Column: United tick another box in derby drama
Manchester City showed positives in the face of adversity, but Manchester United repeated a key trait which has kept them in the title battle one last time.
It was frantic. It was everything a derby should be. Under the setting sun, United and City went toe to toe, blow to blow, neither quite manging to land the knockout punch they should have, until Marc Skinner’s side did what they have done so well this season, laid their opponents down in the 12th round.
It can be so easy to get lost in the narrative. A Manchester United win would send the title race to the final day and condemn their city rivals to a season without European football for the first time since 2015, while anything else would seal Chelsea’s third successive Women’s Super League crown and give Gareth Taylor’s Blues just a whiff of the Champions League anthem.
In all of that, you can forget about the game itself, and what it felt like on TV I don’t know, but inside a crowded LSV, it was one of the most exciting ends to a game I’ve witnessed covering the league.
The noise helped, as supporters packed in to set another new record for a United game in Leigh, while the end-to-end nature of what unfolded, plus big decisions and near misses, informed the atmosphere beautifully.
Skinner gleefully exclaimed post-match it was the “first time we have painted Manchester red” and allowed him for once to take in the atmosphere and applause of the crowd post-match.
Because you can analyse tactics all you like, that’s for the managers, this what about pure sporting spectacle, two sides who knew nothing but a win was good enough, and it made for a breathless and fraught finale, with a winning goal always likely, no matter what the set ups and counter punches.
What came before mattered, of course it did. Hayley Ladd’s stunner - United’s first goal from outside the box in the league this season - set the tone, but it was as much about the build-up as it was the strike. Twice, City got pressed off the ball, first Yui Hasegawa in midfield before Filippa Angeldahl as the visitors desperately looked to scramble Ona Batlle’s cross clear, before Ladd decided to thump one in the top corner.
Matters weren’t helped when Ellie Roebuck, after the merest hesitation, wiped out Nikita Parris - who again continued to look the part in a United shirt - and saw red, leaving City with 10 players and a tactical reshuffle for the second half.
Funny things happen in games though, and it’s not the first time we’ve seen a team with 10 come alive against a team with 11. Nothing to lose vs everything to lose. No pressure vs all the pressure.
No coach likes to lament bad luck, but Man City had their fair share of it. Chloe Kelly hit the woodwork twice, Khadija Shaw was denied an undoubtable stonewall penalty after Angeldahl’s equaliser, and Hayley Raso missed a sitter minutes before Lucia Garcia’s final blow.
That’s not to say United couldn’t have been out of sight. So often they utilised their pace on the break but either misplaced the final pass or took a heavy touch, while Leah Galton missed two huge chances of her own and Garcia knocked a rebound against her own leg seconds before Raso’s chance at the other end.
It’s a shame it wasn’t a cup match, because another half an hour would have been superb, only for Garcia to pop up anyway and score a late winner, not for the first time for United this season. Man City join Arsenal, Brighton, Reading and Aston Villa in knowing just how it feels to be deflated by Skinner’s new mentality monsters this season, and sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.
Make no mistake about it, despite a very positive first half, United almost let this slip, hence Skinner’s toned down reaction to the late winner.
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“Yeah, we didn’t play very well second half,” he said, when asked about his “angry” expression on the bench. “We allowed Manchester City…we have to be braver with the ball, we know City are going to come full throttle, we’ve got to be more streetwise in those moments and there was a frustration for us because when we’ve played and we allow that one-v-one, if we move it again it opens up the gaps, but if we switch off and be lazy, which we were in moments which I’ll assess tomorrow and speak to players.
“That’s what’s driven us this year. Don’t accept laziness, don’t accept anything that’s sub-standard and so yeah, they shouldn’t have got back in the game, we allowed them. At the end of the season I promise I’ll smile and celebrate, but we’ve got one big game left and I respect Matt [Beard] and his teams a lot, so we can’t let ourselves slip for a second.”
Taylor meanwhile felt hard done by, lamenting the lack of a “stonewall” penalty and claiming Roebuck’s red card was “harsh”, citing Leila Ouahabi covering as a potential reason it should have been only a caution.
