look like Real Madrid, he said, in a scathing analysis of a performance as bad as any in the post Fergie era.
O’Farrell was eventually sacked 18 months into his tenure with United third from bottom. In swept Tommy Docherty with the radical reforms that would eventually return United to something like themselves, but not without suffering the ignominy of relegation in 1974. The penalty for failing has shifted since.
Save for Raphael Varane, who did not make the second half, and Andre Onana, none emerged with any credit. We can excuse Kobbie Mainoo, who looked to be carrying the effects of the illness that made him a doubt and was substituted in the second half. It seemed a cruelty to keep Marcus Rashford on the pitch so ill equipped was he for the night. Whatever is ailing Rashford it appears to be evading detection among the coaching staff, who kept him on for 80 minutes.
The 31 shots that peppered United’s goal were the most amassed by Brentford in seven years. Only Sheffield United and Luton have a higherthan United. Ten Hag has fashioned a team without personality or pattern. The nearest they came to coherence was the punt up the pitch by Onana, a stratagem revealed straight from the kick-off when Bruno Fernandes passed the ball back directly to Onana, who duly walloped it into orbit.