If Jose Mourinho is allowed to continue what must be called his rebuilding at Manchester United in the summer, it will be evidence, not of patience at Old Trafford, but of panic.
Since Alex Ferguson retired, Manchester United have led a life of quiet desperation, coming to terms with the reality that one man’s authority, one man’s need for power and control, was what drove them towards enduring success.
In 2016, Jose Mourinho appeared to be the answer, but increasingly it seems that the idea of Jose Mourinho was the answer. The reality of Jose Mourinho has turned out to be something different.
Manchester United were not devoid of ideas against Sevilla on Tuesday, they were devoid of creative ideas. They had one big idea, the concept Mourinho has pared down to its most basic, a philosophy which is no less of a philosophy because it so often merely resembles fear.
But those who still believe in the manager insist that Mourinho needs time. Another transfer window where Ed Woodward can spend money on a collection of players that don’t seem to fit into any cohesive plan is seen as the next logical step.
Maybe they are right, maybe with time Mourinho will turn the current United team into the version of Manchester United some hope they can be. But if it happens, it will be unusual because, in Jose Mourinho’s world, it is the ordinary manager who needs time. Jose Mourinho has never needed time. In fact, time has always been his enemy.
Mourinho has always been able to make an impact quickly. It has always been essential for a manager who took so much strength from his ability to divide and conquer to move fast and break things. He then left others to gather the pieces and, for much of his career, count the trophies.
Perhaps the view that he needs time is correct, but then Mourinho is not the Mourinho we once knew. Maybe Mourinho has joined the ranks of the ordinary, perhaps Jose Mourinho is just an everyman manager these days, hoping things work out one way or another, a sort of Alan Curbishley for the super-rich. Maybe the ability to lash out at enemies in the media is the last thing to go. Maybe now he simply divides.
Mourinho, in his defenders’ eyes, is no longer a Master of the Universe but Old Gil from The Simpsons, a forlorn and desperate figure, buffeted by the wind and at the mercy of greater forces.
In this analysis, Mourinho is helpless on the sideline as players make basic errors. He watches some of his players’ performances with a quiet fury as if he is a man who finally got a ticket to watch his beloved Manchester United a couple of hours before kick-off and is now sitting in the stands unable to believe his eyes. They speak of him as if he was not the most powerful, most feared manager of his generation, but a helpless cipher. So when they speak about him are they really speaking about Jose Mourinho at all?
When Mourinho reminded people on Tuesday night that it was not unusual for United to be knocked out of the Champions League, sure, he had done it twice himself, he, too, was turning to the memory of Jose Mourinho for comfort.
He had been recruited by the club in the hope of restoring the Manchester United way, but few believed the way they were talking about was the way United used to fail in Europe.
But there was never any chance of the Manchester United way resembling anything other than the Jose Mourinho way when he arrived two years ago and, uncomfortable as it may be for some, that is what now exists at Old Trafford.
Many wondered how United could fall from the heights of their victory against Liverpool last Saturday to a performance like Tuesday night’s. But there is a clear line from the victory against Liverpool to the defeat by Sevilla. United scored twice against Liverpool in the first half, so they had no need to show any ambition, which was just as well, because under Mourinho there is none.
Mourinho’s risk-free football is, as was shown against Sevilla, high risk, even if it doesn’t include many of the elements normally associated with risk like excitement, adrenaline and the sense that anything could happen.
The players like Paul Pogba and Alexis Sanchez who are not performing are letting him down, some say, and this is a reasonable argument if Mourinho was a reasonable manager. But Mourinho was never a reasonable manager. He could shape a team to his own desire and there is still enough evidence that he can still instil fear into his side.
It might not be the players’ fault. When United have a manager whose core philosophy is giving the ball away and believes in controlling the game without the ball, nobody should be surprised when players continue to give the ball away.
So when United needed to create against Sevilla they couldn’t, suggesting that far from Mourinho being helpless, he has made his mark on this side. What is it about the current Manchester United set-up that turns players like Pogba and Sanchez into hopeless journeyman? What connects these players with all the others who once worked for Jose Mourinho and found the platform to express themselves somewhere else?
The performance against Sevilla was still identifiably a Mourinho performance, especially now it has been reduced to its essence. If there was a time when Mourinho could trust his players to follow his commands, now he distrusts them in case they do anything else.
The difference is subtle but immense. The world has changed and where once Mourinho dominated a landscape where there were few alternatives, players now see how things could be if they played for Jurgen Klopp or Pep Guardiola and can wonder if Mourinho’s way is still the only way.
In this changed world, Mourinho’s core message has become even more insistent and dogmatic. This is his Manchester United side. He is not working towards some bright future. This present consumed by fear is it. Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United is Paul Pogba giving the ball away forever.
In one way, Mourinho remains the perfect manager for the age. Those who believe in him can explain away every failure as something caused by the failure of others, ideally by those who resist him and his methods.
With a contract extension signed six weeks ago, Mourinho can continue his work in the summer but there will be no change in approach. Instead, Jose Mourinho will endure, shaping a club which appears to feel it has no alternative, in his image. But there may be no steady progression. There may be no progress at all. Jose Mourinho may have already done his best work. Time is never on his side.
