Well, well, well, they can’t sack him now, can they? A Kobbie Mainoo artwork worthy of the Tate Modern and a sense of purpose that proved beyond Manchester City. Erik ten Hag promised Manchester United would bring the sunshine, and they did.
Sir Jim Ratcliffe in raptures, Sir Alex Ferguson smiling like it was 1999, the champions of England looking on crestfallen as the FA Cup went to United for the 13th time.
Whether a club like United winning a trophy at Wembley represented a radical shift in narrative is a funny old thought, but the occasion seemed at least a little more interesting with City not on the winning side, the defeat a first in normal time since December.
The second half felt like a week, especially after the late Jeremy Doku goal, and yes, City at least came to resemble the team that bossed the season, but United held out for a victory that seemed right. No whistle ever sounded so sexy for Ten Hag, who was hoisted to the moon by Lisandro Martinez, an unscripted moment of epic purity.
Once he had grounded his manager, Martinez ran straight to the United fans banked to his left, communing it seemed with each individually. His teammates gathered in the middle, bouncing about like schoolboys. This was probably a game too far for City, a team that looked tired in mind as well as limb. United sensed it and once ahead wrenched the initiative in a way few believed possible.
Ten Hag touched a lot of hands as he walked up those steps ahead of his team to collect the trophy, and the cheer he received as he made his way along the gantry appeared sincere, sending the watching Sir Jim and the United hierarchy an unmistakable message. Keep the faith. I told you so, was the gist of his conversation with the BBC afterwards, heaping praise on players he said were not all match fit.
“I tell you this all year. When the players are fit, we can play good football,” Ten Hag argued. “And you’ve seen a very good performance against the best team in the world, I think.”
The tone was defiant. Indeed he might have been addressing the ownership directly. Even prior to the game Ten Hag looked happier than he has for a long time, like a coach unburdened. He must have been reading the obits on social media and in the papers. His febrile rant to Dutch TV beforehand was cathartic, a portrayal of the man in full, saying it how it is.
We needed to hear more of that when it mattered. The words that accompanied the season did not accord with what we were seeing. The disconnection between his version of the truth and the reality on the pitch made him look silly. Here he regained his authentic voice, and it was refreshing. He admitted his players were not good enough, he nailed the pundit class of ex-players for criticisms that took no account of context.
Ah well, he had this day to leave a mark of sorts, to let his players speak for him in the same honest fashion, perhaps. They would need to get the ball first, of course. And if they did, would they know what to do with it against the best drilled outfit in English club history?
His patrolling of the technical area in best bib and tucker, in deference to the Prince William walk-past before kick-off, was suggestive of authority. His team fell into an organised shape suggestive of a plan. The issue with that was not only the inevitable surrender of initiative involved, but the deference it conferred, effectively admitting their inferiority. Lions need no invitation to gorge on red meat, yet Ten Hag’s battle plan was exactly that, gifting City 75 per cent possession.
On this fated afternoon, at least, a mistake changed everything. A long ball from Sofyan Amrabat caught City sleeping. In two minds a hurried Josko Gvardiol mistimed his header back to the keeper and Alejandro Garnacho rolled it in.
If that was fortunate for United, there was nothing lucky about the second, arguably the finest team goal scored this season, a red dagger through the heart of the City structure, begun and finished by Mainoo with the most sumptuous pass from Marcus Rashford in between. Where had that been this season?
The second half was all hands to the pump as City colonised Wembley, roused at last by the unfamiliar experience of trailing by two. Erling Haaland stepped out of the shadows to clobber the bar, Kyle Walker brought a spectacular TV save from Andre Onana, Julian Alvarez spooned wastefully over, trying to hit the ball too hard when placement would have been enough. And when power might have been better, he slid one wide trying to walk it home.
At the back Raphael Varane rolled back the years and Martinez was hellfire in boots with a display of vivid aggression and tenacity until he was replaced with 20 minutes to go. Rashford made way at the same time, but this was planned to bring in Rasmus Hojlund, recast as a late-season poacher from the bench.
In the end Doku had the final say in front of goal, a decent strike that benefitted from the soft hands of Onana. It made for a frantic finale. United hung on to give Ten Hag a second trophy in as many years. Enough to save his job? Over to you Sir Jim.
