There is a sense of pain and embarrassment at Manchester Unitedwhich may just be their biggest weapon in trying to overcome Bayern Munich and reach the Champions League semi-finals.
“Of course it hurts,” defender Phil Jones said, as he reflected on the criticism, the defeats and the ridicule heaped on the club and David Moyes this season.
“It’s our job,” Jones said. “When you go into training on the back of a defeat it’s horrible. The place is... you don’t want to go into training the next day.
"But you have to pick yourself up and we’ve had to do that too many times this season. But hopefully we can keep our run going in the Champions League.”
The competition has the capacity for salvation, as Chelsea found in 2012, and United have given themselves a puncher’s chance in Munich with the 1-1 draw in the quarter-final first leg last week, a result built on team shape, determination, spirit and the cute tactic of exploiting the pace and athleticism of Danny Welbeck.
There were a few more subtle tactical tweaks as well – such as allowing the Bayern right-back Rafinha as much possession as he wanted, as his distribution is a relative weakness – but essentially Moyes fell back on an approach that had served him well during his 11 years at Everton.
Jones admitted that the team were set up to hit Bayern “on the counter-attack” and there was little concern that they claimed only 30 per cent of possession in a home tie.
Moyes said: “You can look at some Champions League games recently where teams have sat back and then got something, so I don’t think there’s any shame in what we did. Tactically, we played very well on the night.”
That policy of containment is not enough for United in the long term. But in the short term, when drawn against the European champions and a team widely regarded as the best on the continent, with the best coach in Pep Guardiola, it is acceptable – certainly if United make the last four.
“We’ve definitely got a chance,” Jones said. “They had a lot of possession but they probably did not create as many chances as they have done in other games.
"Defensively we were reasonably sound, albeit they scored a goal. We studied Bayern and what their weaknesses are and hopefully we can exploit them again.
"You can see that on the counter-attack we can be dangerous even though it will be a completely different game in Munich.”
Moyes suggested that he may “have to think differently” in the second leg, but it would be a surprise if the game had a radically different template.
Moyes had identified Bayern’s vulnerability to pace – he even referenced how Theo Walcott was missed by Arsenal – and the fact that Guardiola demands his team to squeeze up incredibly high.
United lack stellar speed, but Welbeck is one of the few exceptions. He also has a physical presence that can harry defenders through the centre while being astute enough to pull wide to make them make a decision: do they pass him on or track him?
United added to this with Wayne Rooney’s prodigious work-rate. He dropped deeper and covered more ground, and also pushed up to press and support Welbeck. Moyes will be desperate for him to have recovered from his toe injury by Tuesday.
Further reason for hope came on Satursday when Bayern’s 53-game unbeaten run ended with a 1-0 league defeat at Augsburg.
There is another factor that might just sow a seed of doubt in Bayern’s minds and help United: they have failed to win any of their last four games against English clubs in the Allianz Arena.
They lost to Manchester City and Arsenal in 2013, plus Chelsea’s penalty shoot-out win and Arsenal’s draw last month.
Nemanja Vidic, United’s captain and scorer in the first leg, laid out what he expects. “It will be the same, they will have a lot of possession as that is the name of their game – to wait for someone to make a mistake or leave the space for them,” he said.
United need to score. But they do not need to win. A 1-1 scoring draw takes them to extra-time and then penalties; a 2-2 draw takes them through on away goals.
In the last round Jose Mourinho claimed that going into the home leg with a 1-1 draw, as Chelsea did against Galatasaray, was a dangerous scenario.
The theory is that if the tie goes to extra-time, the away team has the advantage. One goal from them and the home side has to score twice.
No one quite believes that although the statistics, marginally, show that over the past five years 53 per cent of teams who emerged from the first leg at home with a 1-1 draw have progressed – something United know only too well.
They were eliminated by Real Madrid having left the Bernabéu with that scoreline last season. So much has changed since then for United and they are, rightly, the outsiders.
But they do have that puncher’s chance.
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