Having slept on it, I think last night might have been one of our most cruelly calculated performances of the season. We looked rocky for half an hour, yes, but what United threw at us amounted to a Kompany yellow card, a shot by Rashford from distance, and Ederson coming off his line to stop an attack. That really was it. Once we got a foothold in the game about ten minutes before half-time, United never had a chance of sneaking back in to the contest. They had one attempt on target in the entire game, considerably less possession, and frankly the way we got them all hot and heavy early on, before picking them off pretty expertly in the second half, was a sign of just how large the gap is between us now. It's hard to believe that we finished on exactly the same points (66) just three seasons ago. Since then we've spent roughly £520m to their £354m, but the distance in quality between us is a chasm now that's larger than £170m suggests. And, frankly, with the spending they're going to have to undertake this summer to right the wrongs they've committed in the previous three windows (and the windows before that), they're going to catch us up in terms of money spent but still not come close to us as a team or as an organisation.
