Ralf Rangnick critics are missing the point in Manchester United debate

The bell tolls once more and the increasingly weary eulogies are written again. Manchester United's procession has been going on for a near-decade yet nothing seems to change.

At this stage, the sombre mourning of the club is getting a bit ridiculous. Every pundit for every televised match, other than the understandably delighted Micah Richards, is there to give a soundbite 'take' on their former club's downfall.

Every game requires a post-mortem. Every elimination an inquiry. Every bad result has to come with a deep philosophical exploration into what it truly means to be United. It's this over-bloated sense of self-importance, sprinkled with absolutely nonsense terms like ' United DNA' that has helped lead to United's staggering decline; an innate feeling that United are somehow more special than any other club and are thus above the plights that affect them all.

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United are not special. They have a special history and have done special things but as an entity, they don't have any divine protection from stupid decisions. And for the last nine years, stupid decisions after stupid decisions have got them to this point.

This fine-toothed examination almost always centres on the players and the man who is hired to manage them, but they are not the ones to blame. United's owners have spent enough on their squad to insulate them from ever suffering the full wrath of their mismanagement, but they will never reach their previous glories while poor decisions continue to be made by those who hold the true power at the club.

United crashed out of the Champions League to Atletico Madrid on Tuesday in the most predictable way possible: losing