Five damning statistics prove just how far Manchester United fell under Mourinho
When Manchester United confirmed that they had sacked Jose Mourinho, the news came as a real surprise to many. The pressure had of course been building on the manager for some time, but the eventual announcement certainly came somewhat out of the blue.
You won’t find many United fans that disagree with the decision, even if no immediate, permanent replacement is forthcoming, but Portuguese has received countless messages of good will for the future from his peers. There is, however, no escaping the facts, and we take a closer look at five remarkable statistics that highlight the club’s demise this season and suggest that the right decision has ultimately been taken.
1) Goal difference? What goal difference?
A 3-1 defeat to fierce rivals Liverpool on Sunday proved to be the final straw for the United owners, and in truth it’s hardly surprising given the state that the result left the club in. The decisive goals scored by Xherdan Shaqiri may have been fortuitous in nature, but a 2-goal winning margin was far from it.
It leaves United without a goal difference to speak, fittingly back to zero ahead of a new era. That much, it should be said, is nothing short of disastrous for a club of this stature though, now having conceded more goals in the league this season (29) than they did over the entirety of the previous campaign (28). It was one that they ended with a very impressive +40 goal difference, so the drop is astounding, and even in David Moyes fateful season that figure was +21.
2) Reliance on David de Gea
United needed their saving grace to keep the scoreline respectable at the weekend, and not for the first time this season or indeed in recent memory. With no disrespect whatsoever to their heroic shot stopping, for a goalkeeper to win the club’s player of the year award in four of the last five seasons, it’s clear there is something seriously wrong.
Sunday’s gutless performance ensured that the Red Devils have now conceded more shots (13.9 per game) this season than they have attempted (12.7 per game) in the Premier League. Without De Gea it would be entirely conceivable that the club would be in the bottom half of the table - they are only three points above it after all - and the 28-year-old hasn’t even been at his best. The fact that only Joe Hart (72), Lukas Fabianski (64) and Neil Etheridge (62) have produced more saves than the Spaniard this season is quite frankly embarrassing.
3) Dropped points becoming a regular occurrence
17 games into the 2018/19 season, Manchester United have already dropped points on ten occasions. In reality they are fortunate that they sit sixth in the table and, in some respects, the fact that their supposed competitors for silverware are so superior has meant that a giant of English football hasn’t slipped even lower down the rankings.
United’s current record would only have been enough to place ninth after as many games last season, and this is a new low. In Louis van Gaal’s final season at the club it took 18 games to drop points on ten occasions. Under Moyes it took even more (20). In fact, the club only did so ten times all season in each of Sir Alex Ferguson’s last two years at the helm. Oh how the mighty have fallen indeed.
4) Mind the gap…
The defeat at Anfield was not only tough to swallow due to the rivalry between the two clubs but the chasm that it stretched between the sides in the table this season. United may be sixth but they are 11 points behind Chelsea in fourth in what is surely an unassailable difference and 19 off Liverpool at the top. That’s the same margin by which they fell short to Manchester City last season, and we’re only 17 games into the campaign. At the current rate that both clubs are picking up points this season, that gap would stretch to an astounding 42 come season’s end.
5) No star performer amongst a squad of ’superstars’
While there have been patches of good form from a number of Manchester United players this season, none have performed consistently well over the course of the campaign so far. De Gea’s season has been scattered with some remarkable saves as ever but he’s not hit the same heights, Anthony Martial enjoyed a purple patch in front of goal and Paul Pogba has been a caricature of the picture painted of him, the latter remains the club’s highest rated Premier League player.
That, however, is no great feat with a score of 7.04 enough to lead the way for the club but rank outside the top fifty in England’s top-flight. For context, he is the second worst top rated player at any Premier League club this season, ahead only of Southampton’s Danny Ings.
