This summer was supposed to have offered Manchester United fans hope. After years of watching their side in decline, a new manager was arriving to turn things around.
Just two games into the new season and the crisis is getting worse. Defeats to Brighton and Brentford – the latter in humiliating fashion – have exposed all the same problems that were present during the disastrous 2021/22 campaign.
Erik ten Hag has so far been unable to turn the tide, with his signings having failed to fully freshen up a squad that was lying stagnant after last season’s debacle. He hasn’t been helped in that regard by the club’s failure to follow the approach of their greatest ever manager.
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Sir Alex Ferguson led United to incredible success during his tenure. During that time, he continually rebuilt his side in order to keep them at the very top.
Rene Meulensteen described the great manager’s approach in a feature with The Coaches’ Voice: "One of the things that always impressed me about Sir Alex, especially in the last six years that I worked with him, was his ability to delegate to his staff without losing control. He was always there, but he wasn’t really involved in the training sessions. And we didn’t go to him with things we could solve ourselves.
"But when you look at the reasons why he was so successful, I think more than anything it was his ability to refresh things at just the right time. When you build a team, you go through different processes – a building process, then a performance process, and then you go into decline.
"To be able to avoid that decline, you need to be able to refresh so you can extend the performance process for as long as possible."
Since his retirement, United have continually failed to avoid that decline. And there can be no better example of the club ignoring the great man’s masterplan than this summer.
Despite hitting a new low last season, United haven’t refreshed things enough. Just two new signings were present in the starting line-up for Saturday’s humiliation at Brentford, with the other nine players still on the books from last season – and perhaps some of them lucky to be in that position given their performances.
With just over two weeks remaining in the transfer window, the club are in a race against time in order to fix the mess that has been left over from last season. United have been desperate to rediscover the glory of the Ferguson years, and it’s now time for them to revisit his proven process.
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