Home and Away: Reigning champs are starting to look like chumps
City are stuck with a squad that cost too much, is probably too international and is ageing
For years, Manchester United fans were accustomed to the sight of their team lording it over their "noisy neighbours". It was the same for neutrals. We all knew the world was working because the English Premier League standings assured us it was.
Sure, there was a blip on the last day of the 2011-12 season when Sergio Aguero's last-gasp winner secured Manchester City's first ever title in a dramatic 3-2 victory over QPR and pushed United into second on goal difference.
But the Red Devils bounced back the next season, securing their 13th trophy in the final season of Alex Ferguson's glorious 26 years in charge. Then the world went bonkers.
A car wreck of a season will loom large if the handbrake is not applied on Sunday
For 16 crazy months, Manchester United headed south into the midtable tundra while City nabbed the title for the second time in three seasons, plus more silverware. It was a new day, heralded the pundits. The sun had altered its axis and was rising and setting in different parts of Manchester.
A false dawn more like. Last Monday a demoralised City lost 2-1 at Crystal Palace and for the first time since November 23, 2013, United now sit above them, having played the same number of games.
The reigning champions have turned to chumps, while Louis van Gaal's rejuvenated side look more likely to challenge champions-elect Chelsea.
City now trail United by a point ahead of Sunday's derby at Old Trafford, a game that has suddenly become a must-see showdown.
The critical loss at Selhurst Park has left a gap of nine points between Manuel Pellegrini's flagging warriors and Chelsea, who have a game in hand and with only eight matches to play.
For United, the beige pedestrian-paced revolution is now taking purposeful strides thanks to Van Gaal's footballing philosophy of control through possession.
This does not make for pretty attacking football, but it does lessen damage and secure points during the rebuilding process.
Last Saturday's 3-1 win over Aston Villa was proof his doctrine is not only steadying the United ship, but steering it back towards the sunlit summit.
The Reds enjoyed 76.37 per cent possession against Villa - their third-highest in the past 10 seasons of the EPL.
Underperforming players, including Marouane Fellaini and Juan Mata, have come good under Van Gaal's tutelage and a collective confidence and cohesion is evident throughout the squad.
City, meanwhile, have careered off the road, driven onto the verge perhaps by ambitious overreach.
Their first title was supposed to signal an era of domination to mirror that of their neighbours. Yet progress at the Etihad has been slight given the money spent to consolidate the club's elite status.
A car wreck of a season will loom large if the handbrake is not applied on Sunday. A humiliating derby loss would put immense pressure on Pellegrini, who is coming under fire from his growing number of detractors.
Many claim he lacks character with uninspiring dressing-room oratories and is "too nice" to his underperforming stars.
Many cite his rigid belief in the 4-4-2 system and poor substitutions for causing despair in the squad.
The gripes are borne of hearsay. But there's no denying the consecutive away losses to Liverpool, Burnley and Palace have many thinking the unthinkable - Champions League qualification failure.
The loss of form is not entirely the manager's fault. The problem lies in a squad that cost too much, is arguably too international and which, most tellingly, is ageing.
Top EPL football clubs are like first-world economies. They must invest shrewdly to move forward to survive, otherwise they are in danger of slipping into stagnation.
City's ageing fleet of world-class stars is dragging the club towards immobilism. The long English season off the back of a World Cup has taken a toll on those players who carried City over the line a year ago. Aguero, Pablo Zabeleta, Yaya Toure and Vincent Kompany are drained mentally and physically, while the £203 million (HK$2.3 billion) spent to consolidate power has bought more misses than hits.
If decline is not to become the new normal for City, then some shrewder summer purchases alongside greater dividends from the heavily invested club academy are urgently required.
