Man United top, but for how long?

So after disposing of Hull 4-0, Manchester United stand top of the Premiership as of late January. Plus ca change. Well actually, this may not be the normal order being restored, but more of a false dawn. Cracks are appearing in the edifice that Fergie has built and it would take a myopic fool to ignore the evidence. All the facts suggests that Man United are on the wane and the only way is down.

Is this the moment we have all been waiting for? Ferguson’s reign of pugilistic pestilence is beginning to unravel. After all we have been waiting for this epoch for many years now. Man United’s bubble is finally, after two decades of success, about to burst. The aura of invincibility has begun to show serious signs of stress. It could hardly be a more opportune moment to revel in the demise of the great leviathan of English club football. It has been a period of unparalleled dominance but one feels it is coming to an end, and coming soon.

Firstly, there are the financial shenanigans, which are plaguing even the biggest club in the world. The Glazers issuing of a £500 million bond looks like papering over some of the cracks but the debts are mounting despite increasing turnover. The major problem is the wage bil, which rose from £92m in 2007 to £123m in 2009, and there are fewer players on the roster so the actual increases are staggering in the harshest economic times. The air is thick with grumbling and dissension as fans express their disillusionment with the way the club is being run (into the ground?).

If the finances are in a mess then the playing side is not exactly rosy. Good players have left and not been adequately replaced. Between them, Ronaldo and Tevez contributed 87 goals in the previous two seasons, one can hardly imagine Valencia and Obertan replicating this and at the midpoint of current season they had amassed 5 goals. Berbatov is a classy forward but is becoming better known for his surliness than his silky skills.

But it’s not just the exits and entries that are causing concern in the corridors of Old Trafford, the squad is looking increasingly old and frangible. Giggs, Neville, Scholes are no spring chickens despite Giggs’ remarkable fitness there is only so much time left on those body clocks. Ferguson is struggling to replace them and more crucially there is no clear successor to Van Der Sar as neither Foster nor Kuszczak are budding Schmeichels.

There is depth to the squad but injuries to key players have undermined the quality – O’Shea, Ferdinand, Hargreaves (remember him) – have played fewer games than would be expected. There is an over-reliance on Rooney who is consistently brilliant as exemplified by his scoring all 4 against Hull. But he is not Atlas and cannot carry the rest of them on his admittedly broad shoulders. He looked exasperated during the Carling Cup semi final defeat at Eastlands and no wonder. Like England there will be a wailing and gnashing of teeth if he sustains any injury.

We have been here before and Ferguson, the master alchemist, usually pulls a string of rabbits out of his bobble hat. But the traditional January surge is not powering up and their sloppy Cup performances are maybe an indication that the good ship Fergie is listing. His recent admission that he is losing patience with some of his players is a rare and perhaps revealing insight into the travails at Old Trafford.