It took us less than 5 years to turn things around.
What I will say is that Klopp came into a club that had a better footballing structure than United have now. Ours looked a mess from the outside in 2015 but in fact it was starting to take shape and reap the benefits of our recruitment strategy. It just wasn't;t that apparent until we had a manager to utilise it appropriately.
I think United could be a title challenger in the next 2-3 seasons but they'd need to appoint the right DoF, the right manager and have a more coherent approach to the entire footballing side of things. For a club of their resources not to even challenge for the league title in 6 seasons, and probably more, shows a level of mismanagement that's hard to imagine. They are likely to have finished outside the Top 4 in 4 out of 6 seasons. That was unimaginable when Ferguson retired in the summer of 2013.
That's why they're so far off though. Once they get things right — or at the very least, moving in the right direction — in terms of club structure and club infrastructure (which Mourinho frequently had a go at), they then have to get their recruitment right in terms of who is the manager and then get the recruitment right in terms of players.
Next season they're going to have to grapple with either a terrible squad full of want-away stars dogging through Europa League schedule with an inexperienced manager whose obsessed with fanning the nostalgia phase, or an absolutely astonishing turnover of players, like say 8/9 mainstay players. Realistically, no one gets that right and gets that all to gel (throw in the "who's buying them?" question too for good measure.).
They either start getting very itchy about Ole, or they recognise that while they're far off they're going in the right direction. Option A means they sack another manager, make another terrible decision and maybe hire a DoF midseason, while their world is falling apart again. Option B means they don't hire a DoF and just see how much juice they can squeeze out of the smiley lad who's leading them on their worst run of form in 60 years with no evidence that he's got a tactical plan for the team going forward, or a structural plan for the playing side of the club other offering continual fan service for the content on the Utd App.
The following season will be trying to pick the bones out of either of those situations. Another major crisis or a realisation that half the players they bought aren't working out and while they've now got a bit of identity as a team, they have to buy 6 more players this summer and hope that 4 of them work out. And add in again, their negotiating and recruitment has been a travesty since the end of the Ferguson years.
Best case scenario, we've all underestimated the guy whose delivered their worst run of defeats in 60 years and been relegated with Cardiff and managed Molde and they're very very very slowly coming up the hill in 2021/22.
