Doomed to fail: Why Van Gaal shouldn't be 'amazed' with Manchester United's debacle at the Emirates

Rooney and his men were annihilated by a first half blitzkrieg from Arsenal on Sunday

One moment summed up Manchester United’s performance on Sunday perfectly: With the clock dwindling down and at the wrong end of a 3-0 score line, Antonio Valencia looked up, saw 5 of his teammates ahead of him in the opposition box and almost robotically played a back pass to Daley Blind deep within his own half. It was as if he had been programmed to take no risks and to protect the ball at all costs. Indeed a far cry from the swash-buckling, vivacious style that the 20-time champions have come to be associated with.

A team which had performed Houdini-esque escapes time and time again that no opposing team felt safe till the final whistle blew, no matter how big a lead. A team so dangerous that the last time Arsenal had scored more than one against them in the Premier League, they had buried 8 in the opposing net. One might argue that Louis Van Gaal might be forgiven for being ‘amazed’ at the result as he had responded during the post-match press conference and that it was merely one of those days where nothing seemed to be going right for his team.

Quite the opposite, actually. ‘Horrified’ would have been a more apt reflection. As had been pointed out by pundits and millions of fans alike, this was a tragedy long coming. Having ground out unconvincing performances one after the other and propelling themselves to the top of the league, one always felt that United were likely to come up short against the ‘Top four’. But the manner in which they crumbled against Arsenal and the uninspired, insipid showing once they had gone behind sent shock waves throughout the footballing world.

Lifeless and leaderless, they resembled a disjoint school team even after boasting of a matchday squad costing £330 million. Van Gaal’s honeymoon period is well and truly over and serious questions will now be asked about his famed ‘philosophy’.

Team selection was the first and biggest tactical blunder

Most observers pointed out that the match was over within 20 minutes. But the contest, in fact, was decided even before kick-off, with Van Gaal’s team selection. With Luke Shaw out injured, the wings were always going to be problematic irrespective of whether Young or Valencia started. But it was the inclusion of both Carrick and Schweinsteiger that left everybody scratching their heads. Surely Morgan Schneiderlin, whom Wenger had pursued long and hard because Arsenal clearly lacked an enforcer of his mould, would have been the perfect weapon to deploy against them.

Besides, Schneiderlin had gained somewhat of a reputation for being a big-game player, routinely stifling the likes of Arsenal, Chelsea, City and United themselves when he was at Southampton. However, this was the second big game in a row he was left on the bench after being forced to watch the game against Liverpool also from the sidelines. While this strategy had paid dividends against a less mobile Liverpool, the gamble backfired spectacularly at the Emirates with Cazorla and co. making the United midfield duo look every bit their combined 65 years of age.

Also when Fellaini came on in the second half, the impact of his physical presence was clearly there to see, when Arsenal found it far more difficult to run rampant in the middle of the park.The continued presence of Memphis in the line-up was also bizarre, as it is becoming increasingly clear that he will take time to adapt to the English game and was promptly withdrawn at half-time after yet another lackluster display in which he always seemed to take a touch too many.

Valencia or Pereira would probably have offered a bit more upfront even though the Arsenal defence had put on an ‘over-my-dead-body’ display. Another unorthodox option would have been to use Rooney as a midfielder since he was contributing very little in the final third and deploy Herrera as a Number 10 which is something that Van Gaal has steadfastly refused to do.

Defensive frailty exposed by the agile and lightning quick Arsenal attack

Despite having spent £228 million in transfers this year alone, United looked woefully short of organization at the back. Young and Blind lack the positional sense to fare well in their makeshift positions against big opposition and there is only so much De Gea can do alone. While Sanchez terrified Darmian all day long, Walcott and Ozil calmly swapped positions and passes using the acres of space United defence had given them. This was highlighted especially in the second goal when it took all of 13 seconds from Walcott stealing the ball from the United midfield and Ozil finishing it off with aplomb.

Granted, United were short of options but you would have imagined that Van Gaal’s ‘game plan’ at the back would have involved man-marking Ozil and Walcott out of the game but both Blind and Smalling did not exactly cover themselves in glory.

The only United player who looked like causing any sort of problems was Martial, whom Van Gaal has seemingly bought for his successor but without whom this team could easily set the record for the longest time without scoring. Even after going three goals behind, United seemed to be in cruise-control mode with side and back passes being the norm. With Van Gaal emphasizing that ‘to win you have to score one more than the opposition’, United were playing like they planned to score only once during 90 minutes even then.

If the plan was to absorb all the opposition pressure, frustrate them and pray to God that Martial pounces on the one chance it somehow fell his way, Van Gaal conveniently forgot that on their day, Arsenal could sweep across any team in the world.

After Sanchez ripped them apart, United fans would have shuddered at the thought of facing either of the Big Three in Europe- Real Madrid who had passed over a chance to sign Sanchez, Barcelona who had deemed him surplus to requirements and Bayern Munich who decimated both their top two challengers in the Bundesliga 5-1. It was remarked that United were going to challenge for major silverware this season, but Van Gaal interestingly used the same tactics and almost the same team against Ipswich Town and Arsenal and hoped for the same result.

United’s football seems to be like a Mozart symphony- classical, methodical and well-orchestrated but the remnant of a bygone era nonetheless. Arsenal meanwhile very much look like the ‘heavy metal’ team- unpredictable, fast and modern. Wenger would have surely expected to go to the Board Meeting later this month very much in the line of fire, but as he has done on numerous occasions before, the Frenchman has dug himself out of the hole with this result again.

Meanwhile, United need to find their footing fast- the transition excuse will not work this season and fans would surely hope that Van Gaal makes bold decisions to avoid such an ‘amazing’ result again- a suicidal performance in which the contest was over before it even began.