LONDON (AP) — The rot runs deep at Manchester United. Firing Jose Mourinho just removes the immediate stench of gloom.
With every rebuke aimed — very publicly — at his players or paymasters, Mourinho looked more fixated on picking public fights rather than addressing his own shortcomings.
Call it palpable discord.
Chelsea used that phrase when dismissing Mourinho — for a second time — just three years and one day ago. A championship-winning side had been dragged down to a point above the relegation zone. Also, the authority of a rare female doctor of an English Premier League team had been undermined while being publicly humiliated by Mourinho.
The serial winner became tainted goods. So United knew just what it was getting when it gave the game's most volatile character a route back into the dugout in 2016.
The owning Glazer family and Ed Woodward, the vice chairman entrusted with running United day-to-day, ignored the alarm bells in their obsession with racking up social media interactions and Galactico signings.
But since Manchester City had just hired Pep Guardiola, how else was United to respond in 2016 than by installing its own managerial colossus in the dugout across town? The answer was — and is — to formulate a rational strategy to restore the Red Devils to the pinnacle of English football where Alex Ferguson left them before retiring in 2013.
Instead, Woodward abandoned the studious transfer strategy honed under Ferguson in tandem with David Gill, who stepped down as chief executive when the manager's 26-year reign ended. Since then, the record 20-time English champions haven't come close to winning the league under David Moyes, Louis van Gaal and now Mourinho.
"The regression of the team led by the manager may be the immediate trigger for today's action, it is also the result of some poor decisions," the Manchester United Supporters' Trust said. "Three managerial appointments each with different playing styles and the player investments that they triggered."
The players knew who was boss under Ferguson. The Scot offloaded David Beckham in 2003 after growing "uncomfortable with the celebrity aspect of his life."
But Woodward gives the impression of allowing the egos in the dressing room to run the show while churning through managers — three now since 2013 — while indulging the demands of players and agents. Can you imagine Ferguson allowing a player to have personalized advertising on perimeter hoardings during games? That happened when %href_on(file:
