The 2022 Manchester United season preview post
Season preview time! How are Manchester United doing compared to their rivals?
Back in the days of my old blog I would write an annual season preview post about how Manchester United would be all right and finish in the top four that year. The jist of it was yea, Manchester United are better than the fans believe but more importantly, their rivals aren’t NEARLY as good as United fans think they are. Sure United have flaws in their team, but their rivals had just as many flaws, if not more.
I wrote the first version in 2019, which aged well. A year later amid a fanbase freaking out about United being stagnant in the transfer market while Chelsea made eight or so signings I wrote a new version of the piece where I said not to worry because Arsenal were wildly overrated and not all of Chelsea’s signings would be successful.1 I didn’t write the piece last year2 probably due to a combination of the fanbase actually having optimism and simply not having enough time.
So the question was, would I write the “United will be ok” piece again this year? I’ll be honest, two weeks ago the answer was “I genuinely don’t think I can.” Then I saw United look really good on their preseason tour and suddenly optimism was coming back. There’s enough optimism now that if you ask me if United will be all right this season my answer would be, “mayyyyybee?” I mean, it’s not just about getting better than everyone, there’s always a ‘top six’ team that has a nightmare season
As always, let’s start by looking at what they’re up against.
Manchester City and Liverpool
Once again Manchester City and Liverpool remain on their own planet but god, this was the year to get them. I can see a drop off from both these teams this season as both will be having a bit of a transitional rebuild-on-the-fly type seasons.
The addition of Earling Haaland means City are going to be transitioning away from the strikerless system they played over the last two years to one with a more traditional number 9.
No matter how good or dominant Haaland is, that’s still going to take some getting used to. Jack Grealish is going to play more, Kalvin Phillips is a different kind of player than Rodri, it’s going to be different.
Similarly Liverpool are going through a transition of their own. There’s no more Sadio Mane and the signing of striker Darwin Nunez means they’re going to be moving from more of a false-9 system to one with a more natural striker. Additionally, Liverpool played the maximum number of fixtures last season. This season is very front loaded leading in to a World Cup and a lot of their top players are getting up there in age. That has to catch up to them eventually right? Right?!?
Both these teams are very strong and should handle their transitions relatively easily. When I say I think they drop off, it’s relative. I don’t see either team crashing, but this could be the season they both fall back into the 85 point range.
Now if last season United had taken a step forward on their 74 point total in 2020-21 a jump to 85 points may not be too unrealistic. But alas they chose nostalgia and no midfield instead.
Tottenham
I’m not sure what to make of Spurs this summer. They suddenly uncovered a boatload of money and have been pretty active in the transfer market though I do find some of the moves to be a bit questionable. Having said that, one of the few people I’m very confident knows exactly what he’s doing with each one of those signings is Antonio Conte.
I do have some question marks over Richarlison and how his performance will translate to a team like Spurs. I do wonder if they’re still going to be over reliant on Harry Kane, who enters the season at 29 years old and will play almost every minute for an England team expected to go far in the World Cup. If I were a Spurs fan I’d have my concerns about how good this team will actually be long term.
But we’re not previewing the next few years, we’re looking solely at this year, and in the immediate short term, Antonio Conte will be getting a tune out of them. They’ll be fine.
Arsenal
I’ve had my doubts about Mikel Arteta in the past but I like what he’s doing at Arsenal. He’s (slowly) building a nice young core that all play the style of football he’s looking for. Of course at a certain point you need to make a jump to the next level otherwise you risk stagnating but they’re not at that point just yet.
Overall I think between Arsenal, Chelsea, and United (and mayybee Spurs) Arsenal have the lowest ceiling of the lot, but they also have the highest floor.
Chelsea
Probably the most interesting non-United team in the field here. Chelsea were actually pretty good last year, by Chelsea’s standards at least. Their 74 points were the most they’ve won in a single season since their title winning campaign in 2016-17 and five more than they’ve averaged over the last five seasons.
They definitely are coming in to this season in a weird place. Romelu Lukaku wasn’t really involved too much last season so losing him isn’t too big of a loss. Chelsea have been linked with every player under the sun this summer but so far only Raheem Sterling and Kalidou Koulibaly have actually walked through the door.
Sterling gives them another wide attacker but given how Timo Werner just hasn’t figured it out in two years he’s probably an upgrade. At 27 years old (but having been playing first team football since he was 17) Sterling is a very questionable long term signing, but again we’re only talking about this season and this season he probably(?) makes them better. Koulibaly is 31 and it’s hard to say he’s anything more than replacement for the departed Antonio Rudiger.
