Marcus Rashford cites Liverpool example in plea for Man United to escape “no man’s land” | OneFootball

Marcus Rashford has urged Manchester United to follow Liverpool example if they’re to get out of the “no man’s land” in which they’ve found themselves in recent years.

Since Alex Ferguson’s retirement in 2013 – which was also the year in which the Red Devils last won the Premier League – they’ve been through six permanent managers and 10 in total including caretakers and interims, finishing inside the top three in only four of the subsequent 12 campaigns.

Their decline has coincided with the Merseysiders’ rise from barely achieving Europa League qualification to winning two top-flight titles and the Champions League, while also finishing runners-up on three occasions and appearing in three other European finals.

Rashford urges Man United to copy Liverpool example

Rashford broke into the Man United first team just a few months after Jurgen Klopp took charge at Liverpool, and he’s seen how the Reds have been transformed under the German, who held the manager’s job for nearly nine years.

In an interview for The Rest Is Football (via Football Espana), the Barcelona loanee said: “Under Fergie, the system was the same for the whole academy, so you could pick players from 15 onwards. Whereas if you’re changing all the time, it’s different. It’s reactionary. You can’t expect to be able to win.

“You might win a cup tournament, because you have a good coach, good players and a good team. It’s not an accident. But when I take a step back and think about it, with regard to where people want United to be, what do you expect?

(Photo by Michael Regan/Getty Images)

“People say we’ve been in a transition for years, but in order to be in a transition, you have to actually start it. The transition hasn’t started. When Liverpool got Klopp, they stuck with him. They didn’t win in the beginning, but nobody remembers that. You have to make a plan and stick with it.

“We’ve had so many managers that you just end up nowhere, in no-man’s land. 100% [it hurts], not just as a player, but as a United fan.”

Thank goodness Liverpool kept faith with Klopp in the tough times!

It’s easy to forget that Liverpool actually finished eighth in Klopp’s first season in charge in 2015/16, and they needed final-day victories to secure fourth in the subsequent two campaigns before challenging for the title in 2018/19.

A club such as Man United or Chelsea – both of whom have had significant managerial churn over the past decade – may have pushed the panic button after little more than a year. For instance, the Reds’ awful start to 2017 (no league wins in January, three defeats at Anfield in a week, quickfire cup exits) could’ve seen the German given the bullet had he been working under impetuous owners.

Thankfully, the LFC hierarchy didn’t pull the trigger, instead keeping faith and leaving him to accomplish so much on Merseyside before he departed on his own terms in 2024.

There was a time when the Liverpool manager’s job had a revolving door feel to it – we had four different men in charge between 2010 and 2012 – but Klopp’s reign encompassed four permanent bosses and two caretakers/interims at Old Trafford, where Rashford began his senior career under Louis van Gaal and also played under the likes of Jose Mourinho, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Erik ten Hag.

There’ll be wry smiles on faces across Merseyside at the 27-year-old’s yearning for his parent club to follow the Reds’ lead by showing loyalty to the man in charge. How the roles have reversed since the dark days of the early 2010s when we quickly went from Rafael Benitez to Brendan Rodgers via Roy Hodgson and Sir Kenny Dalglish.