“What went wrong? It’s hard to put your finger on it. I’ve got some ideas,” he said. “We didn’t start particularly well, but after we conceded I felt we were on top of the game, sustained pressure, we had attempts at their goal, Mary made a really good save, we hit the woodwork twice.
“We had to change things and before Filippa scored we looked the team going to score and after that we had good chances with Hayley and Bunny. The one on Bunny is a stonewall penalty, I don’t understand how the team of officials can’t call that. You don’t need VAR, it’s so clear she’s been taken out.”
With Champions League football now beyond them, Taylor added “Frustrating because we knew we had an opportunity with Arsenal losing and to take as many points as we can.
“It’s life, we move on, we dealt with a setback and we were really positive. The players were outstanding, sometimes you don’t get the rub of the green and we didn’t get that tonight.”
Taylor looks set to remain at Manchester City for another year, working alongside new Head of Football, Nils Nielsen, and after a high turnover of key players last summer, he was defiant despite missing out on a top three spot this season.
“When you’re at this club it’s about winning. I came here to win, I had some success in the first two seasons but this season it’s frustrating for me, the players and the club to not win. It’s easy after to look at a goal here, a point there, but it’s fine margins and that’s why Chelsea have set such a high level, they get over the line.
“It’s really difficult [missing out on Europe]. The format is so tough with the qualifiers and we’ve seen the difficulties we’ve had facing Real Madrid and the changes to the squad last summer. It’s a blow, you love being in those games and the Champions League. There’s good teams competing for three places. I feel like if we got into that group stage we could do what Arsenal and Chelsea have done with this group of players in the next two or three years.”
On his own future, he added “I love the club. I work hard, I love working with the players, so I don’t see anything changing on that front.”
Skinner was on the other end of it last season, with supporters questioning him after United missed out on a top three spot on the final day. This season though, they have secured second place with a game to spare and are taking Chelsea to the final day.
Having taken four points off their city rivals, six off Arsenal and reached a first cup final, United’s progress has been evident, but the manager now knows he needs to take it further, as well as admitting the club will hire a dedicated Head of Recruitment.
“I think it will look different, I think it has to look different,” said Skinner, when I asked about the make up of his squad next season. “I don’t think it has to be a massive overhaul, it has a lot of the key components we need but what it has to have is when we get to bigger stadiums where they can’t hear you, Emma Hayes doesn’t have to tell Sam Kerr to go and run in behind, she just does it.
“We have players growing into that, so we need to add that right quality and experience. We’ve beaten Manchester City, we’ve beaten Arsenal twice and we won’t always do that of course, but if you’re interested in this huge project at Manchester United, then we’re ready for you and if I’m a top player I’m looking at Manchester United and thinking I can make a real difference there.”
On conversations with the club regarding what he will be able to do with a takeover still hanging over United, Skinner added “Yeah, I do leave that to Polly [Bancroft] and John [Murtough] and the reality is I think I’m delivering what I can on the field and I believe the club are going to deliver what we need off the field.
“We have conversations, we are talking to good players of the highest level, so we’ll keep doing that but I want to give credit to the squad. This might sound like I’m saying it’s going to be all change, no, it’s going to supplement what we have for Europe. If we qualify for the Champions League, we will have midweek games, I will have to rotate better, I know that, but I haven’t had to, we have to go and get top players.”
saddling that squad of talent with *that* manager in Taylor continues to show a blatant lack of respect for those players.
"a boys academy manager could surely manage our womens side, plus, we're hiring from within!" they say at the Academy stadium instead of "right, how do we maximize these players upsides and become a force in this country and in Europe?" - because if thats the question they're answering, there is a zero percent chance they allow Taylor to remain as manager (or hire him in the first place). MCWFC remains unfortunately an unserious club who still get written up like they're an elite womens side - a club of massive resources who can barely be bothered.
"When you’re at this club it’s about winning. I came here to win, I had some success in the first two seasons"
That's just insulting the intelligence of anyone who's watched the last two seasons play out. Similarly, it's telling how often Taylor's comments (and explanations of his actions) include this line almost verbatim whether it's about individual games or every season he's managed.
"We didn’t start particularly well, but..."