They didn’t christen this place the Theatre of Dreams because you came here for a good old snooze.
But the Premier League’s first half-billion-pound match confirmed that the days ofManchester United playing swashbuckling, lock-up-your-daughters football are long gone.
When Sir Alex Ferguson hung up his hairdryer, they urged David Moyes to ‘play like Fergie boys’. They don’t even bother asking the same of Louis van Gaal.
Under the Dutchman, United have regained Champions League status and even have a genuine chance of winning the title in this most open of seasons. But if you want entertainment, forget it.
In pictures - Man Utd 0-0 Man City:
Van Gaal has got a lot right, United are better than the sum of their parts defensively, and two of his summer signings, Morgan Schneiderlin and Anthony Martial, were arguably the best players on the pitch.
Yet the decision to shunt Martial out to the left and play Ander Herrera directly behind Wayne Rooney set the tone for an afternoon of stifling caution.
Rooney was frustrated and frustrating in equal measure. Life had hardly begun at 30 for the United and England captain, a day after his landmark birthday.
Asked about his skipper, Van Gaal snapped: “I’m not going to talk any more about Wayne Rooney because I’m sick of it.”
The most memorable moment for Rooney arrived when he suffered a badly gashed head in an accidental collision with Vincent Kompany – but he might as well have spent his afternoon bashing his noggin against a brick wall.
Rooney’s lack of touch summed up the dismal quality of the richest match in the history of the world’s wealthiest league, supposedly watched by hundreds of millions worldwide.
But how many were still glued to their screens when Jesus Navas produced the first shot on target in the 82nd minute was another matter. The Chinese president had visited Manchester City on Friday and if he needs an alternative to water torture, he could show political opponents endless replays of this.
City had some valid excuses – they were away from home, lacking their two most potent attacking players in Sergio Aguero and David Silva – and they nudged their way back to the summit with this point.
Manager Manuel Pellegrini admitted he had ditched his attacking principles to grind out a point, suggesting he’d had to watch the action with a clothes peg on his nose. It was City’s first goalless draw in a Premier League match since a visit to Norwich 61 matches and 20 months ago.
Somebody will turn up on the internet and tell us this was some sort of fascinating tactical battle, but that sort of thing is all just part of the great Premier League smokescreen.
Too many people have invested too much money to admit that the majority of the time the product simply isn’t very good.
Van Gaal rolled out his prepared excuse of having played in Moscow in the Champions League on Wednesday and he claimed United should have had a penalty when Herrera went down having been brushed by Raheem Sterling. But few paying punters would have sounded as positive as the manager about United’s lack of attacking ambition.
They only really threatened after the introduction of Marouane Fellaini, prompting a more direct approach.
Joe Hart slid out to deny Juan Mata and then finally, in the last five minutes, United sub Jesse Lingard clipped a volley against the bar from Martial’s chip.
Then Fellaini got on the end of a free-kick, heading down for Chris Smalling’s shot which finally asked a save of Hart after 88 long minutes.
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