The concern with Chelsea is they were already among the older teams and they’ve only gotten older. Connor Gallagher could be an interesting addition to midfield but we still need to see how he Thomas Tuchel plans on using him. At 28 Matteo Kovacic is the youngster of the midfield that will still be relying upon a more and more injury prone 31 year old N’Golo Kante. Chelsea do have young pieces that have been talked about for years, but all these years later players like Ruben Loftus Cheek, Callum Hudson-Odoi and even Christian Pulisic remain mostly out of favor.
There’s all that and then there’s the fact that Chelsea looked horrific in their preseason matches this summer. I know it’s only preseason but here’s my rule of thumb when it comes to preseason. You take it all with a grain of salt but when you’re playing teams you should easily beat, you still have to win those games. When you’re not, that’s usually a good sign that a collapse is coming. Chelsea’s preseason saw them draw with Charlotte FC and lose 4-0 to Arsenal, but they did beat Club America and Udinese so it wasn’t bad enough to make any definitive statements.
Nevertheless this could easily be the year it all comes unravelling for Chelsea. Thomas Tuchel has a shelf life before he starts fighting with everyone inside the club, which could easily happen if things don’t get off to a good start.
I see Chelsea being the most likely top team to implode and fall out of things, but I can also see them getting jusssstt enough out of their aging stars to hold off that implosion for one more year.
Manchester United
Where does that leave Manchester United?
The club has made a massive upgrade in the dugout which is already looking extremely positive. Beyond that, there’s still a lot of question marks about this team.
When United line up against Brighton on Sunday the starting XI is going to look an awfully lot like the starting XI from the 2019-20 season, and frankly, this team (still) has a lot of similarities to that one.
United scored a 4-0 win over Liverpool to kick off their preseason in a very open match where Liverpool were wasteful and allowed United to play on the counter attack. We already know that’s a strength of theirs. They then thoroughly beat a reserve Crystal Palace side as they should3.
Over the last few matches the same problems have started to peep through. Marcus Rashford is less effective when there’s no space to run into. If you take out Jadon Sancho all the creation falls onto the plate of Bruno Fernandes and everyone is less effective.
Erik Ten Hag is only going to be able to do so much. The bottom line is, United remain incredibly thin on depth.
It’s a very safe bet that, defensively, United will improve on the 57 goals conceded last season. Ten Hag has put in structure that the team so badly lacked last season, which will lead to improved performances among many players in the back line. It’s a different question whether they’ll be able to get as low as the 36 goals conceded from 2019-20. That team only started gaining some semblance of defensive consistency when Nemanja Matic started playing. Matic left and has not been replaced.
That 2019-20 team only started getting consistent results when Paul Pogba came back into the team. Pogba has left as well, and while some of what he gave them will be provided by Christian Eriksen, Eriksen is still 31 years old with giant elephant-in-the-room regarding his health. It’s entirely fair to question how much he’ll be able to give you over the course of a full season.
All this could change if Frenkie De Jong actually arrives but at the time of writing, that looks less and less likely by the day. Nevertheless last weekend highlighted just how frail this United team is when Jadon Sancho “woke up wrong” and wasn’t risked against Atletico Madrid. That’s how easy it is for United to suddenly be severely lacking.
This is going to be a weird season. There’s five games in August and 16 games before mid-November. A World Cup is going to be played in the middle of the season. There’s going to be injuries. Fatigue is going to play a major factor. United need depth. Right now they have decent depth at center back, left back, and… well that’s basically it.
United have so many question marks up front, especially regarding Cristiano Ronaldo. The midfield is still incredibly thin. With every day that passes the reality of needing one of James Garner or Zidane Iqbal or both to be ready to step in and play big minutes this season becomes more and more apparent. I’m a big fan of both of them and hope to see them actually get their chance, but asking two academy players to step in and be good enough for Manchester United? That’s asking a lot…
The transfer window is still open for another month. Plenty of things can change between now and then. But the Premier League starts in just a few days. At this moment Manchester United remain alarmingly short on depth in a season you can be sure they’re going to need it.
United can finish in the top four this season but in order to do so they’ll need a lot of things to break perfectly for them, as well as a lot of things to go wrong for their rivals.
Can’t take all the credit here. I very much said that Timo Werner and Kai Havertz would be among the successful ones
Which has also aged well
Before you start saying “United have been known to play down to their opponents level” check yourself. That 19-20 team struggled against organized Premier League teams, they had no issues beating lower division teams in the cups or Europa League.