Dave’s Ramblings – Manchester United

April 20, 2026 Admin

Prematch, it was fantastic seeing our Academy Under 21s with their medals and PL2 trophy. The future’s looking bright… like sunglasses-at-night bright. Now, if the present could kindly stop buffering, that’d be great.

This must win game could have started better. Estêvão had almost scored early doors, and then got injured. That is football’s way of saying, nice momentum you’ve got there… shame if something happened to it. Poor lad looked absolutely gutted limping off, like someone had just told him VAR was his Uber driver.

Cue Garnacho entering the pitch to a chorus of boos from the Man Utd fans. Here was his chance to rub their noses in the mud.

For the first 40 minutes, we played like we were buffering. Just… loading… thinking about passing… maybe passing… nah, hold it a bit longer. When we did move the ball quickly though… Chef’s kiss. Suddenly, we looked like a team that had remembered what the sport is supposed to be about. Honestly, not scoring at least one goal in that spell feels like a crime that should be investigated.

And then, as football law dictates: if you fail to take your chances, the other team will absolutely punish you. It was written in the stars. Just so you know, I don’t like Bruno Fernandes. Emotionally, spiritually, or aesthetically but annoyingly, the man can play. One ridiculous killer pass later, Cunha slots it past Sanchez, and suddenly they’re 1–0 up at half time. It didn’t help that we only had 10 players on the pitch at that moment.

Did they deserve it? Absolutely not. Did they get it anyway? Of course they did. Football, everyone. A perfectly reasonable and not at all infuriating sport. Did I mention it was their one and only shot on target? Bugger.

With almost an hour on the clock, Delap hit the bar with a header. An inch lower and it’s a goal, but when you’re out of luck, you’re out of luck. For a while that woke the crowd from their slumber.

Later, we hit the bar again, although I don’t think it would have been allowed as Fofana looked to have handled it.

And that was that.

My takeaways…

Our problem, well one of the many items on this ever-expanding disaster menu, is that it genuinely doesn’t matter how well we play. We could be prime Barcelona for 85 minutes, doing little triangles, looking silky… and then, right when it matters, we collectively decide it’s naptime.

Like, fully tuck ourselves in. Blankets out. Bedtime story. “Goodnight lads, see you after we’ve conceded.”

At this point, it’s less defensive mistake and more a generous community outreach programme.

Garnacho got absolutely nothing down the left. He might as well have been running into a brick wall that occasionally booed him back. Why Rosenior didn’t just swap sides with him and Neto is beyond me. Just. Try. Something. Different. Please.

Then, because the football gods weren’t done laughing, Enzo gets injured late on. Big moment. Chance to shake things up. Maybe go bold. Maybe, dare I say it, try to score?

Nah. On comes Lavia.

1–0 down and we’ve decided the best course of action is… more defending. Brilliant. Inspirational. We can’t break them down, so let’s make absolutely certain that we don’t.

At this point, trying something different wouldn’t just be bold, it would be basic common sense. Throw on a striker. A winger. A random bloke from the crowd. Honestly, just try something other than defensive midfielder.

Because it genuinely couldn’t get any worse.…could it? 😬

Just where our next victory in the league is going to come from, well I simply don’t know. It’s Brighton away next and they are on a great run of results at the moment.

I say next victory, I should say next goal. It’s now 386 minutes, (more than 6 hours), without a goal in the Premier League, and our worst run of results since the 90’s… the records just keep on coming.

I’m going to attempt, against all available evidence, to end this on a positive note.

Seven games left. Win them all and suddenly it’s silverware, European nights, and possibly sending Spurs down. This absolute car crash of a season might yet age like a fine wine… or at least like a drinkable boxed rosé.

Stranger things have happened. Not many, but a few.

Maybe… 😅

Onwards and upwards. UTC 💙

Dave M