This defeat will hurt Louis van Gaal. History tells us that he doesn’t like conceding ground to Ronald Koeman.
It will disturb Manchester United supporters even more, though, simply because it is indicative of changed circumstances.
During the golden years, only the really big teams came to Old Trafford with victory in mind. Now, that invitation is open to any side who have the courage and nerve to take it. Sides such as Southampton.
Koeman’s team didn’t win this match with a smash and grab. It was no backs-to-the-wall, hang-on-and-hope operation. Not a bit of it.
Southampton came to Manchester looking to outplay United, while Saints’ manager came to prove himself tactically more astute than the compatriot with whom he once worked fractiously at Ajax.
As the result suggests, both plans worked. The winning goal in the 69th minute, from Serbian substitute Dusan Tadic, surprised nobody, while United’s jumbled attacking formation failed to produce anything resembling a chance until Juan Mata missed a couple of opportunities late on.
Southampton goalkeeper Fraser Forster had to be vigilant but no more than that. He won’t be washing his gloves this week, so rarely did he have to use them.
An interesting fact — the one that dominated social-media chat at full-time — was that United ended the game without registering a shot on target. That put Wayne Rooney’s suggestion that United had ‘deserved to win’ into its proper context and was indicative of the home team’s impotence in the final third of the field.
Perhaps equally as pertinent, though, was that this was a game that ended with no late cavalry charge from United. Here at Old Trafford, United teams used to view the possibility of victory for their opponents as an affront to their pride, as an insult even.
Even on the days they did lose, they did so while threatening to kick the door down.
Not on Sunday, though. Van Gaal made late substitutions and changed things round a bit. He pushed Rooney up the middle and threw on Marouane Fellaini to try to unsettle Southampton physically.United still ended the game quietly, though. Beaten in every way.
Young striker James Wilson remained on the substitutes’ bench while Radamel Falcao — £280,000-a-week Radamel Falcao — watched from afar, having failed to make the squad.
It was all a little odd, but then maybe not that odd at all. For this is the type of thing that always looks as though it may happen to United these days.
The misery and defeatism of David Moyes’s time at United has disappeared but a vulnerability remains. Indeed, Van Gaal’s United have the same number of points that Moyes’s team did after the same number of games. Koeman was gracious afterwards but still struck a relevant theme when he mentioned the ‘difficulties’ of United’s three central defenders. He also stated that victory had not surprised him.
‘It is a good feeling,’ he said. ‘Certainly it’s better than how I felt when United beat us at Southampton.’
Southampton began brightly, and Steven Davis and Pelle were denied by interventions from Chris Smalling and Luke Shaw respectively. Pelle also headed wide from a corner before, with 21 minutes to go, United’s defence was breached.
It was Tadic’s vision that did the damage. He seemed to have his head down amid a sea of red after United had failed to clear a long pass to the edge of their own area. But somehow the Southampton man spotted Pelle unmarked to his right and squeezed the ball out to his team-mate.
One on one with David de Gea, Pelle should have scored, but even though his shot rebounded from the near post, Tadic was alert enough and calm enough to side-foot the ball back into the empty goal from 15 yards.
There was still time for United and Mata could — maybe should — have scored late on.
Twice Daley Blind provided the Spaniard with good chances but twice he failed to hit the target. Soon after, he missed again with a half volley.
In many ways, Mata sums up the current United. Talented but unreliable, only sporadically impressive.
