If Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s declaration that cup competitions should not be the gauge of Manchester United was a cute psychological move it reaped dividends at Milan on Thursday. Needing victory at the San Siro, his side duly delivered to eliminate Stefano Pioli’s team and move into the Europa League quarter-finals. Next United travel to Leicester on Sunday for their other realistic route to silverware: the FA Cup.
Solskjær’s perspective shifted noticeably on sudden-death competitions before United’s trip to Italy. Rather than claim a triumph would be a major step and crucial for his side’s development, which has been his stance, United were to be judged primarily on Premier League performances and position.
Before facing Leicester, Solskjær again repeated how cup glory “can sometimes hide” deep-lying fault-lines at a club, but he then expanded on his thinking. “We feel like we’re on an upward trajectory, that we’re going places, and I feel that winning a trophy could be a catalyst, not like an invisible cloak [covering problems]. It would kick us on and hopefully we can take that next step and go to a final. But the improvement: you see most of it in the league position and how the consistency of our performances is getting better and better. But we’re measured on trophies and everyone wants to celebrate a trophy.”
The reason for Solskjær’s playing down of knockout competitions might be found in his four semi-final defeats. Last season, United fell to Chelsea in the FA Cup, the Carabao Cup to Manchester City and in the Europa League against Sevilla. This campaign, again City eliminated United in the Carabao Cup.
In all of these reverses United were hardly a whir of scintillating football who caught the wrong end of a result that might have gone their way, making it easy for some to label them “bottlers”. This, though, is a simplistic reading that ignores the mess of a club Solskjær walked into when taking over from José Mourinho in December 2018, and how last year’s first full campaign was a vital staging post in his efforts to rebuild United.
Yet given how a manager’s public utterances are noticed by his players, Solskjær may well have used the build-ups to the Milan and Leicester games to ease the pressure on them. In one sense the 48-year-old’s words are immaterial. This is United and the expectation is to claim a trophy every season, regardless of what the manager says.
Another, though, is when Solskjær arrives at Leicester, he hopes for a victory that can ultimately prove the next step in achieving what Sir Alex Ferguson took longer to do: claim a first honour as a United manager. Should they be FA Cup winners for a 13th time or the Europa League a second – they face Granada next – it will have taken Solskjær two full seasons to Ferguson’s three to open his account.
Privately, he must be desperate to do so. Solskjær often cites the 2006 League Cup triumph as the catalyst for Patrice Evra and Nemanja Vidic’s United careers – each arrived that season – and for Ferguson’s third and last great team that would claim another League Cup, three Premier League titles and the Champions League by 2009.
What Solskjær and his side require is a first success, to convince themselves they are winners. The process of making United genuine title contenders is under way – they are second in the table – but re-establishing them at the summit, with the 14-point gulf to City with nine matches left (to the latter’s eight), means a 21st title will almost certainly not come this season.
FA Cup or Europa League victory (or both) this term would quieten critics and prove lift-off for the Solskjær era just as Ferguson’s first silverware did in 1990. with the FA Cup final win over Crystal Palace.
“The FA Cup has always been a massive trophy,” he says. “I have been fortunate enough to win it a couple of times myself [as a United striker] and growing up as a kid it was always the last game of the season, after the league was finished. It was the big game. So it is a big game for us [Leicester].
“The history of the FA Cup and the history of Manchester United in the FA Cup is so great and for me it is one of the most iconic trophies you can win. Especially walking up those steps at Wembley – it’s something I watched on telly and something I’ve been lucky enough to do myself as well. So we really want to go all the way.”
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He is understandably wary of the challenge Brendan Rodgers’s side will pose, however “Leicester deserve to be spoken about as one of the top six. Because of the way they have developed the club, the way that after they won the league [in 2015-16] they have consolidated a place in and around the top six with Brendan [Rodgers]. They have a fantastic way of playing, the style of football is pleasing on the eye as well, they have quality players and they have players who can score goals.”
Solskjær’s hope is that United have the quality to overcome Leicester and end the season with the first honour of his tenure.