Given he’s a manager who’s never worried about upsetting anyone or speaking anything other than the truth, it was only a matter of time before Louis van Gaal delivered a forthright verdict of David Moyes, his predecessor at Old Trafford.
He previously side-stepped questions over whether a seventh-place finish was a failure (which it of course was, given the fact Moyes lost his job) but when the issue of personnel arose during a press conference on Monday, his opinion was crystal clear – a squad left broken and imbalanced with too many central midfielders and confidence levels battered.
It was a fairly stinging evaluation, but ultimately an honest one as even a cursory glance at United’s first-team reveals a number of obvious deficiencies.
Van Gaal focused his criticism on the midfield area where, with the addition of Ander Herrera, United have an abundance of central attacking-focused midfielders: Marouane Fellaini, Shinji Kagawa, Juan Mata, even Anderson.
Five simply does not go into one and you would imagine by the end of the transfer window at least two of those players will have been moved on, Fellaini, Kagawa and Anderson the most likely to leave.
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Increasing the lopsided nature of United’s squad is in the wide positions where Van Gaal will have Ashley Young, Nani, Antonio Valencia, Adnan Januzaj, Danny Welbeck and Wilfried Zaha at his disposal.
Plenty of options, but not a great deal of quality – outside of the emerging Januzaj – while Zaha’s apparent lax attitude to training threatens to also see him cast aside.
With quantity over quality in those areas, the real issue of concern for Van Gaal, however, must be in defence, as their only addition in that department this summer has been 19-year-old Luke Shaw.
Following the departures of Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra, United’s defence will currently be made up from Phil Jones, Jonny Evans, Chris Smalling, Shaw and Rafael.
As good as the ‘Iron Tulip’ is working with young players, it will be a minor miracle if he can form a top-four quality back-line out of those five.
However, while Moyes certainly deserves a degree of discredit, what is glaring is how it reflects on Sir Alex Ferguson’s transfer dealings towards the end of his reign.
With the exception of Mata and Fellaini, all the aforementioned players were his signings; Anderson, Nani, Valencia, Young, Jones, Kagawa and Smalling costing a total in excess of £110m (Dh684m) but have either failed or are running out of time to justify their status as Manchester United players.
And while Moyes and chief executive Ed Woodward’s failings in the transfer market were obvious, an inability to cure festering wounds has now left the club with even more work to do this summer.
Jones, Smalling, Kagawa and Zaha may well come good under Van Gaal’s tutelage but there remains a considerable amount of deadwood that not only needs to be moved on but also replaced.
Van Gaal’s image of a broken squad was not just an assessment of Moyes, it was a message for Woodward to get to work.
