There were genuine hopes of a title challenge by Manchester United at the start of the season after a decent steadying first season under the guidance of Louis van Gaal. The main talking point in the summer was the future of David de Gea but the brilliant Spanish keeper somehow stayed on after a late glitch on his proposed move to Real Madrid. The start of the season was a decent one as the team was stable and assured at the back, albeit uninspiring in attack as Wayne Rooney toiled and new signing Memphis Depay could not really hit the ground running. The Red Devils continued with the mixed results in September but did find themselves top of the table at the end of the month. Yet performances remained somewhat paltry and an emphatic beating suffered away at Arsenal served up as something of a wake-up call about the failings of the side. Van Gaal seemed entrenched in his dogmatic view about sideways possession and lack of speed in the team’s game and that started to gradually grate more and more with the supporters, who were demanding more attacking football and more risks taken. A run of some quite turgid displays in October and November seemed to lave lost the Dutch manager the backing of the fans and he never seemed to regain it for the rest of this challenging season. The players were not exactly showing too much desire and dedication to the system and it was all feeling rather static and monotonous, even if the team was still getting decent results and staying close to the top of the table. Indeed, their defensive stats were looking excellent as they kept clean sheets in eight out of 11 games across all competitions during the autumn. However, the chickens came to roost at the start of December when United really hit rock bottom and everyone turned against their suddenly embattled manager. First, they suffered an ignominious early exit from the Champions League in a very easy group, losing 3:2 to Wolfsburg in an uncharacteristically messy game. Then came humiliating losses to Bournemouth, Norwich and Stoke City in the new few weeks and suddenly the Red Devils were far away off the summit in the table and all the talk was about their manager being sacked. Van Gaal stayed on and oversaw some sort of improvement in the coming weeks. Rooney finally caught some form while the continued brilliance of De Gea was earning the team lots of points. But there was little else to encourage the fans as the displays remained well below the expected standard and the team remained some way off the top four. They finally garnered a bit of momentum at the end of February as Arsenal were surprisingly beaten with a patched-up side and then local rivals Manchester City were beaten on the road as well. That set up a tight race involving their neighbours and West Ham for the final Champions League slot and all of the teams had their chances in the remaining games. An emphatic loss away at Tottenham was a fresh blow for United but they won three of the next four games and were holding their fate in their hands before the final two league games. Yet the visit to West Ham saw them suffer a hugely disappointing 3:2 loss. That meant that they missed out on the fourth spot on goal difference and will be battling it out in the Europa League next season. The one saving grace for Van Gaal was the triumph in the FA Cup as United produced good performances in the spring to overcome West Ham and Everton and then showed character to overcome Crystal Palace with ten men after extra time, courtesy of a brilliant goal by Jesse Lingard. It was not enough to save Van Gaal from the sack as Jose Mourinho was given the job shortly after the end of the season. He inherits an unbalanced squad that showed tangible signs of progress in the last few months, amid the emergence of Lingard and Marcus Rashford, but one that still needs a lot of work to be turned into a challenger for the title next season.
