Players make mistakes, that's bound to happen ... but I don't think you can fault the effort and commitment of the lads today. They played out of their skins first half. They were let down by Manuel, just as they have been for the last two seasons. I'm sure he's very nice, very charming and all that ... but he is too one-dimensional and too stubbornly set in his ways.
I know that people have been agitating for Nacho to be given a run, but surely not at the expense of wasting KDB by sticking him out on the wing? Did anyone see any semblance of a partnership with Sergio and Nacho upfront today? No! So why play 442? It's perverse. It was obvious midway through the first half that KDB should be central and that swapping Sterling for Nacho and going 4231 would put Arsenal under even more pressure. When Walcott came on, that became even more imperative and you assumed that he would make the change, as he always does, on the hour like clockwork. But he dithered and waited ... and sure enough they scored. So he finally makes the change and you think, okay, we have 20 minutes to go up a gear and kill this lot off. But what does he do? He takes off Fernando and Navas, who were both having great games, to bring on Yaya and Bony ... and go fucking 442 again, except now infinitely slower and ploddier. It's been like this all season. Suicidal tactics, naive formations and an insistence on playing the likes of MDM, Bony and Yaya (in a defensive two) when any fool can see it isn't working.
The turning point for me was the Chelsea game in the cup. The kids should have been blooded before then and it is inexcusable that they weren't. But to compound that by telling the world beforehand that they were going to lose and then ... and this is the part that really galls ... deliberately setting them up to lose in a 442 formation, with lads playing out of position, was outrageous. It was petulant and shoddy. He was banging on for weeks about how we were in all four competitions, yet seemed to be astounded that we might need to do some judicious rotating to accomplish that.
All season this has been going on. When we had the centreback probs, he insisted on playing his mate MDM, who should have been moved on in the summer instead of farming Denayer out. A braver manager would have put Adarabioyo or Humphreys in there as soon as MDM's lack of pace and form became obvious. How many times has he insisted on playing Yaya in a defensive two, when its obvious his legs have gone? We spent most of the season watching Yaya lumber behind someone else's nippy midfielders like a Grandad running after a bus. Anyone could see that Yaya was killing us in the Real Madrid game. It was sad, embarrassing and frustrating to see the game pass him by, in both directions.
Anyway, rant over. I thought I'd feel better after venting but I don't ... I'm still really irritated that this season, and all the progress that we had made since the takeover, has been needlessly tossed away. There is no real upside to this - Van Gaal and his clown car of a team will squeak into the Champions League. The management may try and put a brave face on us missing out, but with all the ramifications in terms of revenue, prestige, progress, etc this is a bit of a catastrophe.
