(Vote) Wednesday debate: Is the Europa League worth winning for the Manchester clubs?
Feb 22 2012 | Written by Ross Highfield

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Patrice Evra described being knocked out of the Champions League as 'embarrassing'

Ross Highfield and Luke Strauss debate whether it is worth Manchester United and Manchester City giving it it their all in Europe’s secondary cup competition after being knocked out of the Champions League…

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It’s worth winning for the Manchester clubs - Ross Highfield

When Manchesters United and City crashed out of the Champions League at the group stage earlier this season, fans of rival clubs delighted in singing ‘Thursday night, Channel 5’ to supporters of the Premier League’s top two. It was a chant that neatly summarised the British attitude towards Europe’s other club competition; a needless distraction from the real business, an embarrassment to the prestige of the biggest clubs.

Yet for a club the size of Manchester United, or with the spending power and number of high-quality players of Manchester City, no competition should be taken lightly. Whilst the Champions League will remain the focus for these clubs in the future, the Europa League represents a chance to win silverware this season.

Manchester City in particular have not yet earned the right to take the Europa League lightly. For all the money the club has spent, it has taken part in just one Champions League campaign, and failed to progress past the first stage. To treat this competition with disrespect would be a significant mistake. Progress and victory in the Europa League may be less glamorous, but co-efficient points that will benefit City’s future Champions League progress can be added by winning matches in all UEFA competitions. City were drawn in the Group of Death in this season’s Champions League alongside Bayern Munich, Napoli and Villarreal. Such a difficult draw would have been unimaginable were City not in the third group of seeds owing to their lack of European profile.

The competition is often written off as a ‘distraction’ but this ignores the fact that City and United have both amassed squads big enough to be fighting on numerous fronts. Both teams are already out of the two domestic cup competitions, meaning the league and the Europa League are the only competitions left to play for. To win the Europa League would take just eight more games from this point, and it would be a severe indictment on a Manchester City squad assembled at such huge cost were they not able to handle 21 games between now and the end of May.

It also represents an opportunity for the bigger clubs to rotate their squads, to keep fringe players happy, and more importantly, fit and ready to play in a tough run-in in the league. Manchester City could play the likes of Kolo Toure, Aleksandar Kolarov, James Milner, Nigel de Jong, Adam Johnson and Mario Balotelli in this competition without even touching their first 11.

To their credit, both Manchester clubs and indeed Stoke City have taken the competition seriously thus far. Stoke manager Tony Pulis can often grate but his comments regarding the Europa League have been positive throughout and his team has constantly tried to progress, even when facing a tough test against Valencia just days before an important (and more winnable) FA Cup game against Crawley.

Man City brought on Sergio Aguero with the score at 1-1 on Thursday evening and ended up gaining a priceless 2-1 victory at Porto. Their willingness to bring on such a player and not simply settle for a 1-1 draw demonstrated that City were rather keen to get the job done. On the same evening, Manchester United strolled past an exciting Ajax team with a 2-0 win in Amsterdam. None of the British clubs – including, earlier in the competition, a Birmingham side who could have been forgiven for focussing entirely on getting out of the Championship – has treated the Europa League with the contempt so often expressed in the media and amongst fans.

Yet the most compelling argument to do one’s utmost to win this competition is that all great clubs have a strong winning mentality. Manchester City’s immense riches will mean little if trophies are not won, and whilst the FA Cup would not have been at the top of Sheikh Mansour’s wish-list when he bought the club, victory in that competition last May was a pivotal moment in City’s development as a club. It was a statement of intent, a gauntlet thrown down to their rivals. It was tangible proof that this team was here to win.

Of course, the Premier League is the top priority for both Manchester clubs, but just as the FA Cup served as a warning to City’s domestic rivals, victory in an European competition (even in the lesser competition) would send out a similar message to the rest of the continent. Barcelona won five trophies in 2011 and have won 13 out of 16 trophies the team has competed in since Josep Guardiola took over the club in 2008. The self-belief that comes from winning silverware is not something that can be bought, even with Sheikh Mansour’s billions. Great clubs win trophies.

It’s not worth winning for the Manchester clubs - Luke Strauss

When Manchester United exited Europe’s elite competition, the Champions League, Patrice Evra could amass four words to describe it: “a catastrophe”, “embarrassing” and “devastating”. Does this sound like a player who is excited to play in the Europa League, or one who sees it as a big disappointment to be in it?

For both Manchester clubs, it was not a realisation that they would have a chance to win the Europa League, but that they failed to advance in Europe’s top competition and to live up to their huge expectations as elite football clubs. Whilst watching the United games against Basel, I sat alongside my United-supporting housemates who looked on in frustration as their side were detached from the upper echelons of European football for a season. It showed that for clubs like Manchester United and City, playing in elite competitions meant more than lowering themselves to the second-tier.    

But why is this an unnecessary distraction?

United and City, contrary to the likes of Stoke and Birmingham, contain some of the world’s best footballers showcasing their talents at the top of the Premier League, so being demoted from the top of European football doesn’t sit well by their standards. United, with all their history as England’s most successful football club, have to strive for the top, always wanting to be the best and therefore winning Europe’s second-tier competition will not do them justice.

Furthermore, the subsequent schedule changes have an effect as games in Europe will no longer be on a Wednesday but a Thursday night and therefore domestic fixtures are moved around. When it comes to crunch time in the league, the last thing you want is to be flying across Europe to play in a competition believed to be beneath you. Tottenham Hotspur treated the competition as a chance to play some of their youth and reserve players, resting key first team members, and you can see what effect that is having as Spurs are having their best domestic season for a very, very long time.

Although Stoke City will not see the Europa League as an unnecessary distraction, you have too look at it from a different angle. They started their season with Europa League qualifiers occurring at the end of July. This meant that, contrary to the majority of other Premier League teams, they have played more games this season than anyone else. This can have an impact on their domestic campaign as when you compare this season and last season, Stoke were three places higher and therefore one can suggest that players are tiring quicker and not performing as well. The probability of Stoke reaching the last stages of the Europa League are bleak, especially after losing 1-0 at home to Valencia and as a result, maintaining consistent Premier league form and staying in the division will be a priority.

I believe that unless the Europa League is your top priority as a club, then it is an unnecessary distraction because if you ask any United or City fans whether they’d want to win the Premier League or the Europa League, I think we all know what the answer would be.

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Written by Ross Highfield on Feb 22 2012. Filed under Online Exclusives, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry