THE MAGIC OF A DREAM

Greater Manchester boasts two wonderful stadiums. The first is the City of Manchester Stadium. Built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games, the stadium has a capacity of over 47 thousand and now belongs to Manchester City Football Club. The other stadium is Old Trafford. Belonging to Manchester United FC, the stadium is the second biggest in England after the national team’s home; Wembley Stadium. It is the 29th biggest football stadium and 57th biggest sports stadium in the world with a capacity of over 76 thousand. It was Bobby Charlton who summed up this stadium, its atmosphere, its fans and its football club the best when he gave it the nickname; ‘the Theatre of Dreams”.

Before the arrival of the Abu Dhabi-based investors, Manchester City were hidden in the shadow of United’s star. Manchester United have been one of the Premier Leagues dream clubs pretty much since the arrival of Sir Alex Ferguson in 1986. Sir Alex is United’s most successful manager. He arrived with a dream; ‘knock Liverpool off their ——- perch’. Bar some bumps in the road, Fergie and United have succeeded in doing so. The point that I’m trying to convey is that Manchester United are a club with vision, desire and dreams. United have a ‘magic’. Not many clubs have ‘magic’. Chelsea had money thrown at them and won titles and fans but, unless you are a true Chelsea fan, there is no magic there. That is true for every team. Each supporter will find ‘magic’ in the side he/she supports, but very few teams have magic that goes beyond knowledgeable football fans.

The FA Cup is full of magic but that’s not a team. A World Cup could boast magic moments but again, that isn’t a club. Now this isn’t a list of who does and doesn’t have ‘magic’. (It could be a hugely debated subject.) Rather what I want to say has to do with the lack of – or loss of – magic. The reason, I would say United possess this ‘magic’ is due to the fact that a non-football fan default ‘who is your favorite team?’ answer is Manchester United. Why? Beckham, Cantona, Rooney, Ronaldo etc. Players who have… MAGIC! The fairytale heroes of football…

Last season Manchester United needed to take every point to stay ahead of Liverpool and Chelsea to lift the trophy for the third season in a row. The game: United v Aston Villa, the score: 2-2… arrive boy wonder, enter Federico (aka ‘Kiko’) Macheda. At just 17 years old the young Italian slots home an injury time winner to secure United all three points. Just 6 days later he scored with his first touch after coming off the bench to give United a 2-1 win over Sunderland. If it was a movie we would all roll back our eyes and say ‘oh come on! That’s not very believable”. But it is what happened. It is like a movie script and it is what we call… MAGIC.

Where am I going? United currently sit between Chelsea and Arsenal in one of the closest title races we have had for a while. A lot has been said about United recently and the poorness of the performances. Sure second isn’t bad, but they haven’t been convincing by any stretch of the imagination. In fact imagination is part of the problem. United have lost or drawn often this season and have done so against relatively ‘easy’ opponents. Most people point to the loss of Cristiano Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez as the reason for their misery. I don’t think losing them helped but that’s not United’s biggest problem. For all Ronaldo’s pomp and performance what he brought to pitch was… you know what I’m going to say… magic.

In the end United haven’t lost Ronaldo and Tevez, they haven’t lost players, they haven’t bought badly nor have they been choked by debt. What has happened is that United have lost their magic. Last season, irrelevant of the score, somewhere deep down sat a belief that United would win every match. With 5 minutes remaining, 2, 1, a couple of seconds even, United were a fairytale. Especially when playing on the magical pitch in the Theatre of Dreams! This season however has less sparkle, less fantasy. I’m not sure if the players believe they have it in themselves. When United fall behind everyone looks at Rooney as he throws his all into everything. One team, relying on one man… it is the reason United lost the Champions League Final to Barcelona. United pinned their hopes on Ronaldo and he didn’t deliver, Barca played as a team – that allowed Messi to shine. He didn’t have the pressure Ronaldo had. That night a little bit of magic died within United and they are suffering because of it this year.

United’s squad does lack a little bit of quality but no matter who is bought in the transfer window, unless Fergie can rewrite some magic into the script, United won’t see much success this season. I’m not shouting for Fergie’s head (here is a whole article about that:) but the question is can he play Walt Disney?

There are very few people writing for football related media who don’t pledge allegiance to one particular team. Me, I throw all my weight behind the English national side. But you can’t watch everyone every week, so one tends to gravitate. I used to gravitate towards the magic. Now United seem like just another team and are at times frustrating and possibly boring to watch. If you want to see some magic this season the team to watch in my opinion is Tottenham Hotspur (and they boast plenty of English talent). Lennon, Defoe, Huddlestone, Modric… there is plenty of magic there!

Supporters will always support their clubs and true love is tested by commitment. I’m committed to football and the magic of the beautiful game.

Within ‘the Theatre of Dreams’ resides a very good side, an experienced and trophy-winning side.

But a side that lacks…

MAGIC