A month into his interim spell at Old Trafford and Ralf Rangnick has made the blunt admission that progress has not been as swift as he wanted or expected.
Few would be particularly surprised by that, but it is a further illustration of the size of the job Rangnick and whoever he helps to anoint as his successor faces in reshaping Manchester United in 2022 that he has encountered some resistance – or an inability to translate – his ideas. This is a big job and a new manager bounce is not enough to change the narrative at Old Trafford.
To be fair, the rescue mission handed to the temporary coach on 29 November has been hampered by Covid and the closure of Carrington for much of the early part of December. There were inevitable signs of rustiness at St James’ Park on Monday.
But winnable matches against Burnley and then Wolverhampton Wanderers will offer more insight into whether the issues lay with a lack of cohesion caused by Covid or more fundamentally around adapting to Rangnick’s emphasis on physicality, pressing and intensity. The latter would be worrying, with implications for just what Rangnick could change in what feels like it will be a transitional second half of the season.
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When postponed Premier League fixtures could be played as calls grow for a ‘circuit break’29 December, 2021At Newcastle, the decline in performance was alarming. A tweak to the 4-2-2-2 display at half-time rescued a point but the manner of his team’s performance was – in Rangnick’s words – a “negative surprise”.
Asked whether he felt he had made the start he’d hoped for, he replied: “Of course not. Every coach wants to take faster steps forward but in order to do that you need to be able to train and as you know we had to close Carrington for four days.
“We had eight or nine fewer players in training directly after the Norwich game and they only came back in small pieces. Only in the last three days did we have a full squad in terms of training and we couldn’t do that much in training.
“On the other hand, in those three training sessions the team looked good so it’s a negative surprise in terms of the way we played in terms of game speed and game tempo and physicality.”
Rangnick should be able to use his interim title to slay a few sacred cows at Old Trafford and there are no shortage of big names he would be justified to drop after the Newcastle draw.
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i's guide to the pundits, commentators and presenters for this week's football on Amazon Prime28 December, 2021From the flat-lining Marcus Rashford to the error-strewn Harry Maguire, few should consider themselves safe. But it perhaps says much about the way the club has been managed over the last few years that such moves have been so few and far between.
Asked to be drawn on the performance of his centre-back pairing of Raphael Varane and Maguire, Rangnick played the straightest of bats. Both can expect a physical test at Burnley.
“Raphael hasn’t played for the last five or six weeks since the Tottenham game in which he got injured,” Rangnick said. “He hasn’t played much in the last three months. Yes, he made a mistake for the first goal we conceded but apart from that I thought he was OK.
“I wouldn’t say he was outstanding, the same with Harry. They did OK. Our problem was again that we allowed too many transitional moments but this wasn’t just the centre-backs, it was the team. It starts up front.
“I don’t think it makes sense to talk about the individual performance of players. We need to get better as a team.”
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On Tyneside, Edinson Cavani provided a rare glimmer of light and he could start at Turf Moor.
Ragnnick revealed it was the player himself who had decided he was not fit enough to play at Newcastle – but there was no alternative given the first-half display.
“In the last two days I was considering playing him from the start,” he admitted.
“He didn’t feel comfortable to play from the beginning because he didn’t know how fit he really was, but after being 1-0 down at half-time it was clear to me that we needed to take more risks and needed to change something, which is why we needed to bring on him and Jadon at half-time.”
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