Manchester United – A new era

It was a forgettable season for “The Great” Manchester United. The former manager Niall, who took the club from Division 3 to Division 1 in 3 seasons, had to leave the job mid season due to his personal commitments. From the day I joined as the manager, I knew the pressure, responsibilities and expectations placed on my shoulder. Of course, the greatest club in the world, once winning trophies was their day-to-day casual thing, now fighting relegation – not a good picture for any football fan, let alone Man Utd supporter.

From the day 1, my thought process was to improve the squad depth so that we don’t have to field low rated players in crunch time of the season while fighting to save the club from relegation. Initial transfers reflect my words. We sold off Mitoma for Nelsson, Buendia and Diop – 3 88 rated players in different positions, Goncalo Guedes for Aboukhlal, Ribeiro and Assadi, Otavio for Arana, Roca and Wolfe, Ozcan for Al-Dhakil and Gomez. Through these 4 transfers we strengthened our depth and put a hold on our first team transfers as the players need time to gel and form a bond, to have better understanding among them which might come handy in the tail end of the season.

Everything was set as per the plan and me along with my coaching team, backroom staffs and our players worked tirelessly to survive the battle. We had some best moments beating super giants like Chelsea, Porto etc and some bad moments like losing through narrow margins. As I believe, success is 99% hard work and 1% luck. We had put in our 99% but 1% was not in favor as we came close but pushed down to Division 2.  

As soon as our fate was decided on the final day of the season, I sat along with the Chairman and Board of Directors and briefed my ideology and requested to give a free hand in regards to transfers. I explained that going for senior – higher rated players (I’d rather use “Senior” than “Old” as it sounds offensive and insult to their illustrative careers they had) may get us a result in short term but it will affect our squad building in our long term as the players lose their value over time and we may not able to find the suitors. The relegation has come. We should take advantage of this opportunity. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise. Now we can reshuffle whole deck and build a team that may not win games immediately but definitely. This way, our team’s value will improve over the time, not in the reverse way. I convinced the whole room full of businessmen who are just looking to pocket the profits about my strategy and got the approval to go ahead.

During post season, we gave the players off as they needed rest after what they had through physically, mentally and emotionally. They just turned up for mandatory friendlies just to keep their fitness. Meanwhile, I had a busy 2 weeks with our transfer team of the club. We decided to trade off all senior players for younger ones who are waiting for that one opportunity to show their talent to the world. Don’t worry guys; Manchester United is the one for you all. And that’s why we play in The Theatre of Dreams. It’s going lengthy and may bore you all. So I’m going to breakdown the transfers under my era into tables which will be easy to understand.

Players In	Players out	Club to/from
T. Dallinga + A. Rossi	M. Icardi + Kepa	Augsburg
Al-Dakhil + Victor Gomez	S. Ozcan	Hoffenhiem
S. Dodo	W. Galeno	Inter Milan
V. Nelsson + E. Buendia + S. Diop	K. Mitoma	Lille OSC
C. Pepe + N. Fraser	A. Laporte	RCD Espanyol
G. Arana + M. Roca + D. Wolfe	M. Otavio	RCD Espanyol
N. Collins	D. Carvajal	RCD Espanyol
R. Horta + R. Renan	L.Dunk	Real Madrid
E. Ribeiro + Z. Aboukhlal + L. Assadi	G. Gudes	Stuttgart
M. Arthur	B. Dia	Stuttgart
D. Leite + D. Garcia + L. Stergiou	G. Xhaka	Tottenham Hotspur
E. Ampadu	E. Buendia + K. Goto	Valencia

(Not a world class transfers but it’s start of building a strong foundation.) The above pattern of transfers proves my strategy regarding the player buys. We are also planning to tweak some changes in tactics and formation which is a work in progress. The average age and rating of the first team has reduced a lot which surely can have impact in our team’s performances in the season. (We hope for the positive outcome of course.)

I’m happy with the squad and we are all set for the new season that starts tomorrow. No major changes expected until the end of the season and we’re good to go. Our plan (my plan) is to stay in Division 2 for few seasons and build a team which is strong enough to compete against the big boys in Division 1 and stay there forever rather than going up and down the leagues every other season. One step backward, two steps forward. I’m not saying everything will happen as per plan; we’ll have some hiccups on the journey and we’ll try to adapt to it and move forward. Thanks and good luck to everyone.