Defining week for Solskjaer that seem familiar with McGuinness and Moyes era

Wilf McGuinness and David Moyes had taken their teams at Manchester United to the semi-finals of the League Cup which they lost in 1970 December and 2014 January and went out of the FA Cup 3rd round respectively with the former's reign ending in December itself while the later lasted till April. That predicament could soon befall Ole Gunnar Solskjaer if the tie against Wolves in the 3rd round of FA Cup and against Man City in the league cup semi-finals over two legs do not go right, nor if he fails to stitch together a run of victories in the league to secure the 4th spot.

The patchy results in the league despite the victories over Spurs and Man City he has clearly failed to bring consistency that normally would have meant a run of 5 or 6 straight victories increasing the confidence of his young charges. Unbeaten at Old Trafford since the loss to Crystal Palace in late August and six game unbeaten run that included three draws are the only two positives that have protected Solskjaer in the results oriented business of football management. Loss to Arsenal was a consequence of two bad choices by the Norwegian: Lingard instead of in-form Andreas and James instead of Greenwood. No Angel Gomes in the squad either who traveled but did not make it to the bench due to issues over his contract. To resurrect the confidence of David De Gea MUFC appointed a new goal keeping coach Craig Mawson from Burnley.  Fans would have loved to see a hard fought draw given the hectic schedule and eke out a result to maintain another run of games unbeaten.

All focus was once again and unfairly on Paul Pogba who did not play in the match after Solskjaer had hinted that he might be involved earlier in the week. Two events clearly points to non-cohesion between the football and commercial management at the club. Firstly after MUFC pulled out of Haaland deal Pogba's agent gave a damning indictment saying "It’s a club out of touch with reality and without a sporting project. I wouldn’t take anyone there, they would even ruin Maradona, Pele and Maldini." Huge loss of commission from that Haaland deal seem obvious but why should MUFC allow such a diatribe from an agent of a player employed by the club. Second is more worrisome actually spoken by Solskjaer "How long is Pogba out for? Three or four weeks maybe, I don't know. He's been advised to have an operation by his people and he'll probably do that." It reminds of Mourinho wanting the Frenchman out but could not due to Management disagreement over the loss of revenue vis-a-vis social media. Despite Solskjaer maintaining utmost restraint so far this season to put a brave face on a tough situation given the weak squad this admission does demand an transparent revelation of the exact injury suffered by Pogba. No talks about contract extension with Pogba who is already in his final 17 months of his existing one does bare out the hard truth.

Without Pogba and more importantly McTominay for a whole month could jeopardize what could possibly be achieved this season. James Garner and Dylan Levitt may get more game time but its probably a year too early for them to be playing in the Premier League every week. MUFC must reignite the interest in Kalvin Phillips or Sandro Tonali based on Solskjaer's template of young and hungry, after sounding out their first tier targets in Grealish and Maddison. The iconic number 7 jersey remains vacant and is still a big draw for an aspiring midfielder seeking world wide acclaim. Ferguson wasn't a fan of January signings either but did bring Vidic and Evra when required. Saul Niguez, Donny van de Beek, Arturo Vidal, Fabian Ruiz, Marco Verratti are pricey options that should be considered. Although experience is the key driver to bring a midfielder given that McTominay might be the first choice Denis Zakaria or Boubakary Soumare may be looked in purely from availability point of view only if none of the other names work out.

The sheer passion shown by Solskjaer coupled with courage to chart through the tough times for the club does deserve more praise than scorn. He is also perhaps caught in the clash of classical manager versus the modern hands on coach from varied background that has inundated the game. The loss to Arsenal away followed by the loss to Wolves in the FA Cup quarter-finals in March was the start of unraveling of deeper issues that led to a collapse towards the end of last season. The same opposition and a year later will the performance and result be any different now? Worse given the same two fixtures are early in January this season if the deficiency in midfield isn't managed by the way of player acquisition the fallout can be disastrous for the 17 remaining league games.

Pivotal game against arch rivals amid the shadows of 73-74 relegation

Fans and media must keep the pressure on Ed Woodward esp since Oliver Holt's article in the Daily Mail which hit the nail on its head. There are parallels with end of Busby and Ferguson illustrious trophy laden reign - towards the end the investment in the squad dried up which meant they did not replace their key players like Herd, Foulkes, Stiles, Charlton, Law from 1967 on wards and Keane, Ronaldo, Neville, Giggs, Vidic, Ferdinand from 2005 on wards. In 1974 MUFC hurtled downwards to relegation with a very decent defense in Buchan and Holton but without any prolific striker, a situation very similar now. Is the MUFC team now too good to go down? This accentuates the urgent need for MUFC to buy a proven striker in January.

Ed Woodward has come out with his justifications on wasting most of #850 million dollars under his watch and how can any sane MUFC fan believe him. What worries fans further is that this 6 years & #850 million mess is not the benchmark to rectify other areas like youth policy where they are well behind most of their rivals. He has however backed Ole Gunnar Solskjaer ahead of the most crucial fixture in our calendar but has it come a week early? Does Ed believe that MUFC will get anything out of this game?

MUFC have in the past ended Arsenal's 49 game unbeaten run that stopped the invincible's in the famous 'Battle of Buffet' and now despite being in bad form, crucial players in Paul Pogba and David de Gea injured and the squad being low on confidence, given the nature of this fixture between the two most successful English football clubs they can stop LFC's run of 17 game winning streak. Marcus Rashford, Scott McTominay and Axel Tuanzebe being the academy lads will be crucial to channel their high emotions into decent performances belying their age given the thread bare squad. While the wide area's at full back need to counter LFC surge and Ole might play a three man defense to release Dalot and Young while another exciting prospect at left back Brandon Williams might get some game time.

Huge credit to Marcus Rashford for carrying on despite his lack of form and non-coherent midfield where he does not know where the through ball is going to come from. Yet he has backed himself for the cause of the team and being on the pitch. Having aspirations to be central striker is not bad which means he is prepared to work to make it happen despite being found out a few times or missing a few runs. Marcus Rashford is of the same age as Tammy Abraham and already with 36 caps for his country while Mason Greenwood a good four years younger. One of the traits of players like Cristiano Ronaldo who reached 700 career goals is how they personally look after themselves and avoid injury in spite of  training regimes at club and country. Rashford has at least kept himself in the reckoning for a start always where as Anthony Martial who finally gets his chance at being the No 9 is returning from injury. Martial though has still scored a third of MUFC goals this season and hoping the Frenchmen adds to his tally against LFC to cement his favourite position #AM9.

On paper and form its a 0-3 defeat and anything better especially team coherence and fighting quality with a plan from Ole will take it as a positive sign. 1973-74 season after 8 games 10 points(3W, 4L, 1D - 8GS 10GC) and in 2019-20 season after 8 games 9 points (2W, 3L, 3D - 9GS 8GC) a serious cause for worry. Coincidentally the 9th game of 1973-74 season was against Liverpool at Old Trafford which ended in a 0-0 stalemate, even a similar result in 2019-20 might not be good enough in the eventual league standings at the end of the season.

As for LFC it will be crucial to not only win but do the double over their arch rivals MUFC similar to 1963-64 season that setup them up for a first League Championship win after 1946-47 and not mind the margin of victory. In hindsight Klopp might seek to improve the performance at Old Trafford where they dropped two points last season while at the end they lost the league title by only one point to MCFC. Old Trafford is the last summit LFC need to conquer to avoid complacency of last season and lay down the fears of a meltdown that accompanied Arsene Wenger's Arsenal after the 49 game unbeaten streak was ended by MUFC.