Abhranil Roy
As Manchester United stuttered to another defeat at the hands of lowly Bournemouth, people have now started asking serious questions about the future of Louis van Gaal. He has been severely, and most of the times unjustly criticised for his tactics, as United now have only 3 wins in the last 12 matches. Here, we list the 3 things we learnt from the game:
1. The injury list keeps growing
Paddy McNair and Jesse Lingard were the latest players to be added on the ever-growing injury list at Man Utd, one which already has the likes of Chris Smalling, Ander Herrera, Antonio Valencia, James Wilson, Wayne Rooney, Marcos Rojo and Luke Shaw. Whether these continued injuries are due to the manager’s training methods or just pure bad luck we do not know, but it has severely dented the team morale at a time when the fixtures are coming thick and fast and we needed our best players in the team.
2. Memphis Depay is improving at last
Depay has been steadily showing his class, against Wolfsburg he had a decent game and he was again pretty good versus Bournemouth, especially in the first half. He received many diagonal passes in the game, which he received with a brilliant technique, and always looked to run at the fullback. It was his run which set up Fellaini’s goal, and we all hope that he keeps improving day by day and lives up to his potential.
3. Van Gaal’s substitutions don’t make sense
Van Gaal has a habit of making substitutions which no one can fathom, and this is another reason why fans are calling him “clueless” and want him out. Against Wolfsburg, he bought off Juan Mata, the player who set up the goal for a young Nick Powell, who had barely played any first team football for the last 2 years and naturally, he looked quite out of his depth in the game. Last night, he again bought off Maroune Fellaini, United’s goalscorer and quite easily our best man to get a goal, for Powell, who again barely had any influence on the game. He also bought off Paddy McNair for Phil Jones in the dying minutes of the game, as United were left chasing a match and needed more ammunition up front. The substitutions are perplexing to say the very least, and one is at a loss to understand why they were carried out by the manager.
