Manchester Un-United - Ferguson to Mourinho to Hell

Born in the early 80s in India, I was literally forced into loving Cricket. 

But, I got away.

It was a blessing in disguise that my full-time-working-&-full-time-bickering parents airlifted and dropped me across most of my school holidays at my maternal grandparents’ place. My grand-dad, a retired army-man, introduced me to sports beyond Cricket - Football, Hockey, Tennis & tons more. I got hooked to Tennis. By 1992, when Tendulkar was, by million miles, the most famous sportsperson/God in India, I was in awe of a female tennis player from Argentina.

Gabriela Sabatini.

Fast forward 10 years - 2002. I met a bloke [Gaurav Malik] when I moved into Howitt Hall in Monash University. He loved two things: Bashing Aussies & Manchester United.

Courtesy big-ass projector rooms available for the students, I began watching football like I had always watched AFL {Aussie Football}, Tennis & Cricket. It took me a hell lot of time to comprehend the rules & tactics, but with each passing week, I kept falling in love with football - to be fair, I fell in love with United, Ronaldo & Ferguson.

In those days, I wasn’t dating or slutting around - so watching United week-in, week-out was the chief source of my orgasms. And Boy! United gave me plenty.

Winning almost every match & Premier League title was the norm over the next decade. The only exception was Chelsea, who pissed me off by winning back-to-back Premier League titles in 2004-05 & 2005-06.

During that era, Chelsea was coached by the Special One - Jose Mourinho.

A decade later, almost inevitably, Mourinho became United coach. As much as I didn’t like his dour style of football, I knew he was our best bet for a Premier League title. 

Yesterday, 18 December ’18, he was ‘let go’ after an insidiously acrimonious spell that ended with a 3-1 defeat at Anfield against Jurgen Klopp’s rampaging Reds [Liverpool].

In the past four months ‘every motherfucker’ has claimed that Mourinho is destroying United & has to be sacked rightaway. He’s been ridiculed more than Donald Trump. Jose, staying true to his cranky nature, responded with walking out of press conferences, refusing to answer standard questions, constantly dropping United’s most expensive player [Pogba], breaking bottles by the hordes, criticising everyone without restraint & abusing all the haters in Portuguese. 

In my opinion, Mourinho’s departure from United at this juncture is the right call. He got fired and got £23 million [200 crores] in compensation. United has already made its worst start in three decades so the only way to go now is - Up. 

Everybody wins.

It’s about time, I get to the fucking point of this letter [article]

I want to get one thing straight — Jose Mourinho is not the cause of United’s recent disturbing performances even if he deserves both the sack & responsibility for everything that’s wrong at United at this hour.

How did a legendary team that gave me multiple orgasms week-in, week-out, incessantly began giving me mild-depression and nightmares?

Let’s take a step back - five years back to 2013

It all started well before Ferguson retired in 2013 - the last year United were the Champions. 

There’s absolutely no doubt that Ferguson was a champion manager, but the team he left behind wasn’t a great one. Manchester City had already found the Oil-Tycoon angel [Saudi Sheikh] who was pumping in not millions, but billions. The world of football was swiftly changing to ‘buying’ instead of ‘building’ a team. Patience had quickly become an archaic word. New Rules: Buy the Best Players & Best Coach & give them 2 years max to buy [win] the League title and 3 years max for Champions League. [Trivia: Ferguson didn’t win his first Premier League title for ‘six years’]

At Ferguson’s insistence, David Moyes [both Ferguson & Moyes are Scottish!] took over. Within a few matches, it was evident to me that Moyes, though a great manager at a mid-level club - Everton, was totally out-of-his-depth at United, a Goliath in the footballing realm. With the pressure mounting with each loss/drab display, Moyes began to unravel quicker than a shoddily plotted Bollywood suspense thriller. With social media spreading like plague and every retired player becoming a TV pundit, the pressure of results was war-like. United fell to 7th in the league - an absolutely alien [unacceptable] state of affairs. As much as it was unfair to boot Moyes out within less than a year [he had a ‘six-year’ contract], it was the right decision. 

Then Ed Woodward [who really should go back to Accounting & Investment Banking], executive vice-chairman at United, roped in Louis van Gaal, an illustrious manager, with the prime motive of damage control. Fair enough

Gaal brought United back into the Champions League finishing fourth in 2014-15, but the boring style of play was criticised by ‘every motherfucker’. This criticism resulted in ridiculous scrutiny [vicious personal attacks]; inevitably the results worsened [United finished 5th & out of Champions League] and the style of play remained the same: Boring. 

Two days after winning the FA Cup, United [Read: Ed Braindead Woodward] fired Louis van Gaal, a year before his contract’s expiration.

The reason: Jose Mourinho was available and Ed Woodward & Glazers & other decision-making dimwits believed Mourinho will do better than Gaal. On the face of it, it wasn’t illogical. Though the style of play will remain ‘dull & dour’, Mourinho’s record literally guaranteed a title within 2 seasons. 

In the first season, he, given his pesky nature, was mostly calm. And though United finished 6th in the league, he won the Europa League to steer United back into the coveted Champions League from the back door. 

In his second season, he began making the team a real Mourinho team. Defensively solid & Visually Unattractive. Had it not been for Guardiola’s breathtaking City, United may well, undeservedly, have won the Premier League title. United ended the season with 80+ [81] points for the first time since the end of Ferguson era.

Jose made a realistic statement that United performed much better than their calibre and asked everyone not to compare this team with the legends of the Ferguson era. 

But guess what - Even after finishing second, United & Mourinho were butchered by everymotherfucker throughout the season. 

This really pissed off Mourinho and his worst came out even before the 2018-19 season started. To cut the story short, he became unstable & by extension, United became unstable. 

My point is - How on earth did Woodward, Glazers, & all the decision-making punks not see this coming. 

It was ‘deja fucking vu’ of what had just happened with Mourinho at Real Madrid and Chelsea - The Third season meltdown.

Dour Playing Style: Why on earth were we expecting that Mourinho’s United will play like Guardiola’s City, Klopp’s Liverpool, or Pochettino’s Tottenham. Only the delusional decision-makers & fans would.

And finally, if you - Mr. Woodward - are going to extend Mourinho’s contract but refuse to let him buy whoever-the-hell he wants to buy [centre-backs in this scenario] then do you expect a personality like Mourinho not to explode like a nuclear bomb. You gotta be fucking kidding me if you didn’t see that coming, you imbecile dumbfuck.

To Everyone: Blame Mourinho all you want. But if you’re telling me that Mourinho was wrong in benching Paul Pogba & was responsible for their broken Manager-Player relationship then you don’t know shit about football & human psychology. I’m no one to question Pogba’s footballing talent, but I can tell you without a shred of doubt that Pogba is too goddamn immature to be a United player. And both Ferguson & Mourinho were right not to play him.

Mourinho should never have been at United. His style of play, touchy personality, the English media, United fans and everybody who can speak or type were never going to get along. Mourinho & United's relationship was doomed to begin with. It was the perfect Kamikaze. 

It’s over now. 

Now if any sense still prevails then United will offload Pogba & Woodward at the end of the season - considering Glazers are darn hard to get rid off. And get a manager who really knows Manchester United - a manager who believes in the beauty of football like Jurgen Klopp does - a manager who can see the humour even in unwarranted criticism [by everymotherfucker] & is hell bent on waking up the true Manchester United which has been dead asleep since Sir Alex Ferguson called it a day. 

P.S. On an honest personal note, I, doubtlessly, believe Mourinho’s heart was in the right place; it’s just that ‘he’ wasn’t in the right place.