The move of Michael Owen from Newcastle United to Manchester last Summer was unexpected and surprising, mainly due to Michael’s injury prone history.
Experts were left scratching their head at this decision by Sir Alex. After Cristiano Ronaldo’s transfer The general consensus was that a star would jump into the new Manchester United jersey to take over for him. however, United got Luis Valencia from Wigan and Michael Owen. A player who, for the past 5 years has had injury problem after injury problem as well as inconsistent fitness and form. The fact that he is a former Liverpool player only adds insult to injury. Their were a few unhappy faces from Manchester United fans when the transfer was announced.
When the finer details of the agreement were released it became clear that once again, the shrewd Scot had been canny. Michael Owen is intended to be used from the bench and is on a pay as you play deal at Manchester United. He would not be expected to bear the lone striking responsibilities, instead he would just assist when needed.
A slow start for Owen was not helped by the fact that he hardly featured in many games and if he did, he was a late substitute. Michael Owen’s last minute goal against Manchester City showed the role Alex Ferguson had planned for him in the team. This goal was expected to kick start more involvement from Owen in the team, their was even talk about a place in the England soccer team if he could find consistent goals.
Owen has not managed to continue his form however. Another two goals has given Owen four this season from 18 games, which is not great statically despite the fact that in many games he was a substitute, There seems to be an increasing feeling that Owen’s long term stay at Manchester United is looking shaky.
Certainly, in terms of forwarding Owen’s hopes of regaining his place in the England squad, the move hasn’t worked out well for the striker. Fabio Capello has stated that his players need to be fit and playing well consistently in order to play for England.Over the past few years Owen has managed to be neither of these things. However it should be known that Capello doesn’t seem to apply this rule to all of England’s strikers, Emile Heskey looks like a certainty in the team regardless of his performance at Aston Villa.
So for the time being, Owen’s wonderful last minute goal against City has been the high point of the experiment so far. It is hard to see that Sir Alex will want it to continue much beyond the current season unless the England striker can find form and goals in greater abundance and force his way into the managers reckoning, much in the way youngster Darron Gibson is doing. Whether Owen has the ability and level of fitness to do that remains questionable and as such, it seems likely that Sir Alex’s gamble, in the long run, may not pay off.
Tags: mancheseter united, premier league, soccer