GRAEME SOUNESS: These United players need to take a good look in the mirror, grow a pair and stop blaming everyone else

I don’t get the pass the buck culture at Manchester United, it’s an old cliche but look in the bloody mirror.

It’s a trend of the modern game to hear players disconnecting with the coach because they are unsure whether he will be manager come the summer, they blame his tactics, the coaching, the selection. As a player, when my team played badly it was OUR fault. It wasn’t the manager’s, it wasn’t the tactics, it wasn’t down to the coaches’ messages, it was down to us.

This United squad is getting away Scot free. They’ve been s***! You are representing Manchester United, don’t blame anyone else but yourself. It is immaterial who the manager is, you are the one that pulls on the United shirt come Saturday.

Who out of this lot truly deserves to be wearing a United shirt?

We see Bruno Fernandes hinting he may go. That shows player power these days. It used to be once you signed a contract, the club decided when you left, now the players tell the clubs when they are leaving. I’m on slightly dodgy ground as I pushed to leave Middlesbrough in 1978 but at least I was pushing to join the European champions. 

But I don’t know where these guys think they should be. They must be waking up every day thinking ‘Am I dreaming? Or am I really a Manchester United player?’ And many of us are asking the same question about them.

They shouldn’t be concerned with uncertainty about the manager, take pride in yourself.

They are playing in front of a crowd that has known a lot of success and still they are not being booed off every week. That fantastic support must be shaking their head at what they are witnessing this season. If nothing else, as a player, do your best for them. Don’t start whingeing about training or the manager and his tactics.

If you play for Manchester United, you will never have an easy game. It’s the same today if you play for Manchester City or Liverpool or Arsenal. You are every other team’s cup final so they raise their game. You have to grow a pair and take responsibility.

This lot don’t seem to understand they have to do the hard yards first. It’s no use pointing fingers, shrugging shoulders and whispering to each other as they walk off the pitch at Selhurst Park like schoolkids covering their mouths in case someone lip reads what great information they have. Who cares? Maybe if they were proper players we would be more interested in what they had to say.

After the way they went through the motions against Crystal Palace, United owe their supporters a performance.

The players are talking of a determination to put in a better display that it could give them confidence building up to the FA Cup final. To even be thinking about the FA Cup now is out of order. They should be giving absolutely everything for the final three league games. 

Only if they come off mentally and physically shattered, having had a right go, can they be remotely satisfied. It’s not been good enough. Those supporters deserve better – and that’s coming from a Liverpool man.

We have seen against Liverpool on two occasions, that United can get lucky so it’s possible they turn up against Arsenal but you would have to fancy Mikel Arteta’s side.

There are people trying to draw parallels between Arteta’s first two seasons and Erik ten Hag’s but there’s no comparison. Arsenal dropped off last year but have obviously learnt a great deal from their experience; they know they need to win every game. You would not want to be playing them now.

The day Yosser terrified me 

It was incredibly sad to hear the passing of Bernard Hill the actor.

I didn’t know him well but we had met a couple of times and memorably for the 1982 BBC series Boys From the Blackstuff where he played Jimmy ‘Yosser’ Hughes.

Alan Bleasdale, the playwright, is an old pal of mine and he had asked myself and Sammy Lee to take part. We met on set in a church in Toxteth which had been made up to look like a bar. Before the scene, Bernard sat with us and was this lovely, warm, smiling guy who talked us through how ‘we could do this’ or ‘we could do that’ and made us comfortable. 

Two minutes later, he snapped into character so convincingly, as this beast of an aggressive man, that I thought he was going to lose it and throw the nut on me which was the trademark of ‘Yosser’. I was genuinely worried I was going to have to defend myself. He was incredible.

We had hoped to reconnect as my friends at Liverpool Film Office had invited me to a private screening of the BBC series The Responder this week which Bernard is in and was also planning to attend but sadly it was not to be.

He will be greatly missed and my condolences go out to his family.

Big Jack’s Boro made me a man 

I caught up with some old friends from Middlesbrough’s team of 1973-74 this week as we celebrated 50 years since earning promotion from the old second division as champions by a record 15 point margin. I’m very fond of my time at Middlesbrough. I did a lot of growing up there under Jack Charlton who was manager. 

You had to man-up because it was Jack’s way or the highway and we had a great blend of aggression and technical ability. It formed an incredible bond between us which remains to this day. There were some great old friends that I caught up with but sadly a few have passed now and others were too poorly to make it.

I was sharing more memories at the Scotland PFA Awards in Glasgow last week too when I was honoured to receive a merit award. I caught up with friends like Neil Lennon and Alan Rough. It’s funny how we are of an age where none of us remember having a bad game.

Boehly’s steep learning curve

It will be interesting what conclusions Todd Boehly draws for his end of season review after his speech at a conference in Los Angeles this week.

Boehly says Chelsea are starting to play ‘beautiful football’ and a ‘clear plan’ is coming together. He also hopes Cole Palmer can become a household name in the United States.

Boehly is obviously an intelligent, smart man in certain walks of life but since buying Chelsea in May 2022 he has been on a very difficult learning curve. He can’t be happy with the return on his money, the pre-requisite this year would have been Champions League, but I hope going forward he has worked out who he can lean on for football knowledge.

We will wait and see if Mauricio Pochettino continues as manager. In Palmer, he has a proper player who I expect to see star at the Euros. He probably won’t start for Gareth Southgate but he’s the type of player who will perform that well as a substitute, that England will have no choice but to start him next game. There’s every chance he’ll be a household name globally after that tournament.