RANGNICKARÖK:
The Future at Manchester United
Could it be that, finally, Manchester United have caught onto this newfangled millennial idea of having a football structure in place?
Fitzgerald is the greatest poet prose produced but even he, that prescient man who wrote so achingly beautifully about the futile realities of the American Dream, would have never made the connection between The Great Gatsby and Manchester United. And yet, orangesaint., in its infinite wisdom, jest, wit and intellect, stands before you today and claims like the madman philosopher chained in the dungeon, that Jay Gatsby is Manchester United and Manchester United is Jay Gatsby.
It wasn’t always this way. Busby and Ferguson are institutions within the United institution, modern men who repurposed a creaking Old Trafford for a modern age. But they are gone (Ferguson is here, there and everywhere, but nowhere near the decisions) and Old Trafford is creaking again. During Solskjaer’s reign, one looked up at gleaming ivory towers and wondered at the (Glazers’) corruption, while they always held onto an incorruptible dream. The hedonism of the 90s is a white whale (hello Oasis) but this didn’t stop United; they “beat on, boats against the current, borne ceaselessly into the past.” This malaise in Manchester similarly afflicted Gatsby; it killed him. But this is where highbrow comparisons end. Gatsby clung onto his dream. In sacking Ole and stopping the rot of living in the past, United have wrested the manager’s parking spot back from Ferguson.
Ralf Rangnick is a contradiction. He demands control, but this control demands intense mayhem. He builds things up by tearing them down. He appreciates United’s past as he drags them into the future. Much has been made of the gegenpressinghunting he brings. Ferguson called it working hard; tracking back. Much has been made of the rush forward as soon as the ball is won – the famous shot within ten seconds is already evident. Ferguson called it Beckham, Giggs, Scholes and Cantona. Much has been made of the vertical pass. Keane called it pass the f*cking ball forward (ask Rio Ferdinand). So nothing is new, but then football is not new. Pep learned from Bielsa, Lobanovskyi and, of course, Michels, who learned from Burnley and Santos, who learned from the Magic Magyars, who learned from La Maquina, who learned from the Wunderteam. How Rangnick interprets old into new is what will be new.
So the German will instill a culture and that is of eminent importance, but the tactics he infuses now will be that culture’s bedrock. The team since the Arsenal game has resembled a distorted sickle, or a particularly vertically unchallenged mushroom. The narrowness of the front six, the gegenpressing in its infancy, the sacrificing of traditional winger width, the culling of Shaw and Wan-Bissaka, the renovation of the much haunted McFred – all these seem transformational but also fleeting. The Covid-enforced postponements are a blessing in disguise; it will give Rangnick’s ideas time to gestate at the training grounds of Carrington, and will give Rangnick breathing space to try and organically marry his ideas to the Premier League’s physicality, pace and trickery. As a partial non sequitur, Ronaldo falling foul of pressing is a non-starter. The man would chase down the Concorde (and probably could).
Rangnick needs to do away with the wantaways. Pogba is a wonderful player but refuses to put in the hard yards; United have a luxury player already in a certain Mr. Cristiano Ronaldo, whose aura of arrogant invincibility demands all the luxury is bestowed on him and all the hard yards on others, but whose reality beggars the belief that he doesn’t put in the hard yards. My word does the lad yard hard. So Pogba must go (or rather, Raiola must go). Martial will similarly not get game time ahead of Ronaldo, Cavani and Greenwood (even Maguire’s looked more of an attacking threat than Martial). There is a player in there, a player who cares despite his resting face, but United do not have the time to wait for him to learn how to move in the box before defenders do, to move in sync with his wingers and midfielders, and to learn when to pass, move and shoot. He must go. Lingard is unfortunate; the only hurdle to his success is United’s abundance of talent going forward. He will rightfully demand first-team football and, even with Pogba gone, Van de Beek, Fernandes and McFred a crowded midfield make. No matter; East London is delightful. McTominay should stay on account of being a United graduate; Fred should go on account of being a makeshift in order to bring in an actual defensive midfielder. Rice, Phillips, Tonali, Brozovic, Haidara – any would do and, in any case, all could learn from the extensive, expansive experience of Mr. Nemanja Matic.
United in the post-Ferguson days have arguably tangoed with the maxim of no culture, only vulture. Success has only come off the pitch. But culture, culture is that thing with feathers. It is culture that ultimately goes viral. Barcelona have their Catalan equality. Bayern have their German fan-worship. Everything means more in Liverpool.
What is Manchester United, then? All clubs are inherently socialist – the miners and dockworkers did this, needing to forget their grime-ridden lives. United just went that bit further, taking young lads along with them in their flights of fancy – the Busby Babes were unprecedented, of course, but instilled in an entire generation the belief that whenever you die, you must be content that you played the part well. And even when Manchester United transformed from the messiah for the alleged Northern animals to the Premier League’s sledgehammer of a provocateur, hated, adored but never ignored, the culture remained the same – who’s going to stop Manchester United? Who’s going to stop Mancunians?
The rot is deep at United but it can be cleansed. A football director, a manager, recruitment and culture -- et voilà, title winners. There’s no poetry left in Manchester, Ralf. Bring it back.
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