A Misspent Force

It was, as about 20 different Manchester United supporters remarked in none-too-subtle stage whispers, like something out of a Second World War film.

The match at Bayer Leverkusen's Bayarena stadium had finished long since. It was past midnight, and moonlight was the only illumination as crash-helmeted German policemen herded around 200 English fans along a riverbank towards the now quiet town and its heavily guarded station.

It was never actually frightening, even if one wondered whether it was wise for everyone to hum The Dambusters March quite so loudly. There was, though, something slightly sinister about the way the straggling procession scooped up every non-German it encountered along the way. Not all of us even wanted to go to the station, much less hang around for communal urination halts in hedgerows en route, but the guards had their orders and they had to be obeyed. So far so clichéd, except that it is absolutely untrue that Germans do not possess a sense of humor. Neutral observers might have concluded the opposite was the case, especially at the moment when a fan giving full vent to 'Two World Wars and one World Cup' was silenced by a poke in the ribs from a Polizei baton. 'I have an idea,' Robocop said in perfect English. 'Why don't you give us a few verses of Football's Coming Home ?'

That song had been played at the end of Manchester United's unsuccessful attempt to reach the Champions League final, as it had after Liverpool's quarter-final defeat. Irony was not Leverkusen's intention. Watching their players singing along with the crowd at the final whistle, acknowledging their support by joyfully flinging themselves to the turf in the sort of spontaneous celebration rarely seen these days at Highbury or Old Trafford, the tune seemed apt because Leverkusen are such a homely club. Their modest ground will not be staging any World Cup matches in 2006, since, despite being modern and comfortable, the Bundesliga's sole all-seat stadium holds only 25,000 people. As one one of the last true factory teams, Leverkusen generate little support from outside the local community, and are far from fashionable within Germany. Their hitherto unknown coach, Klaus Toppmöller, is still in his first season at the club. And now Leverkusen are in a Champions League final with Real Madrid. Ahead of Manchester United, ahead of Bayern Munich, and ahead of all the other big names in Europe with their bloated budgets and squads assembled specifically to cope with the demands of the Champions League.

For all those reasons, Leverkusen deserve their day in the sun, if Glasgow can be thus described. Mostly, though, they deserve it because they surprised their supposed betters with the quality of their football and their ability to keep their nerve when it mattered. Sir Alex Ferguson was quite wrong on Tuesday when he suggested his side had deserved to win and Leverkusen were lucky to be going through. There were plenty of moans and grumbles on the moonlit march to Leverkusen station, but not once was Kim Milton Nielsen's timekeeping or United's alleged catalog of near misses invoked. The majority view was that United had failed to sparkle when they needed to and had not done enough to win either leg. Given time to get over his intense disappointment, Ferguson may eventually come round to a similar view.

Whether he will admit to it is another matter. On occasions like Tuesday evening it is easy to understand why Ferguson is sometimes reluctant to talk at all. His positive answer to a question about Roy Keane turned into headlines suggesting he was dissatisfied with the rest of his players.

His comments about United scoring the most goals and playing the best football in the Premiership were in response to a question about how he would feel if his side ended up with nothing. Defiantly and loyally, Ferguson stuck up for his players, only to see his remarks construed as yet another attack on Arsène Wenger. At least Wenger appears to understand how the whole process works, and steadfastly refuses to further inflame these situations. If the Arsenal players can express themselves as eloquently as their manager on Wednesday at Old Trafford, Ferguson's contentious claim could be laid to rest in a manner that even he will find hard to dispute.

The truest thing Ferguson said all night was that individual mistakes had cost United dearly this season. It is easy to round up the usual suspects: the erratic Fabien Barthez, the initially ponderous Laurent Blanc, the misfit Juan Veron. Yet most of United's untypical generosity took place before Christmas and was corrected by the New Year, which is how Ferguson's players came to be in a Champions League semi-final against the least fancied team and keep the title race with Arsenal going until the last week of the season. It is true that a moment of carelessness by Veron two months ago was punished by a goal that now looks likely to cost United a fourth title, but it is hardly fair to let the £28 million Argentine carry the whole blame for an inability to beat - or even score against - Middlesbrough at home.

There have been mistakes though, and some of them made by Ferguson himself. United did not go out on Tuesday through Barthez's clowning or Blanc's hesitation after all. They might have gone out due to Ferguson's odd decision to ask Veron to play 'in the hole' behind Ruud van Nistelrooy, increasing the number of players playing out of position in an already patched up team. Not even Veron's closest friends would make much of a case for him as a support striker, and Toppmöller admitted after the game he was aston ished United did not start with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. This seemed a reasonable point to reflect that United could also have played Dwight Yorke up front, as they did three years ago, had Ferguson not decided to freeze him out. Or he could have kept Ryan Giggs as a support striker, and gone with Solskjaer or Yorke on the wing. His argument that his formation was designed to protect the wings held little water when Paul Scholes kept wandering infield to leave poor Wes Brown with the whole right side to look after.

In time, Ferguson may own up to a few of these miscalculations. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the Jaap Stam business, for instance, there is no doubt that he rushed into a transfer when he had inadequate cover for the departing player, and that United could ill afford the time it took for Blanc to adjust to the Premiership. What might take a lot longer is for Ferguson to face up to the criticism, which has been hanging over him all season. Namely that when he finally persuaded the plc to hand over a Real Madrid-sized wodge of cash, he did not spend the money effectively.

Van Nistelrooy is as good a striker as money can buy, although strictly speaking he came off the previous season's budget, and possessing the leading goalscorer in the Champions League only underlines United's deficiencies elsewhere. Those deficiencies were mentioned by Keane in the aftermath of last season's European exit, and Ferguson's response was to shatter the English transfer record to buy Veron. There is no need to go back over some of the season's most well-documented territory. Suffice to say that Ferguson still appears to have no idea where to deploy the Argentine to best effect, that Veron has turned out to be more of a problem for United than a solution, and that at almost any other club in Europe the manager's judgment and future would now be a matter of lively boardroom debate.

That might seem harsh, but Ferguson always used to argue that it was difficult for him to keep up with the Madrids and Milans because they had so much money to spend. So they did, but they were ruthless with managers who could not turn investment into results. Having joined the club at last, Ferguson will now be uncomfortably aware that he faces a battle to get United to release more cash, and that his next major signing will come under the most intense scrutiny.

Life is so much simpler for Toppmöller, who from necessity must pick more or less the same players every week, yet has done what Ferguson did at Aberdeen by transforming an unheralded outpost into a European stronghold. The last person to do that in Germany was Ottmar Hitzfeld, and before dismissing Leverkusen's chances against Real in Glasgow on Wednesday week, just remember what happened to him. His Borussia Dortmund side made light work of beating the overwhelming favorites Juventus in the 1997 final; two years later he was at Bayern Munich, and last year he was sounded out for Ferguson's job. So if Leverkusen pull it off in Glasgow, Manchester United fans in particular should raise a glass to the portly guy with the Harpo Marx hairstyle. They could be looking at their next manager.

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