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Van Gaal delivers the right message at the wrong time

By on December 11, 2015

Louis Van Gaal is famously outspoken and gregarious at his press conferences. Jonathan Wilson once coined that he is adamant about many things, most of all that he is right; however, as United’s poor run of form continues his so called genius is increasingly resembling lunacy.

Today, at his pre-match presser ahead of a weekend meeting with Bournemouth, his statements seemed erratic, sometimes contradictory and far off the mark, leaving you wondering whether he really comprehends the size of the club and their expectations.

The Guardian’s homepage illustrated this disconnect between what he said and what the fans are saying. Under their headline, “Van Gaal says club has no right to win trophies anymore,” there’s the title “United to buy Ronaldo, Bale, Neymar and Kane?”

“They say a club like Manchester United has to win,” the manager said, per United’s official website. “That’s the past. You have to analyze the club now. Now we have much more clubs who have money … also the structure and are able to win something.”

The least we can give him is that he’s right. United have regressed and their opposition, notably Chelsea and Manchester City, have poured money into their teams over the last four or five years. Yet after spending £250,000,000 in two years to upgrade United’s squad, the excuse seems far too feeble. Van Gaal was hired, after all, on the basis of returning United to their former glories. The premise of his argument is correct, yet it’s not one that the manager of Manchester United should be making.

After spending a quarter billion dollars and then being dumped out of the Champions League and into the Europa League, perhaps Van Gaal will realize how far they have fallen in the far-flung corners of Europe where they might travel should they be unfortunate enough to draw Belenenses, Slovan Liberec, or FC Midtjylland in the Round of 32.

“Next year, all the clubs in the Premier League have a bigger budget than most in Europe,” he said. “That makes a big difference. Every club can also buy a player. You think Manchester United has a lot of money – that is true. But other clubs are asking for much more from us than from Bournemouth.

“The difference is not so big any more. The confirmation is every week. The bottom clubs can beat the top teams. There is no other league where that happens as often as it does in the Premier League. It is very difficult for a Premier League club to match with the other leagues in the Champions League. It was not so easy for all the clubs to qualify themselves.”

“Within two days we have to beat Bournemouth. That is very difficult. Bournemouth is playing very positive, pressing a lot, working very hard as a team. To beat them shall be very difficult. But we can beat them, just as we could have beaten Wolfsburg. You have seen that. But I didn’t read it. I didn’t see that you say anything positive for [Guillermo] Varela or [Cameron] Borthwick-Jackson. Because you can see that as a positive. Memphis [Depay] is 21, [Jesse] Lingard is 22, [Anthony] Martial 20 and still we could hurt the No2 of Germany.”

There is a lot to dissect in these three paragraphs. First of all, if we are really looking at the financial table, United are close to the top and Bournemouth sit rock bottom, their squad worth barely a sixth of United’s per Transfermarkt.com. Credit is due to the Cherries, but you can count the number of times they’ve won in the league this season on one hand and only one of those results have come against a team in the top four. If Van Gaal is trying to bring his team back down to earth, perhaps lower their expectations a little, he hasn’t realized that they’ve already hit rock-bottom.

It’s hard to avoid splicing his words, but the scrutiny has been justified by the Red Devils’ seeming lack of progression this season. If he implies that United could have done better than featuring their younger players against Wolfsburg, then his decision to take off Juan Mata for Nick Powell in that match, whilst bringing on Borthwick-Jackson and leaving Ashley Young on the bench, seems seriously misguided unless he didn’t realize the weight of the occasion. Either that or he seriously underestimates United’s expectations and neither interpretation looks all that good for his reputation.

Homepage photo credit: By ING Nederland [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.