All Things Must Pass
On this week’s extended show Ed & Paul look back on 27 years of Sir Alex Ferguson at Old Trafford – the man, the manager, and his legacy. What kind of club will Ferguson leave behind, and how should fans assess a quarter century in charge? In a dramatic week for the club, Sir Alex steps aside with David Moyes appointed the new manager on a six year contract. Does the Everton manager have what it takes to lead United to ever greater glory or will the step up prove too much? Also on the show this week: we look back on United’s defeat to Chelsea at Old Trafford and preview the weekend match with Swansea City. It is sure to be an emotional occasion. Finally, we give away a Ferguson book in our new competition.
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Quite disturbed to hear about the oral pleasure you’re giving to kids who use iTunes in Africa but I suppose we’ve all got to do our part to make the world a better place. Cheers for the podcast as always, very nice to be consoled! Glory Glory Moyes & United.
So
Schmeichel
GNev – Rio – Stam – Irwin
Ronaldo – Scholes – Keane – Giggs
Cantona – RvN
Bench –
EvdS, Carrick, Evra, Vidic, Beckham, Ole, O’Shea
Not bad.
About Giggs, the word Fergie used was “cocker spaniel”.
“He was 13 and he floated across the ground like a cocker spaniel chasing a piece of silver paper in the wind.”
All things MUST pass. Ffs.
It’s nice that within 10 minutes of the Fergie tribute you speculate that he’s going to drop dead at home within a week
ffs
Speculate that he’s going to is a bit strong! Hopefully we managed to get the love out there too.
Absolutely brilliant work from Ed and Paul. One of the best episodes this season, although I suppose the subject matter was handed to you on a platter.
I’m going to get my retaliation in early, before the Glazers’ “anti-dissent ray” has me falling into line with the rest of the masses, er, consumers.
Rafa Honigstein put it quite well, in my view: the appointment of Moyes symbolises the “Arsenalization” of Manchester United, in that the Glazers have signalled that stability is more important to them than success.
The pro-Moyes fans are understandably delighted with the appointment as Moyes won’t be a disaster. In fact, even though I am anti-Moyes, I am going to make a series of predictions about Moyes that may seem surprisingly positive. I am quite confident of the following:
1. Moyes will ensure that MUFC stay in the top 4 throughout the entire tenure of his reign;
2. Moyes will win the title at least once during his term, but more likely multiple times;
3. Moyes will ensure that MUFC emerge from the group stages of the Champions League more often than not. (I’m not however prepared to predict that Moyes will actually win the Champions League); and
4. Moyes will not only survive the entirety of his first 6 year contract with MUFC, he will in fact never be fired and will stay until he chooses to retire.
Given all of the above, you might be wondering why on earth I am so devastated that the Glazers have appointed Moyes.
The fact is that if you substituted the name of any good manager for “Moyes” in the predictions above, you could more than likely make the same predictions with equal confidence. Well, perhaps not the last one in the case of Mourinho, but one of the strangest things about the succession discussion is the insistence of so many people, including football journalists and pundits, than Moyes and Mourinho were the only 2 football managers worth discussing. You’d think that Jurgen Klopp, Antonio Conte, AVB and Carlo Ancelotti (just to name 4 men off the top of my head) were contractually prohibited from ever living and working in Manchester given the tone of some of the conversations.
Anyway, the point is that given the strength of the current squad, and given the financial clout that Manchester United has (particularly if FFP ends up having teeth, although I have started to doubt that) any good manager would more likely than not also be able to keep MUFC in the top 4, win the odd title and do a decent albeit not outstanding job in Europe.
I’ll make one further prediction: David Moyes will not take MUFC to the next level and will not establish MUFC as THE dominant force in Europe.
You may scoff and respond that no manager could guarantee that. Yes, absolutely true. But in the case of extraordinary young managers like Klopp and Guardiola (fine, not available) I don’t believe you could confidently make a negative prediction – they might do it or they might not.
David Moyes absolutely will NOT make MUFC the dominant club in Europe. I know it, and deep down you know it too, even if you want to toe the party line and back him publicly.
I could go into all of the big games that Everton under Moyes have bottled during his tenure there, but I don’t have to because if you follow football closely enough to be visiting a football blog site, you know the facts as well as I do. If you’re on Twitter, you would know how many Everton fans felt about Moyes after Everton bottled last season’s FA Cup semi against the old enemy Liverpool, or when they again bottled the FA Cup QF against Wigan.
