Manchester United Season Review 2013/2014
After more than two decades of stability at the top of the club, the retirement of Sir Alex Ferguson was sure to a big blow to Manchester United. Most sane United fans like myself didn’t have too many unreasonable expectations. All we wanted was a top four finish and to get out of the Champions League group stage. A good domestic cup run would have been a bonus, but a luxury nonetheless.
But, instead of a transitional phase, it was a complete free fall. In 10 tumultuous months, David Moyes had managed to crumble an entire empire, lose the support of the players, the fans and finally the board. To go from Champions to seventh place in a span of a single season is simply unacceptable, especially at a club like United, when there has been no major upheaval in the squad.
Instead of a stable transition from a title-winning club to a top four club, what we got was a team that was dysfunctional, a manager who was out of his depth and fans who were completely disappointed. While a collapse of this magnitude couldn’t have been foreseen by anyone at the club, least of all, his predecessor, Sir Alex, if the football was any good, David Moyes would have gone through till the end of the season.
Instead of the traditional free flowing attacking football, Manchester United started playing a style that cannot be described at all, because there wasn’t one. There was no clear identity to the squad and no clear style of play. For two decades, Manchester United had dominated the Premier League, thanks in large part to their wingers.
At the start of this season, they had just three wingers, one who has largely been disappointing for the last couple of years (Nani), another who hasn’t been the same since a horrific injury (Valencia) and another who has looked completely clueless during most of his time at the club (Young). Add an ageing center back pairing and a non-existent central midfield and voilà you have the perfect recipe for disaster.
While a bad summer window, which saw only an overpaid Fellaini arrive as a panic buy wasn’t the perfect start to his tenure, there was still no suggestion that it would go so bad, so quickly. Whilst it wasn’t the greatest of starts, what followed was beyond belief. Old Trafford, which was an unbreachable fortress since the inception of the Premier League had transformed into a run-down building that was coming apart brick by brick.
Teams that hadn’t won since the 60’s and 70’s came to Old Trafford with a belief that they could win and not just walk away with a point. It wasn’t just against the big sides that United struggled against, their form against the lesser teams at home was indescribably bad.
By the end, although United finished with the joint-third best away record in the League, they had lost more home games in the previous four seasons combined. In a season that was riddled with negativity, the only bright spark to emerge out of the cauldron of chaos was the emergence of Adnan Januzaj. The Belgian teenager took the League by storm and is one of the very few good things to have come out of the season.
1. Best Moment
United’s finest achievement of the season was their 5-0 away victory over Bayer Leverkusen in late November. Not only was it United’s biggest away victory in the Champions League, it was also Moyes’ finest hour-and-a-half as United boss. It was the only occasion in the season where United looked in complete control and like the side that romped to the title last season.