Could next season be Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s last at Manchester United?
By Ali Akbar
In the current age when managers are replaced all the time, it is unrealistic to expect that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer will stay at Manchester United for a long time.
When Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was appointed as caretaker manager at Manchester United, the reception among fans and pundits were lukewarm, to say the least.
Although many were happy to see Jose Mourinho gone, they were also apprehensive about whether his replacement would be any better.
Solskjaer’s only prior experience in the Premier League was relegating Cardiff City back to the Championship in 2014, after which he was promptly sacked.
Worse still, the former United player was managing Norwegian side Molde when he got the call to take over at Old Trafford – hardly the level of football a club like United should be aspiring to.
Nevertheless, Solskjaer went on to prove his detractors wrong by winning his first six Premier League games in a row in charge – a joint managerial record he shares with Antonio Conte and Pep Guardiola – and he was soon appointed on a permanent basis.
However, it wasn’t long before United’s form took a nosedive once again, seeing them crash out of the FA Cup, the Champions League and eventually finish 6th in the Premier League table.
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Although these failures have caused some to raise questions over Solskjaer’s ability as a manager, the general consensus among fans is that he should remain as United boss for now.
Some even see Solskjaer going onto be a long-term manager at Old Trafford, given his legendary status at the club and his strong relationship with staff and players – but this would be unrealistic.
The way football works today, the manager is usually the first one to go when things aren’t going well for a club, so it is unlikely that we will ever see another Sir Alex Ferguson or Arsene Wenger in the modern game.
If United fail to recover from their poor end to the season when the next one comes around, I could even see Solskjaer being sacked midway through the season, just like Mourinho before him.
Even if the players were to be the ones to blame for a poor run of results in future, you can count on Solskjaer being the one who will have to leave. I wish things were different in the current age, but there’s no denying that this has become increasingly common – especially in the Premier League.