Wasteful Tottenham still left laughing at Manchester United’s humiliation in Old Trafford rout

This is shameful, but it was the 1990s, and toxic masculinity runs deep: that there was one day back when I was in Year 7 when the two softest lads in our class got into an argument during a PE lesson and were encouraged by a baying mob of 11-to-12 year olds to settle their differences in the changing room.

The two reluctantly caved to peer pressure and obliged, putting on the most pitiful and half-hearted slap fight you ever did see. It made Frasier and Niles’ brotherly squabbles look like Tyson v Holyfield. This was, of course, a needlessly cruel thing to have done, but at the time everyone found it hilarious, and was exactly why it had been so eagerly encouraged in the first place.

So it was with some anticipation that we sat down to watch Manchester United v Tottenham Hotspur, which at this point of the two sides’ seasons promised a strong possibility of a similar kind of hilariously toothless battle, only this time it would be free of that searing red-hot shame and remorse of hindsight – unless, of course, you happen to support one of the teams concerned.

As it turned out, one of the teams here actually turned out to be mildly competent – and with United showing all the fight and resistance of a bullied schoolchild, that was more than enough.

Against a side whose one really dangerous trait is playing on the counter, it takes some doing to approach the game by trying to make the pitch as big as possible, giving Tottenham several widely-spread lines of defence to get through over dozens of yards – and yet still do absolutely nothing to stop them from actually getting through those lines.

United were like a homeowner who had put up a ‘beware of dog’ sign and then looked baffled as a North London burglar took less than three minutes to figure out that no such dog actually existed.

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Gary Neville quickly declared Micky van de Ven’s run up the left to be ‘brilliant’ on commentary, with Peter Drury enthusiastically shouting about the Dutchman’s blistering pace. In reality, after taking the ball from a surrendering Marcus Rashford, van de Ven had simply knocked it about 15 yards ahead of himself and into the 18 yard box, and was still able to get into the box and cross as four red-clad guards looked cluelessly at one another, absently wondering why none of the others were going to apprehend this trespasser.

Brennan Johnson practically laughed as he tapped home van de Ven’s ball across the face of goal, and that was utterly, undeniably the correct reaction: this was just much too easy.

United scarcely got any better, and a more clinical and confident side than Tottenham are at the moment would have been off into the night with three points in the bag well before half time after slicing the hosts open with the utmost ease multiple times: Johnson hit the post after attempting his best impression of Ollie Watkins’ winner for England in the Euro 2024 semi-finals, while James Maddison and Timo Werner both wasted one-on-ones with Andre Onana after cavorting into the United box.

Tottenham’s own general sense of naivety meant United were occasionally able to get in on goal, with Guglielmo Vicario reacting well to save from Joshua Zirkzee and Alejandro Garnacho volleying against the post.

If you had told us United were wilfully self-sabotaging as some kind of protest, we’d have believed it. It is as plausible an explanation as any for just how bewilderingly awful they consistently were at even the most basic tenets of football.

United failed at simple tasks like ‘stopping crosses from going into the box’ and ‘not dribbling the ball directly out of play under the slightest pressure’ and ‘don’t petulantly kick opposition players directly in the shin right in front of the referee’ – the lattermost of which earned Bruno Fernandes a red card just before the break.

Dejan Kulusevski’s improved dink over Onana’s grasping arm immediately the the interval confirmed the inevitable was on its way; not even a side as wasteful as Tottenham were and continued to be were to be denied what should have been the coastiest of victories.

In actuality, Tottenham made hard work for themselves of that, with United finally realising they were in fact playing in an actual Premier League game and not suffering through the latter stages of an anxiety dream.

But their briefly improved efforts, coming from two goals down and with ten men, always felt more vain than valiant, as confirmed when Dominic Solanke slid in to convert Papa Matar Sarr’s flick-on from a corner. As much as we’ve joked about it, Tottenham were good, as their three goals reflected, and they will get plenty of praise for that elsewhere on this site; but the depths of United’s awfulness was reflected in the four or more goals Spurs could quite easily have scored had they come into the game in more confident form.

Erik ten Hag can take surely take nothing of use from his side’s belated efforts when what had preceded was so inexcusably bad – and United’s board can surely make no more excuses for a manager who has been given so much of what he has asked for, including the benefit of time, and constructed a side as laughably bad as this.