Painful to Watch

Last night in Manchester, a strange sense of déjà vu must have filtered through the Professor's mind. Watching your chief export do the dirty on your team, in an excellent performance of the sort he didn't give when he was last with you, must be a painful experience. And losing a match you shouldn't have lost, courtesy of an own goal and a sorry loss of concentration — that must be all too familiar in this part of the country.

It's the same with other former champions that have to rebuild. They'll deny it a lot at first, but the rebuilding takes time and effort, and isn't always successful. Sometimes, it never is. One has hopes for the future, and that the best is still yet to be. But one also worries about the present, and signs of familiar degeneracy.