The FA Cup’s history is steeped in shock results, but the last real upset in a final came in 2013 when Manchester City were stunned by soon-to-be-relegated Wigan Athletic. If City are beaten by Machester United in Saturday’s showpiece at Wembley, it will be the greatest final shock to take place since then.
Both sides have just recorded historic seasons, but for very different reasons. City became the first team in 135 years of English football to win four consecutive league titles. United, meanwhile, have just posted their lowest finish in the Premier League while also ending with a negative goal difference.
The Red Devils also lost 14 matches, another unwanted club record in the Premier League era. In all competitions, they have lost 19. By way of contrast, City lost just four, excluding penalty shootouts. They last tasted defeat more than five months ago on December 6. And with Rodri in their side, as he will be at Wembley, they have not been beaten since February 2023.
The difference between the two teams, which Erik ten Hag had the cheek to describe as “small margins” after the last Manchester derby, is colossal. City finished with 31 more points than United while scoring an extra 39 goals and conceding 24 goals fewer.
Victory unlikely but not impossible
While United are ravaged by injuries, sweating on the fitness of Harry Maguire and Luke Shaw before Saturday, City have a clean bill of health aside from the injured Ederson, who would have played back-up to Stefan Ortega regardless.
Many United fans will be dreading a bloodbath at Wembley, a repeat of the 6-1 hammering City dished out to them in 2011 at Old Trafford or the 6-3 thrashing at the Etihad Stadium early last season. But finals are often tight and nerves always set in. A United win, while unlikely, is not entirely out of the question.
Ten Hag’s side were unbeaten in all three of their games with Liverpool this season, toppling them in the unforgettable FA Cup quarter-final. They could frustrate City, Erling Haaland could miss a few sitters, and United have match-winners in Alejandro Garnacho, Bruno Fernandes and Marcus Rashford who could snatch victory.
But even if United can pull off the seemingly impossible and lift the FA Cup at City’s expense, it should not be Ten Hag’s golden ticket to another season in the dugout.
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Too many false dawns
While a hypothetical victory over City would be one of Ten Hag’s greatest feats as United manager, it would be the exception that proves the rule. Anyone who thinks it could be a turning point for him, a platform from which his side could achieve great things, has not been paying much attention this season.
United fans have heard the words ‘turning point’ quite a few times this season after the occasional big win. But more often than not, those few enjoyable moments have been mere false dawns. Ten Hag first used the dreaded phrase after Scott McTominay’s late show against Brentford. “It has to be a turning point and also a restart. These games give fuel to the dressing room,” he said.
United did indeed win their next two matches against the ‘giants’ of Sheffield United and Copenhagen, both by small margins. But then they were embarrassed by City, losing 3-0 at Old Trafford, before being destroyed by a hugely inexperienced Newcastle team in the Carabao Cup.
No turning point after all
The manager talked in the same terms after the cup win over Liverpool. He said: “This could be the moment that gives the team energy and the belief that they can do amazing things. When you can beat Liverpool like this you can beat any opponent.”
Yet in their next five games after stunning Jurgen Klopp’s side, United failed to win once, shipping 12 goals in the process. Their next win, the hard-fought victory at home to basement club Sheffield United, was also no turning point, preceding the draw against Burnley, humiliation at Crystal Palace and defeat at home to Arsenal.
The same is true of the other big wins United have enjoyed. The 3-0 success at Everton, their joint-biggest victory of the campaign, was followed by the mad 3-3 draw at Galatasaray and then a grim 1-0 defeat at Newcastle. The 2-1 victory over Chelsea in December was followed by the shock 3-0 thrashing at home to Bournemouth. And the thrilling comeback from two goals down against Aston Villa on Boxing Day was followed by defeat at Nottingham Forest.
It is naive to expect that anything different would happen in the unlikely event the FA Cup is draped in red white and black ribbons on Saturday.