If you’re happy with a mediocre decade of grey stability, then Moyes is your man.
BTW I tried posting similar comments on another blog site, but apparently the moderator found them too subversive and wouldn’t approve them. God bless the Glazers, one and all.
@ Geno…
Funny post that… You would have had most of the “Anti Moyes” brigade lining up to applaud that post, until you made the cardinal sin… you blamed the Glazers.
Pfft… unclean heathen, you…
Heh you can tell Ed is going to be gunning for Moyes if he hasn’t won in the first 3 games
Moyes will reinvigorate Rant, it’s gonna be ace
Sid – ha, brilliant. Actually, no I really hope that he’s super successful and gets the full six years. I don’t think he’s the best appointment, but he is the appointment. Let’s hope he proves the doubters totally wrong, me included.
My expectation is that United will finish third next season – for a number of reasons. So with that as an expectation we’ll be ok 🙂
Schmeichel
GNev – Vidic – Rio – Evra
Scholes – Carrick – Keane
Ronaldo – Cantona – Giggs
Bench – vdSaar, Rooney, Robson, Irwin, Stam, Beckham, Ole
Favourite Goal – Cantona vs Liverpool, FA Cup Final, 1996
Favourite Quote – Football, bloody hell!
Favourite team – 2008, best team we’ve had
Carrick in the first XI, but van Nistelrooy doesn’t even make the bench? The temptation to write something insulting is almost overwhelming.
It’s very difficult. Those are my favourite 11 players from the Ferguson era and in my favourite system from the era (4-3-3 of 2008).
There was a fair bit of consternation in the pod this week about Moyes’ appointment, but you failed to really offer any alternatives, other than Klopp. I’m not saying he wouldn’t have been a good choice, but who else is there?
Martinez now as a trophy, would you have preferred him?
Neil Lennon has been in the Champions League on several occasions, beating Barcelona the season, him?
Di Matteo?
It’s the same as the ‘let’s sign a great midfielder, just like Roy,’ debate. People are not pointing out the suitable candidates for the role.
Gopher – I’d categorise it differently. I don’t see our observations about Moyes as consternation. People always seem to see a negative opinion in a ‘negative’ observation. It’s not.
Second, would we observe the cv of alternative coaches differently? Almost certainly.
Third, you know all the alternative options already.
Not bothering listening to the podcast but that is a great post!
Well done
Exactly what I feel
“David Moyes absolutely will NOT make MUFC the dominant club in Europe. I know it, and deep down you know it too, even if you want to toe the party line and back him publicly.”
What? Like Ferguson did?
What a load of bollocks.
Why is Moyes copping all the flack, for being exactly the type of manager we all would have predicted we’d get under the Glazer “business model”… I actually think he’s going to surprise a few people here, if he gets the chance to cement his authority, the way Ferguson did… but that’s not the point… if we had the spoilt, “more money than sense/morals” owners of Chelsea, City, PSG, etc… then we could have had the latest fad manager going… but Moyes is the WISE choice of owners that want stability, prudence, and little controversy…
And stop with the Moyes isn’t going to dominate Europe crap… Manchester United have NEVER dominated Europe… we had a purple patch a couple years back, making multiple finals/semis… and we won 1… on fuckin penalties… against Chelsea… hardly a thumping victory… a lot of people might claim United under Ferguson SHOULD have won 1 or 2 more Champs cups… but we didn’t… and that was down to Ferguson and the Glazers… maybe if we’d made the midfield a priority after Keane left… the way we all know we should have, we might have done better…
To all you Moyes doubters… you might well be right… we’re going to see, aren’t we… but every time I see one of you write, ^^^this^^^, “I know it and you know it” bullshit, I can’t help but laugh at the very simple fact… you KNOW nothing…
“Badges, to god-damned hell with badges! We have no badges. In fact, we don’t need badges. I don’t have to show you any stinking badges, you god-damned cabrón and ching’ tu madre! Come out from that shit-hole of yours. I have to speak to you.”
Why shouldn’t we have aspirations to dominate Europe? We do England
Nowt wrong with that Mate… in fact we should be up there with Real, Barca, Bayern… and by now we SHOULD have passed Liverpools 5… but there’s only 2 ways to win in Europe… you’re either simply the best team in the competition, like Barca have been, and Bayern probably are this year… or you’re one of the top teams, plus you got a bit lucky, like United and Chelseas wins.
