Why the Moyes appointment reboots the grandest of rivalries

“F*** me! That should make for some really interesting matches against them lot.”

That was roughly the thought that crossed my mind when I heard David Moyes had been handpicked to be the heir to Alex Ferguson’s Old Trafford throne.

I meditated on why Ferguson would nominate him and not someone more ‘heavyweight’, meaning someone with a ‘clearer’ manifestation of success on his CV. In layman’s terms: someone who has won at least a couple of trophies of note.

They did not go for the successful uncles…

They could have gone for someone like Jose Mourinho, and almost guaranteed themselves at least one trophy a year (Mourinho averages more than that per season). They could have gone for a Carlo Ancelotti. After all, he does have previous experience of being in the Premier League with Chelsea and would be familiar with the pressurised fishbowl that is the EPL. He has a track record of being able to manage a squad of high profile players with minimum fuss, and he is always a devoted company man, having worked for the likes of Berlusconi and Abramovich without too much drama.

They could even have gone for a Manuel Pellegrini, a well-liked manager who is tactically astute, and, but for the politics at the Bernabeu notwithstanding, has enjoyed considerable success with clubs like Villarreal and Malaga. We know City got him in the end, but I am sure that if United wanted him- or Mourinho, or Ancelotti- they would have identified him earlier and had their man.

United played it smart by not going for Mourinho. True, it is a club that hungers for success every year, but its support-base have had their bellyful of trophies and would be patient with a more project-oriented blueprint. Mourinho’s hunker-down-in-the-bunker-cos-it’s-always-civil-war approach can unite in the short run, but has been known take a lot out of the collective team morale.

They did not plump for continental Armani models either…

If United wanted a young, project oriented manager they could have opted for a Jürgen Klopp – a man who possesses the fantastic middle name ‘Norbert’- an astute ‘players’ manager’ who has his distinct brand of footballing philosophy, talks honestly and rationally and puts a sartorially elegant spin on the old tracksuit manager model. Oh! And he wins things and develops players and could have precipitated the arrival of a certain Lewandowski to Old Trafford.

They could have opted for ABV Version 2: a smarter, sharper and less talkative (and more assertive) reboot of the Chelsea model. He will win trophies sooner rather than later, and would have come with just enough (but not unnecessarily levels of) cache. This is a young manager used to the spotlight, and evolving in it.

Instead they went for the mongrel…

… a man who is cut from the same tartan cloth. Moyes was a 6’1”centre-back, Ferguson was a striker. Moyes represented Celtic just the 24 times, Ferguson played 41 for Rangers. Moyes started his managerial career in the second tier with Preston North End, Ferguson started his in the second tier with East Sterlingshire.
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Initially, both men will have tasted adversity. They would have worked in grimy clubhouses, stood in the rain on Tuesday nights in the freezing cold, far away from the undersoil heating and the prawn-sandwich brigade. They are ruffians, polished thugs of the management world who use discipline and linear thinking as currencies to stability. With them, the press know exactly where they stand, and very seldom will they throw around words and phrases like ‘philosophy’, ‘recycling of possession’. Though these are both tactically astute men, they like to, as a rapper might say, ‘keep it real’.

The War is Rebooted…

When Ferguson and the United board were considering the strengths of Moyes as a candidate, they would have thought for more than a second about the ‘Liverpool factor’. Not so much because where the clubs stand now- for one must admit that across a whole season this squad is not at a level where it can threaten United- but to assess his pedigree in high-pressure footballing ecosystems.

At Everton, Moyes would have lived and operated in a city that has a strong history of local rivalry. He would have learned how to handle the media spotlight at a club with history and a fantastic footballing heritage. At Old Trafford he will have to contend with the ‘noisy neighbours’, a bigger and more brutish machinery than the red men from across the park. I imagine he will not be fazed. He will get on with the job with the quiet determination he displayed in the city of Liverpool, and unfortunately, ensured that he finished above us with a comparative pittance of cash at his disposal.

That Moyes knows how to dislike the old enemy will have been a definite plus.

What it means for us…

All of this leads me to my final point: that Liverpool-United games will continue to be the helter-skelter affairs they have always been. But something tells me that on August 31st, for the first time in a long time, Liverpool will face a United who are on the rebuild, with gaps to fill in midfield and an ageing defence. Rodgers will be in his second season, more confident about what he has done right and (hopefully) the wiser for the things he did wrong.

And it will be of vital importance that Liverpool let United know that this is indeed a different era, and things are about to change.

This is a war of attrition now.
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