5 mistakes David Moyes has made as Manchester United manager

David Moyes after last night’s loss to Bayern Munich

So it’s almost been a season since the reigns at Old Trafford were handed over to David Moyes by Sir Alex. The season has in general been a forgettable nightmare for the fans with isolated flashes of brilliance. Champions League qualification is now out of the question, as United were eliminated from the Champions League last night, and with them currently standing 7th in the League with just 5 games left, its just not realistic.

The Chosen One David Moyes has had to bear the brunt of the teams fading fortunes . The “Moyes Out”outfit are in full force now, having made their emotions clear with the MOYES OUT banner in the home game against Aston Villa. While Moyes has been made a scapegoat for all of United’s trouble, here are 5 mistakes he’s committed that have earned him the disrespect of the fans.

Catastrophic summer transfer window

Moyes stepped into Old Trafford with a dire need of signing new players. It was always evident that without Fergie’s exceptional management skills and new players, United would not be a title contender. David Moyes and Ed Woodward’s lackadaisical attitude in the summer transfer market had many eyebrows raised. Moyes uselessly went after former Arsenal captain Cesc Fabregras when it was he didn’t have the faintest of sentiment about moving to Manchester. Also his failure to address the problem of the aging defensive duo of Ferdinand and Vidic gave United an awful time at the center of defense.

Marouane Fellaini – The panic buy

The only player Moyes was able to lure to United was Maroune Fellaini, from his former club Everton, and that too at the 11^th hour. In the process Moyes ended up overpaying for the Belgian midfielder, spending a whopping 27.5 million pounds. The big Belgian has had a horrible season so far at Old Trafford adding to United’s midfield woes. You don’t spend 27.5 million pounds to just win your midfield battles with fringe teams like West Ham, Aston Villa etc. Moyes’s panic buy has been a big flop with nothing apart from his Afro wigs popular.

The Kagawa conundrum

The most baffling situation concerning a player at United presently is the curious case of Shinji Kagawa. Since the arrival of Moyes the Japanese international has got significantly less playing time. The most annoying fact is that Moyes has preferred the error prone Tom Cleverley over Shinji Kagawa, which has not gone down well with the fans. The out of form Cleverley and Ashley Young have been given more first team starts than the sublime Japanese play-maker.

Inspite of having performed well whenever given an opportunity, Kagawa has had to watch the crucial matches from the bench. Clearly Moyes doesn’t seem to rate Kagawa for some unknown reason beyond my conjecture.

Playing the blame game

The last thing you need to do to invite the ire of Manchester United fans is to criticize the legendary Sir Alex Ferguson. David Moyes has been as ridiculous as it gets when it comes to press conferences and post match interviews. He went one step further when he said “Sir Alex would have also struggled with the current squad”.

Indirectly he might have wanted to state that Fergie stepped out of a sinking ship but Moyes who was hand-picked by Sir Alex Ferguson needs remember that with even lesser resources Fergie won us the title. So let’s make it clear with average players too Fergie made us play like champions, Moyes needs time. But dare not demean the great Sir Alex in front of me.

Replacing the backroom staff

Manchester United’s new backroom staff

Perhaps the biggest blunder that Moyes committed immediately after taking charge from Sir Alex. Contrary to Fergie’s advice Moyes decided to replace his backroom staff with his own from Everton. With this move he lost the valuable insight of people like Rene Muelesteen .Players like David De Gea who had a excellent time in the goal thanks to former goalkeeping coach Eric Steele stated their disappointment over this move.

This brought a lack of experience in management and complete disconnect between the coaching staff and the players. Replacing a mythical figure like Ferguson was never going to be easy and with a complete revamp in system made matters worse.