The back-and-forth volleys of finger-pointing over Manchester United’s tactics between senior players and under-fire manager Michael Carrick after the Como defeat was more reminiscent of an all-time classic on Wimbledon Centre Court than one of English football’s most historic clubs.
United’s director of football, Jason Wilcox, and the club’s recruitment team have more to answer for regarding the Red Devils’ latest fall of disgrace than anyone.
Carrick’s results have been abysmal this season. The form of his captain, Bruno Fernandes, has not been much better, yet United were tempting fate right from the moment the summer transfer window shut.
Saying sorry: Michael Carrick gestures to the miserable Manchester United fans in Como
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Veteran Casemiro was always going to be a big loss - his experience, his leadership skills, his set-piece threat - but directing 100 per cent of their transfer outlay on midfielders was a grim mistake.
Doing so left an ageing, injury-prone Luke Shaw as the club’s only recognised left-back. It left Diogo Dalot, fine but never anything more, as the starting right-back.
It left Harry Maguire, 33, expected to start in the Premier League and Champions League multiple times a week. It left no nominal striker good enough as back-up for Benjamin Sesko.
With the Slovenian out, Bryan Mbeumo has had to deputise: an excellent player, and versatile - but only to a point. Mbeumo is being asked to learn on the job how to lead a one-man forward line.
It is almost an irony that the way he has taken to that role - one which better squad-builders would have given to an actual striker - is just about the only tactical element to United’s game that is actually working for them right now.
And to assess how those midfielders they did sign have fared is to conclude not only that the funds were directed too heavily towards one area, but that the value for money Wilcox was able to extract once he’d set his mind to the midfield is just as deserving of fierce criticism.
United’s catastrophic nosedive belongs to Wilcox as much as anyone
Youri Tielemans’s big-game experience was an understandably attractive proposition, but he has followed in the footsteps of countless others in the post-Sir Alex Ferguson era in looking a shoddy imitation of the player he was before he joined.
£65million plus add-ons for Brighton’s Carlos Baleba was a good fee for a capable young player, yet even he made a critical error in the lead-up to a Como goal on Wednesday night.
Mistakes happen. Risking all of £50m on Andrey Santos, however, is not one of those mistakes that 'just happen'.
Chelsea barely knew what to do with Santos last season because, though tidy in possession and OK at short-distance passing, it was never clear quite what type of player he actually is.
United’s midfield received the whole of their summer transfer outlay. The result: a unit that looks leggier than last season’s and which opponents are finding an utter joy to play against and straight through.
People have described this United team as “unrecognisable” from the one that finished in title-winning form under Carrick last term. Of course it is hard, therefore, to look beyond Wilcox.
United are a classic example of a club who have multiple directors to direct blame to, because bulging boardrooms and glitzy job titles are so in fashion in the modern game.
Under fire: Jason Wilcox has received heavy criticism from United fans - and Lisandro Martinez
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But with director of recruitment Christopher Vivell focused more on scouting than how far the budget stretches, it is Wilcox who is the man leading their overall transfer strategy and the day-to-day running of the club, so it is he who must bear the most responsibility.
United spent well last summer on Mbeumo, Sesko and Matheus Cunha to bring proven top-level quality in the final third. They spent poorly this summer to revamp a midfield that looks weaker as a result.
Why is recruitment being done in three chunks? Why must a backline dreadfully short on quality wait until January or, more likely, next summer for its own injection of fresh athleticism and pedigree?
Even in the age of financial regulation, improving the defence this summer was an obvious priority. Failure to do so was the fans' largest grievance once the window shut and the floodgates opened.
The result of leaving the defence as it was: more Champions League goals conceded so far than PSV Eindhoven and Shakhtar Donetsk combined and more shipped in the Premier League than 19th-place Nottingham Forest.
United’s catastrophic nosedive belongs to Wilcox as much as it belongs to anyone.