Manchester United and the inescapable pall of gloom

Another day, another heart-rending defeat. Perhaps the Stretford End is finally waking up to the reality that Manchester United has entered a new, more sobering era, that home defeats, such as the one to Crystal Palace on Saturday, is not an upset, but part of the new norm for a club that is holding on to its top-six status by the skin of their teeth.

Yes, the same club that made the Premier League its plaything, winning a record 13 titles and becoming the most recognisable football brand in England along the way. Gone are those days. It seems the number 13 is unlucky sometimes.

A different era

It does seem a bit incredible now that United dominated the English game in the manner they did under the legendary Sir Alex Ferguson. Those were heady days at the Theatre of Dreams, blitzkrieg football, home-grown superstars such as David Beckham and Paul Scholes mixed with the right amount of foreign talent in Eric Cantona and Dwight Yorke, and an atmosphere of invincibility and eternal optimism.

During the great success at home came some memorable European nights as United overcame, most of which ended in success for the men in Red, United believed they were one of the best and they proved it on the field.

Ferguson led the club to two Champions League triumphs and took them to two more finals. If not for Barcelona's gladiators in their prime, the club could have been European champions on more occasions.

Tumble into despair

United now struggle to qualify for the Champions League. It is not for want of trying, especially at the managerial level. Post the Fergie era came David Moyes, his hand-picked successor. Moyes's failure prompted the appointment of two heavyweight coaches, Louis Van Gaal and the 'Special One', Jose Mourinho. Both were expected to take the Red Devils back to the exalted state that the fans had got used to.

Both won silverware, but the club's performance remained below par. As bitter adversaries Manchester City and Liverpool went from strength to strength, almost entering a realm of invincibility, United's fortunes continued spiralling downwards. Even when Mourinho took them to second place, the mood of gloom and doom hardly abated.

It's all so dire

It's not just the football, though, admittedly, Moyes began a counter-productive revolution that led to the attractive, fearless brand of football, that United fans had grown up on, becoming circumspect, cagey and ineffective. Van Gaal continued on the same trajectory and Mourinho, with his characteristically pragmatic approach, attempted to instill steeliness in place of freedom.

All of them failed, all of them feared failure and feared that the squads they had built were not good enough to match up to Sir Alex's legendary teams, they were right.

But, by being trapped by the fear of failure, they failed even further. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, the Gaffer's former ward, tried to make the club play the 'United way' for a while. But it seems United are back to square one. It isn't only about the frailties in the team. It is this mood of failure, this pall of gloom that refuses to rise above Old Trafford. David de Gea, once touted the best goalkeeper in the planet spilled a regulation catch to gift Palace the victory on Saturday. It's not the first mistake he has made in the recent past. Paul Pogba, a virtuoso talent who has shown glimpses of it during his United days, has often looked an embattled figure at the club. His desire to leave was public knowledge only days ago.

Players like Romelu Lukaku came, went and complained. It's all very dire at the club right now. It's a mood that seems unending, an eternal nightmare from which the club needs to wake up quickly; if the mood doesn't change, other, more complex changes will never happen and the 13-time winner of the Premier League may never again get a taste of those glory days.

Edited by Kingshuk Kusari