As the title suggests, does Van Gaal understand the English game? It has only been a day or two from his now infamous long ball press conference. It has engulfed British football fans and pundits alike into an argument; what is a long pass? What is a long ball? What is the difference?

It all came about from last Sunday’s game, when Manchester United played West Ham. After the game, ‘Big Sam’ Allardyce made the assumption that Van Gaal’s team were now “Long Ball United”. Surely, though, this comment was in jest as West Ham were below United in the table, and to be fair have in the past played ‘nineteenth century football’, themselves according to one manager. There was a time when Allardyce himself has been criticised for his own team’s performance but later laughed the previous comments off, something Van Gaal needed to do. However, the United manager went all out in a recent press conference to prove his point, a point first raised by Allardyce as a joking pun. Van Gaal obviously did not get it.

Going back to the original question, does Van Gaal understand the English game? I am of the opinion he does not. It seems that Van Gaal will not give any opposition credit, only tending to blame things i.e. the pitch, the weather, or even how the opposition play. For instance Leicester City, when United lost 5-3, Van Gaal did not give Leicester any credit, but went about saying how poor his own side was. Undoubtedly, they were poor that day, but Leicester carved United’s defence open time after time, this all done by a team just recently promoted. Van Gaal also didn’t give Cambridge United any credit after they had managed to hold the Premier League giants to a replay in the FA Cup third round. After the game at Cambridge United, Van Gaal said “I can only give credit to the coach and to staff, they did marvelous, by what I already said every aspect of the match is against us. The pitch, the ref, everything you can think about, this is against you.” Within this comment you can clearly see that even though he gives the tiniest credit to the Cambridge manager Richard Money, he surrounds the same comment in defensive tactics. He blames the pitch and referee. What he clearly doesn’t understand is that this is Cambridge United, their pitch is not going to be the lush green carpet that is laid out at Old Trafford.

Even though Van Gaal is unquestionably one of the most successful managers in the world, he has yet to see and understand the British game. He has managed some of the best sides on the planet in Barcelona and Bayern Munich. However, in Germany and Spain their domestic Cups are not taken as seriously, and are not as competitive unlike the FA Cup where as we know, anyone can beat anyone.

If Van Gaal wants to be successful in this country – arguably the toughest one to manage in – he has to understand the British media, the fans, and our style of play. Yes, he has had good results, but playing the same formation in the Premier League as he did with Netherlands in the World Cup, in my opinion will not work.

However, going back to the original point about the long ball game, here are a few stats that suggest Van Gaal may be right. According to Van Gaal, West Ham made 200 passes in comparison to Man United’s 343. He explained that 71% of West Hams long balls went forward, where United’s percentage was less than 50%. Another stat is that West Ham rank higher in the table for Long Balls where United rank higher for long passes. At this stage it may be important to stress, according to OPTA stats, that a long pass is a ball that is aimed over 25m to a man where a long ball is a 25m ball into space. Van Gaal also stated that it was near impossible to have 60% of the ball in possession when you are playing long balls/passes.

So far, the reaction to the press conference and Van Gaal’s stats has been negative, saying it was not necessary. Even ex-players like Paul Scholes have stated that Van Gaal’s comments were not needed. Next time there is a comment made, should Van Gaal do the same thing or just laugh it off? My view is the latter. Otherwise, at every press conference, it will just be him stating things that don’t need to be.

It will be interesting to see how United play in the future and whether Van Gaal goes with this style of play.