It takes money to be the best, and there’s no getting away from that… otherwise, you just have to be in there with a chance… Ferguson was allways happy to just have a go with what he had, and see how he’d do… but he could never brag about being the best in Europe, anymore than Wigan winning the FA cup makes them the best team in England.
Moyes will do the best he can with what he’s got… but it won’t be his fault if we’re not good enough in Europe… I predict he’ll get us into the last 8 just as regularly as Ferguson did, and even a semi once in a while… but as long as United is financially a second class club against the likes of City, Chelsea, Real, Barca, Bayern… we’ll need to be lucky to get further than that… just like under Ferguson… because we’re not the best in Europe and we never have been… and in my opinion, no manager would make us any better than that, until we start to spend what we earn on the team, instead of only what the Glazers let us keep.
^^^This^^^
So in essence..all this is the glazers fault as we have already stated…hence why moyes was taken on..their austerity measures and as geno states, our arsenalisation, where being in and around there is just enough
Again, I must stress..I don’t blame moyes for any of this..I cannot blame him…it’s clear why he was taken on…
Glazers out
Seems like you’ve answered your own question, and the answer has nothing to do with the relative merits of Moyes v Mourinho or any other manager. We are saddled with the worst owners of any club with pretensions to being the world’s biggest, and until that changes, United will fall further and further away from what it could and ought to be.
This is my point though Cap… Moyes is the one who’s going to cop the blame… especially from short sighted doubters, who won’t even give him a chance.
This is what “Geno” wrote… “David Moyes absolutely will NOT make MUFC the dominant club in Europe. I know it, and deep down you know it too, even if you want to toe the party line and back him publicly.”
Basically, it’s already Moyes fault… and he hasn’t even failed yet!!! complete and utter rubbish!
It’s one thing to doubt Moyes is the man to take over… but what chance does he have, if you’re already condemning him, even though he’s fighting with lead boots on.
My opinion… Moyes IS in fact the right man for the job… I might have preferred Klopp… but that’s based on what he achieved in Germany… he might be Klopp the Flop here… we don’t know, anymore than we KNOW how Moyes is going to do… just as possible as it is that Moyes might fail, it’s also possible that we haven’t seen the best of him yet… given a better budget, better squad of players, better coaches, scouts, youth team managers… he might well turn out to be great… and how good might he be if United would let him sign the likes of players we all want to see… Bale, Strootman, Lewandowski, etc???… maybe he could bring the kind of success United, it’s fans, and its global standing deserves… it’s true standing, as one of the worlds TOP 2/3 biggest clubs in football… not its false standing as a second rate, big team, on a “competetive budget”.
If the Glazers maintain the level of investment that they have so far, then Moyes will have no excuse for not being competetive in England… but let’s be fair… without more money than those greasy cunts have been coughing up so far… he’s got little chance in Europe, any more than Ferguson did, so why blame him?… especially before he’s even sat down at his new desk?
Alf is right.
The only thing I would add is: you are all cunts.
Btw, what sort of mong name is gopher brown ffs.
Well knobby does blame Moyes so how can you two claim to see eye to eye.
We might still have taken on Moyes with or without the Glazers, what with us being principled in terms of who should be managing the club and the sort of philosophies he should have.
Wow Sheesh… that almost sounds… aggressive…
I like it!
There’s a case here to say in a way lets not get behind moyes so the owners have to sack him and their clear lack of financial support may make the top reds sit up and take notice after we change manager after manager…it may wipe a few hundred million off the price and force them to fuck off once and for all
Think about it….
LKHM
Hoofing
We do see eye to eye..but from different viewpoints…we both want the same thing which is a competitive united playing football and achieving greatness…how we want that achieved are by getting rid of moyes, but for totally different reasons.
I agree with knobby that moyes is out of his depth, but I also want him to prove me wrong..but this is down to austerity IMO..
Hope I’m proven wrong and moyes makes me look a cunt in the next 12 months…but I’m quite sure he won’t…and again..that’s not his fault
Again..if the glazers back him..which I doubt btw…then it’s a different argument completely..he will get cunted for his lack of success from a footballing perspective….not a financial one
LKHM
Hoofing