Manchester Derby: What Went Wrong?

It has been a few days since the derby happened, time has passed to allow the anger to simmer. It had to have been one of the most infuriating derbies I have watched in years.

Other than one of the most asinine referee decisions I have ever seen, so dumb that on a rare occasion the football world has collectively come into agreement, just showing you how bad the decision was, a lot of the anger was stemming from a team that I did not recognise on the day. It was not a feeling of being let down but of confusion.

This was a derby. At Old Trafford. Against a new head coach. Who were playing with ten men. For sixty to seventy minutes.

You cannot ask for much more to be in your favour to go and make a statement against one of the best teams in the league. Instead, it was left to one clear cut chance in the 94th minute to try and salvage a point. Who was this team that put out such a flaccid performance?

The red card

One of the talking points in this game was Phil Foden's obvious red card. I thought United had really started to show some confidence. It was not a feeling of fear but almost like we had our chests out, responding to Micah Richards' comment that "Man United are the underdogs here." A response to that can come in different forms, and ours felt almost like a sophisticated one.

Even baiting the opposition into losing their head and doing something silly felt like a refreshing take on what usually would be something United would have done. Fernandes, at this stage the veteran that he is, wound Foden up perfectly to where he lashed out and deservedly received the red card.

Side bar to this incident: if Foden receives a red card, why wasn't it a free kick to United? Instead it stayed as a throw in to City. I never really understand that about football. If you get a red card for a bad tackle, it is a free kick to the opposition, so what is the difference?

However, my scream of jubilation at the red card, thinking that by the way we started, and getting to play against ten men for just about seventy minutes, was for nothing.

The game after the red card

The whole performance after the red card just felt like they did not want to win and were being overly cautious. I could not understand it. There was no excitement or urgency. It was there for the taking, and the players really needed to get the crowd involved, especially attacking the Stretford End in the second half, where they could almost suck the ball into the net.

Instead, as mentioned, there was only one clear cut chance, left until the 94th minute. Mbeumo did not look up once after he received the ball. It should have been buried considering a player of his quality was the one doing the action.

I will go blue in the face asking, why was there no urgency? No excitement.

I am unsure why nothing was changed to take advantage of what could have been a massive confidence boost. One of the front three should have been taken off and Sesko needed to come on at half time. Why not put Mbeumo on the left and Rashford on the right, to just hit non stop swinging crosses? It was a game crying out for United to unload the pressure onto City until they broke.

Instead, all we did was provide them with more and more confidence the longer time went on. This was a team with a new manager after having their best one ever, and a team that, in no minced words, has embarrassed us time and time again: 6-3, 0-3, 6-1 and so on. This was our chance to unload some revenge on our local rivals. Yet we were subdued into the drivel that was played on Sunday.

The incident

What are these referees doing? There really is no other question to ask. I do not have a lot of affinity for referees, as it has been seen a lot in big games like this where they try to make a name for themselves.

It was disappointing because Michael Oliver started the game, I thought, letting a lot of tackles go. As soon as the red card happened, suddenly every fall the City players took was blown up, and he would take his time restarting anything. At one point Enzo Fernandez went down holding his face, screaming after a finger brushed him. I get it, this happens in sport, but this is a twenty five year old man, and it really needs to start being called out in football.

Now the incident itself. First of all, Erling Haaland looks offside anyway, the camera angle is incredible, and how we do not have, in this day and age, an angle to see it along the line, I find astonishing. Apparently he is onside, but Enzo, who is involved in the play after launching himself at the ball, is well offside, and Martinez is affected by this, leaving Haaland. Simple, right? Nope.

VAR, which is there for overturning wrong decisions, for some reason decided to get involved and overturn a right decision without consulting the on pitch referee. What is the point in having a referee, or a referee along with two touch judges and a fourth official, if VAR has completely stripped any referee of the ability to do his job? Whenever they do make a right call it gets judged anyway, so in their heads they must be thinking, what is the point of deciding if the eye above will do it regardless? I am disgusted by that decision. Just like players who get scrutinised for a bad performance, or a manager, the referees deserve to be called out on this.

Moving on

It is genuinely hard to judge that performance, because the main outcome of this game was that I did not recognise the team. I am unsure what to expect in the next game. This was not the mentality I saw last year from these players against Man City or Arsenal, when they went after them.

The positive ish transfer window we had in the summer is also showing its darker side. Why we did not get a left back I do not understand, and it could be a real issue this season. So many variables have come into this team after this game. After what United fans have endured over the last thirteen years, being embarrassed by all of our rivals, it really felt like an opportunity missed. Again. We are better than this, and it is time for these players to start recognising that.