Manchester United should watch Moneyball scene ahead of the transfer window

There is that scene in Moneyball where Billie Beane, played by Brad Pitt, sits at the head of a table for a scouts' meeting. He hears them out, he rolls his eyes, he bites his tongue, he spits into a cup, he buries his hand in his hand. Eventually, he snaps: "Blah, blah, blah."

Three times, Beane asks, "What's the problem?" Three times, the scouts are unable to identify the problem. Beane, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics, urges them to 'think differently'.

"You have a lot of experience and wisdom in this room," one scout respectfully replies, "now you need to have a little bit of faith and let us do the job of replacing Giambi."

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Jason Giambi, the first baseman, has joined the New York Yankees. Oakland are 'organ donors for the rich', as Beane bluntly puts it.

"Is there another first baseman like Giambi?" Beane asks.

"No."

"And if there was, could we afford him?"

"No."

"Then what the f--k are we talking about, man?"

Rewatching the scene, you could place Ralf Rangnick in Pitt's place and it is not a stretch to imagine it playing out as similarly as a meeting with the Manchester United scouts.

United are higher up the food chain than the A's and had a fleeting marketing partnership with the Yankees in 2001, the year Giambi headed east. They do not always act like it, though.

Marcel Bout and Jim Lawlor can no longer implore the power-brokers to 'have a little bit of faith and let us do the job'. Bout was rewarded for two years of failure on Louis van Gaal's staff with the title head of global scouting and then presided over six years of failure in that role.

United hired a Norwegian manager and Bout watched two Norwegians in