This was published 6 months ago
Van Gaal or Pochettino? Fork in the road that brought $52m French star to A-League
By Vince Rugari
Something usually has to go pretty wrong for a player of Morgan Schneiderlin’s calibre to become attainable for an A-League club at a reasonable age – not that the Western Sydney Wanderers are complaining.
That moment came almost eight years ago, when Schneiderlin, a 15-time French international, was weighing up a decision that would ultimately define his career.
If Morgan Schneiderlin had his time again, he would have probably chosen Tottenham Hotspur over Manchester United.Credit: Getty
He had two choices, neither of which looked bad on face value: he could follow his old coach Mauricio Pochettino to Tottenham or accept the magnetic overtures of Manchester United.
His heart was telling him to go with Spurs and Pochettino, but it was overruled.
“Every year, I have this discussion with my family and my friends,” Schneiderlin, now 33, says with a laugh when asked to review this choice.
After seven seasons at Southampton – two of which were under Pochettino as the club rose from England’s League One to the Premier League through consecutive promotions – he picked Manchester United, who paid a whopping £25 million ($52 million) for his services.
Morgan Schneiderlin says he’s still got plenty more to give in his football career.Credit: Edwina Pickles
Only two years removed from the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson, nobody foresaw the fall from grace that United would experience. In retrospect, it was a mistake.
“In football, you cannot have any regrets,” Schneiderlin explains. “And I don’t, because I wore this jersey of Manchester United. It was a dream for me as a boy. I made the decision because it’s the biggest club in the world, and you realise [that] even more when you play for Manchester United, in terms of commercial, in terms of how many fans are following this team.
“It was an honour for me. I will never regret this.”
Long pause.
“But,” he continues. “When I left Southampton, yes, I had many options in England; I had many options abroad. I wanted to stay in England. Honestly, Mauricio Pochettino was doing his best to bring me to Tottenham. My heart was telling me, ‘follow him’, because I knew him.
“Mauricio Pochettino was, for me, the best that I had. He has everything that a manager requires. As a human being, he’s top. As a tactician, he’s top. He made me understand the game even better. He’s a top manager, and I loved him.
“It’s always hard to say, but maybe it’s one of my regrets, that I couldn’t work with him after that.”
Morgan Schneiderlin rates Mauricio Pochettino as the best manager he’s ever had.Credit: Getty
As Spurs went on to challenge for the Premier League title with Pochettino, Schneiderlin’s standing and perception – as well as United’s fortunes – began to nosedive.
It was at Old Trafford where he would become typecast as a defensive-minded midfielder, a stay-at-home No.6, vastly different to the more freewheeling, expressive box-to-box role he flourished in at Pochettino’s Southampton.
The overbearing, restrictive methods of Louis van Gaal, who he once said turned him into a “robot”, did not work for him.
“It didn’t really match,” Schneiderlin says. “I have great respect for him because he’s a big manager, he’s won a lot, and even what he did beforehand, I only have respect. But I felt restricted in my game. I felt like I couldn’t give my best.
‘It didn’t really match’: Morgan Schneiderlin and Louis van Gaal at Manchester United.Credit: Getty
“After, I told myself, ‘You should have done this better. You should have not listened to everything, you should have played your game a bit more’, but at the time it was very frustrating because I knew that I was in my prime.
“I don’t know how my career would have gone if I went to Tottenham, but it’s not a regret. Manchester United is Manchester United. But I didn’t arrive in the best moment for the football club. It was in transition after Ferguson, I could feel that. The mood was not great.”
Schneiderlin played 32 times for United in one-and-a-half seasons, and when Jose Mourinho took over, he was sold to Everton. But he was never able to recapture his best form and, in the eyes of football’s elite, his card was already marked.
Four years later, he was back in France with Ligue 1 side Nice, who recently deemed him surplus to requirements.
Now he’s with the Wanderers, who face Western United at CommBank Stadium on Sunday. He could have stayed in France’s top league, or gone somewhere else, but he didn’t want to join a team that would be battling against relegation – he wanted a new experience that would give him a chance to win something and under a coach who understood how best to use him.
It took one conversation with Wanderers boss Marko Rudan to convince him, and now he’s here in red and black ready to begin a new midfield partnership with young gun Calem Nieuwenhof – one that, he expects, will allow him to do what he does best once again.
“My best years were when I had freedom to do box-to-box, to play, to get on the ball and everything,” he says. “He knows this.
“And now he’s playing with two midfielders. I like it. When I went to Manchester, after, maybe people thought that I was just a No.6 who was staying in front of the defence, maybe they got a picture of me like this, but I’m someone who likes to run, I like to sometimes have the freedom, to play with someone who’s going to compensate my run into the box and stay [back in defence].”
Schneiderlin shares a common trait with some of the A-League’s best imports, many of whom were also destined for big things but never quite got there: he comes to Australia with a point to prove – to the football world at large, but also to himself.
“The fans can expect a lot from me,” he says. “Pressure doesn’t make me scared. Pressure just makes me want to do better and be better. I’m just going to play my game, trying to be the best version of me as possible.
“I tell everyone, I’m not coming here for holiday. Obviously, the last six months, I haven’t played much, and that made me even more realise how much I love football, and how much I want to play. I think this club has everything to win something, even for this season. That’s why I came here.”
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