Why Ed Woodward has the hardest job in the world

Why Ed Woodward has the hardest job in the world

Ed Woodward is, to put it politely, less than popular amongst the Old Trafford faithful. His apparent struggles in the transfer market, over-exuberant flaunting of the club’s fortune and his never ending search for more sponsorship deals have left United fans drawing rather negative pictures of Mr Woodward in their heads (PS: I wonder how long it will be until we have an official bootlace sponsor?). 

But as negative as the opinion may be on Woodward, I really don’t feel his job is at all easy. He has the problem at the moment of a severely unbalanced squad. New signings may mean admitting mistakes and taking hits on players he has spent vast sums of money on. Step forward chief examples, Mata and Fellaini. Fellaini doesn’t really need explaining, he’s just rubbish isn't he? How much of that £27 million will the club see returned if we were to get rid of him? The phrase ‘diddly-squat’ comes to mind. Then we come to Mata… 

As much as we love the smiling, bearded Spaniard, he really does cause selection problems going forward. Woodward and the management at the club need to decide whether he is good enough to nail down the number 10 position at the club, and if not, they need to think about letting him go. You see, with the obvious demand for a right sided winger, that puts Mata’s position in the side under serious threat. He’s already being kept out by Lingard, so if a signing were to come in he may struggle to get back into the side. At number 10, again I’m not sure he’s even near first choice. We've seen Rooney, Herrera, Fellaini, Memphis and even Nick Powell being given the nod ahead of him in recent months. 

Then there’s the problem of the forward position. ‘Play Martial there!’, I hear you scream, and yes I totally agree, he should be our first choice striker with Rooney in behind him. But there is a startling lack of goals in this side, and thus Woodward may be tempted to dip into the transfer market for a new striker. If this happens, Martial will be forced out wide as we have seen recently. But this then means Memphis, Lingard and the like would be struggling for a place in the side. 

Every position on the pitch has this problem for United: there are too many players who are simply not good enough to get in the team every week, but also too good to be third or fourth choice.

So as you can see, there isn’t a quick fix mega-signing that Woodward can make to solve all of our problems. Rather, there would have to be a series of significant ins and outs at the club. His popularity would plummet to even lower levels if he were to get rid of Mata, but if he signs players to fit in the winger and striker positions as people are crying out for, he may have to bite the bullet. The same goes for several other first team squad members, I’m looking at you, Phil Jones.

He also has the unenviable job of deciding about the manager. Van Gaal has had a torrid season, and I actually commend Woodward for holding back his trigger finger. He could have easily booted LvG following THAT Stoke defeat, or even before. But I don't think this would have been a quick fix either. If anything, I think it would have been a HUGE gamble. Bringing in Mourinho would be the easiest option, but then we would be facing the same problem again in less than 3 years. Giggs then probably becomes the first choice to replace LvG. But if that goes badly, the club could be in serious trouble. If Giggs were to miss out on Champions League football, I wonder whether he would be able to attract the calibre of players that we desperately need. The plans for a ‘Neymar-like’ signing, as unlikely as it is already, may as well be flushed down the toilet. At that point we could be looking at a total reconstruction of the side, AGAIN! 

We can’t afford another few years of transition, we need a return on the hundreds of millions we’ve spent ‘rebuilding’ the team, and soon. I don’t think Woodward is a bad CEO, but I don’t think he’s a great one either. I do, however, think he’s unlucky to be in charge in the most unpredictable period of the club’s recent history. He must surely be thinking, ‘Why couldn’t I have had the job ten years earlier? It was easy then!’. But unfortunately, the easy days of Fergie are long gone. Woodward needs to make some big decisions to get the club back to where it should be, and I for one am glad it’s him rather than me.