Excuses, not solutions
The only spell of the season in which United showed any real consistency came between January and February, when the team strung together four Premier League wins, five in all competitions. Their second-longest winning streak was three games.
Ten Hag has often hid behind United’s injury record and, in fairness to him, that five-game streak came when he had the majority of his best players available. But once Rasmus Hojlund got injured in late February and Fernandes had to play up front against Fulham, everything fell apart again.
Injuries are a reality of modern football and it is unrealistic to expect your best players to always be available. The top coaches find solutions amid player shortages. Too often, however, Ten Hag has reached for excuses. The manager has not taken any responsibility for the litany of injury setbacks his team have suffered either.
Ten Hag has also cursed the team’s luck on the pitch, repeatedly bringing up the defeat at Arsenal in September as a sliding doors moment, pointing to a penalty that never was given to Hojlund and Garnacho’s marginally-offside disallowed goal.
Should be worse off
But there is plenty of evidence that United have actually been lucky to finish as high as they did in the league, given their dreadful performances and their propensity to leak chances. United ended the Premier League season in eighth, their lowest finish since 1990, while picking up 60 points. But according to a table calculated by expected points, which changes results according to expected goals totals, United should have done far worse. The expected points table ranked Ten Hag’s side in 15th on 44 points.
That table mirrored the top of the Premier League standings, with Manchester City still finishing as champions ahead of Arsenal and Liverpool, while Sheffield United, Burnley and Luton finished in the bottom three.
United have had many unconvincing wins, beginning with their opening day victory over Wolves when Andre Onana got away with taking out an opponent late on, and ending with their final home win against Newcastle, when Anthony Gordon was furious not to have been awarded a penalty.
Even the big victories have come with caveats. Everton battered United in the first half at Goodison Park while losing 3-0, while West Ham had 19 shots to United’s seven when they succumbed to the same scoreline at Old Trafford in February. United have also struggled against lower-league opposition, drawing 2-2 at fourth-tier Newport County until the 68th minute and overcoming Coventry by the skin of their teeth in the FA Cup semis.
Van Gaal parallel
There is a parallel with United’s situation heading into Saturday and the last time they won the FA Cup, in 2016 against Crystal Palace. Louis van Gaal had failed to get United into the Champions League and Jose Mourinho was on the market. Just minutes after Jesse Lingard won United the Cup in extra-time, news filtered out that Van Gaal was going to be replaced by the Portuguese.
It was cruel timing and very harsh on the larger-than-life Dutchman. But the nature of the win merely underlined the fact that Van Gaal was not the right manager for United and few fans genuinely mourned the fact he was leaving, even if the timing was unfortunate to say the least.
Ten Hag has dismissed the suggestion history could repeat itself on Saturday, remarking last week: “No, because I think they have common sense. They have seen that when you have 32 different back lines, when you lose eight centre-backs and when you don’t have a left full-back, it will have a negative impact on results.”
INEOS will use ‘common sense’
The manager is right that his boss Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his INEOS colleagues have common sense. Sir Dave Brailsford’s elite mentality won multiple Olympic medals for Great Britain and 12 Grand Tours, and Ratcliffe’s shrewdness led to him buying a failing petrochemicals firm for £78m ($99m) and turning it into a billion-dollar empire.
The pair, therefore, should be able to see that a hypothetical victory over City, however glorious it would be, will be highly unlikely to precede the club’s revival. United have plummeted unprecedented depths under Ten Hag and they need a new coach to get them back to the surface.
And, in more parallels with 2016, two former Chelsea managers are on the market, with Mauricio Pochettino joining Thomas Tuchel in unemployment after being the latest manager to leave the west London madhouse.
The two things that kept Ten Hag in charge for so long in this nightmare season were a lack of authority at United due to the uncertain ownership situation and a lack of alternatives. Both situations have changed, and it seems a matter of time before Ten Hag walks out the door.
It would be great if he could do so clutching the FA Cup after masterminding City’s downfall. But it will not undo the damage of this historically bad season.
