Manchester United have had a tumultuous spell over the last six weeks. From the moment they landed in Los Angeles for their US tour without a host of first-team players, Jose Mourinho’s mood has been far from positive and that has also been reflected in their fortunes on the field to this point.
There appears to be a blame game developing, with various groups of fans and pundits having made up their minds who is culpable for the current mess as United prepare for a huge Premier League fixture against Tottenham Hotspur at Old Trafford on Monday. While Mourinho himself has been singled out by some as the main culprit, the likes of executive vice-chair Ed Woodward and the club-owning Glazer family have also been identified as the guilty party.
And what of the players, whose lacklustre performance at Brighton last weekend suggested that the bad vibes have permeated into the on-field staff as well.
So exactly who should be carrying the can for the current malaise in M16?
Jose Mourinho’s characteristics were hardly unknown when he arrived at Old Trafford in 2016. He had long since become known for a spiky management style, a win-at-all-costs mentality which didn’t sit within the usual boundaries of what Manchester United as an institution regards as acceptable.
His frequent run-ins with opposition managers and officials, his eye-gouge of the late Tito Vilanova, the way he had fallen out with, and lost the respect of, his players at Real Madrid and Chelsea… there were many examples to cite when building a case as to why Mourinho’s sheen of invincibility might have worn off.
And his spell at the Theatre of Dreams has only magnified such issues. He has almost ruined Luke Shaw in public over the last two years, undermined the likes of Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Anthony Martial, belittled Paul Pogba and made his dissatisfaction with the board known on more than one occasion after they failed to deliver the players he demanded in the transfer market. He even bemoaned the need to take a group of promising youngsters on tour with him this summer and immediately excluded them from his plans by saying they “are not my players”.
All the while his approach to the football has drawn as many groans as cheers. The decision to send out his side in an ultra-defensive style for the home derby against Manchester City last term lost him any credibility with some fans, while others can’t wait to see the back of him after two years of safety-first football.