Man United fans can’t sleep at night.
After being shown a vision of the wilderness that might await us in the aftermath of Sir Alex’s retirement, we have now been reassured that the whole thing was just to jolt us out of the complacency of winning by expectation. Much as we liked Moyes, the experiment clearly crashed and burned in the short term, and success would require the kind of long term financial and emotional commitment that only a billionaire magnate can show to his errant son.
Now we have LVG.
Let’s recount the facts so far. LVG took over the team after his world cup campaign ended in mid July. He joined the team on the US tour having ditched his holiday, and has effectively had 3 weeks so far with the squad which finished 7th last year, plus Anders Herrera and Luke Shaw, but minus Van Persie, Vidic, Ferdinand and Evra, and for the most part, Carrick.
On this squad, he implemented a new formation, and played 5 friendly games. Against LA Galaxy, Roma, Inter Milan, Real Madrid and Liverpool. Against whom, the team won all games, (including one tie-breaker, with 5 out of 5 conversions) scored 16 goals and conceded 4, including 3 penalties and 1 goal from open play. (by the time you read this, Marouanne Fellaini has completed the pre-season scoring with United beating Valencia at home).
Most United fans are at this point thinking ‘Am I dreaming? Somebody pinch me. On second thoughts, don’t!’
Let’s think about this. Van Gaal bettered Inter Milan, Real Madrid and Liverpool with a team whose mainstays included Ashley Young, Phil Jones and Chris Smalling, amongst others. He managed to play Mata and Rooney in their favourite positions with room to accommodate Van Persie. He took this disjointed and ‘broken’ team and got them to score a goal that came off 20 fluent passes, against Real Madrid.
Should we just wave it all off as stats from meaningless pre-season friendlies? Well, last year United kicked off by losing in Thailand. This year kicked of with a 7-0 thumping of the LA Galaxy. How is it possible to not see that as progress? And while teams are often undercooked, I’m yet to see a manager not wanting to win each game in pre-season. Before the Liverpool game both teams agreed that a United-Liverpool game could never really be a friendly. Both teams played their best available teams, for most of the game. At the very least it was the most meaningful of pre-season friendlies.
In fact the Liverpool game may have had fans wondering ‘is he SAF in disguise?’ – in a game where Liverpool played United off the park in the first half, Man United emerged 3-1 victors. A few million United fans would have seen that and thought ‘yep, this is the team we remember, the one that knew how to win football games’.
The SAF comparisons don’t end there. LVG has, in a ridiculously short period of time, managed to get inside the players hearts and heads. He has given them purpose, desire, confidence and fluency. Unwaveringly true to his word and fair to the players, nobody can complain about being frozen out or the victim of unarticulated likes or dislikes. Sir Alex built a career out of being brutally honest with his players. LVG has benchmarked his opening month in the job with the same public honesty. Not that Moyes was short of honesty, but he clearly had his beliefs about players and their qualities and they were never quite as publicly shared.
You sense that in a confrontation, with players or management or even with the media, LVG will be taking another leaf out of the SAF playbook. Or indeed adding to it. There is after all no record of SAF dropping his pants. He did of course kick a boot into Beckham’s face. Beat that, Van Gaal!
Did LVG get lucky? Yes. Not because he came after Moyes. What he gained from public perception was lost with the talent flight – most notably Vidic, who one suspects would have fit nicely into the back 3 that LVG is modelling. But being lucky is almost a critical managerial trait. Did SAF get lucky with at the Nou Camp in 1999? Or with Terry’s missed penalty in 2008? United could certainly do with a lucky manager this year. The fixture list has duly complied, throwing up a series of opening games against promoted and generally weaker teams, compared to the monster reception it gave Moyes last year. And Fletcher’s return to fitness could hardly have come at a better time. As managers from Mourinho to Pellegrini will tell you, being lucky is not to be scoffed at.
But of course it’s more than luck. LVG is a highly proficient technician, with immense clarity about the training methods and outcomes he drives. He has been seen to exhort Rooney and co to shoot at the corners of the goal in practice. He has isolated specific weaknesses among his players – such as Luke Shaw’s fitness, and worked on them. He comes from the same school of meticulous planning that benefited Mourinho and Rodgers. Or to put it in another way, he wrote the book on the subject. Literally.
Take a deep breath. Don’t get too excited.
Nothing has given me more hope that LVG’s mantra of Totaal Mens Princippe – or the idea of the whole person. Nor just the skill and technique but the human being, and the individual. He wants to understand the brain and then teach players to use it. Anathema to those who are religious fans of instinctive talent but LVG’s track record will win any argument on that, hands down. Also his commitment to the team above the individual, and his ability to articulate this to the players, has been particularly heartwarming. His evaluation of players extends to how they handle press conferences.
On the subject of which, honeymoon period apart, LVG press conferences rank up there with the best. Blunt without being offensive, he has so far ticked every box for the journos. Strong opinions, check. Contentious choices, often rubbing up against the establishment, check. Sense of humour, check. Insight with specifics, check. Sarcasm, check.
Football is a funny game. All this, and Van Gaal’s undefeated start could come to a crashing halt on day one of the league. But 3 months ago, Man united were the laughing stock of the League. Clearly it was SAF who had coaxed a mediocre side to glory. Sometimes the story lines can be simplistic. The ‘simple’ story here is that LVG has certainly demonstrated a SAF like ability. And the very fact that speculation about United being a possible title challenger this year is not eliciting howls of derision says much about what Van Gaal has achieved in his 3 weeks in the hot seat.
