It’s been over seven years since Manchester United last won the league title, but Andy Cole thinks improving in one key area will end their suffering soon.
Cole doesn’t foresee Manchester United challenging for the Premier League title until 2023. Rediscovering their consistency is key and until they get it right, challenges for top honors are off the table.
David Moyes, Louis van Gaal, and Jose Mourinho have all tried and failed to restore United’s glory days since Sir Alex Ferguson retired in 2013.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer is the latest manager to try his luck in the Old Trafford hot seat and has experienced mixed results so far. Inconsistency, in fact, has been a regular theme since he took charge in December 2018.
An underwhelming start to the current campaign has piled more pressure on the Norwegian. United are down in 14th in the Premier League, reigniting rumors once more of Mauricio Pochettino replacing him.
But Rio Ferdinand insists the gossip is false, and Cole is the latest of Solskjaer’s former teammates to back him.
“Two years,” replied the ex-Red Devils striker when asked by the Mirror when the club can expect another title challenge.
“You watched the game on Sunday, Manchester City and Liverpool, that’s the level Manchester United have to get to and that’s not going to happen by next season.
“Everything is a process. It’s about consistency. In football it’s consistency and confidence and if you marry those things together then football won’t change.
“You have to be consistent in that as well. The gaffer always used to say that if you had eight or nine playing well of course you can carry the team. If you’re all playing well then who is going to beat you? You need that belief.
“We used to beat teams in the tunnel. They’d want to keep us quiet for 20 minutes but we’d want to score two in the first 20 minutes – and, from there, everything is possible.
“It’ll take two years because you have to add players, improve, add two or three players and really improve the team. That’s where you find the consistency.
“Ole is a Man United legend and of course he knows what it takes. I hope he gets as much time as is needed. When United get it right, they get it right and they dominate because they got it right.”
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