement by Jose Mourinho or anyone else. Instead he casually ascribes the loss to Midtjylland to Murphy’s Law, which states that anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
Unless you are a United supporter who has paid hundreds of pounds in the hope of something going right, it’s quite funny. There is something deeply wrong and the long-time supporters I meet in Manchester believe the owners, the Glazers, aren’t too bothered as long as the value of their asset remains buoyant. Every day, it seems, they learn of the marketing people congratulating themselves on a new ‘partnership’ that will bring in money.
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“United have underarm deodorant partners in places I’ve never heard of,” one fan wryly observes.
Maybe Mourinho would raise spirits. Maybe not.
But the ever-sharpening contrast with the enlightened ownership of Manchester City shows that more than a change of manager is needed.
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