Even though I am an Everton fan, I thought Moyes was the wrong candidate for the job.  The reason I say that is because Moyes never won anything in his managerial career.  When you are coaching at any big club, you need to look the players in their eyes and say, “This is how I won it here, this is how I won it there, and that is the reason why we are going to win now as I know how to win.” Moyes could never say that.  All he could claim at that time was that he never got fired.  The joke going around the English coaching circles at that time is Moyes got the job because he is from Scotland.
 
I was covering the English Premier League for Foxsports Asia, and our journalist contacts in England were asking the question, “Is Manchester United a bit short-sighted not to select a winning Manager?”
 
Fast-forward to the present day where the Red Devils are struggling, the same question has come up again.  However, this time there are a few more questions being asked.  First question, should current Manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer be relieved of his duties? Second question, should former Tottenham Manager Mauricio Pochenttino, AKA Poch, be appointed as Ole’s successor?

Third question?  Whichever decision they make, will Manchester United be labelled as a club that is still short-sighted?  In the last few days, former United Goalkeeper - Peter Schmeichel - was quoted as saying that sacking Ole would make things worst.  Some former club players joined the conversation and kept stressing that achieving success does take time.  Jurgen Klopp was given a decent amount of time when he was recruited by Liverpool. 

I asked my former colleague at Foxsports – former Sheffield Wednesday defender Benoit Croissant – for his opinion.  My French friend replied and said, “I do not think Ole should be sacked now despite not qualifying for the knock-out stages of the Champions League.  He is trying to build a team and the man needs time.  He can still turn it around.”
 
I do agree with Benoit, but let us not forget when you are managing clubs like Manchester United, Barcelona, the LA Lakers, and the Yankees, losing is not accepted.
 
I personally hope that Manchester United do hire “Poch.”  When Spurs played Malaysia in a friendly in 2015, I attended the pre-match press conference (PC).  During the PC, some of the Malaysian media was teasing Harry Kane that he should move to a bigger club.   At the event, I was very fortunate to be given the chance to ask Mauricio a few questions.
 
After the PC, I also managed to take a selfie with Poch.  I thanked him for not only the photo but for answering my questions in great detail.  He then spent two minutes with me telling me the culture he was trying to build at Spurs which was all about hard work, pressing, and doing more training so that the pressing game would work.
 
Even though I don’t know Ole, he seems like such a nice guy and I would hate to see him out of work.  Nice guys usually make great salesmen.   So one idea that I keep hearing about is that Manchester United might retain Ole, but as a Director of Football to recruit players while Poch coaches the team.
 
Not a bad idea as the said structure might be able to help Manchester United not only achieve long term success but also get rid of those horrible blind spots.  You can’t always use a hammer to smash all your problems.

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