Manchester United club legend Gary Neville is always known for giving a strong take on the issues. Sometimes those strong takes can heat up a little bit and go off the rails, but much of the time he’s spot on. Neville’s got a very solid, cogent interpretation of the dysfunction junction that is currently present at Manchester United.
While almost everybody is blaming manager Jose Mourinho, and many others blame Executive Vice President Ed Woodward, Neville sees the issues stemming from further back. He believes that when the club gave up on Sir Alex Ferguson’s hand-picked successor, David Moyes, so quickly, the club got away from their ideals and standards.
Gary Neville maintains Fergie’s mantra of “stand by your manager” was lost forever.
https://twitter.com/GNev2/status/1046298837952933888
When his idea was challenged, Neville pointed to the club’s not having a real general direction, a wholistic strategy. It’s point that’s been raised by many during this tumultuous period- United don’t seem to really know what they’re doing in the transfer market. Instead they’re just throwing money at everything.
https://twitter.com/GNev2/status/1046301545292288000
So what is the way out of this and who is to blame? In the opinion of Gary Neville, and of this writer, there needs to be some kind of build, or at the very least, the idea of putting building blocks in place and building towards something.
Perhaps the idea of appointing a Football Director really is the answer. Let Woodward handle the marketing, financial and corporate stuff. Let the field manager handle the personnel. Have the Football Director handle the transfers and scouting. United has to try something radically different, cuz what’s been going on since 2013 is just failing miserably.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, is currently a regular contributor to SB Nation, WGN CLTV and Chicago Now.
Follow him on Twitter, Instagram, Sound Cloud and YouTube. The content of his cat’s Instagram account is unquestionably superior to any and all of his.