Let’s start with a spoiler alert, to be fair to all those who have alighted on this article in the hope of reading some reasoned football argument.

No, this one’s written with all the prejudice of someone who pays for his season ticket, and it concerns the subject that has bound us all so tightly this season, whether we wear the red-tinted specs of Arsenal or Liverpool, Man City, Everton  or Chelsea-blue, or prefer to watch our football in black and white at Newcastle or white and navy blue at Tottenham: The glorious, calamitous and hilarious decline of Manchester United.

Kevin Keegan once intimated he’d love their downfall but, honestly, did anyone really think we’d enjoy it quite as much as this? One of the pleasures of my job on the golf circuit has become gathering in some bar with the ex-pats wearing their team colours. We’ve all been united – pun intended – in finishing the night in a state of collapse, not through too much drink but at the latest episode of haplessness.

Crestfallen: Manchester United have struggled this season – to the delight of opposing fans across the country

Loving it! Former Newcastle manager Kevin Keegan must surely be enjoying United's struggles this season

Mock up: A number of virals have been created making fun of Man United's struggles – Moyes, as pop star Miley Cyrus, takes a wrecking ball to Old Trafford

We keep being told this transition period was inevitable given the mediocre squad with which David Moyes was bequeathed. Well, excuse me, but didn’t this mediocrity win the league by 11 points last season? 

Man United, as usual, lapped my team Liverpool several times before settling for finishing just the 38 points ahead. One point per game! This season they’re six points behind. That’s not transition, that’s the most precipitous 22-game decline in football history. Indeed, ‘Moysie’ is looking like the parting gift from Sir Alex Ferguson to fans outside Old Trafford that keeps on giving. It’s certainly the first thing Sir Alex ever did for Liverpool.

Tough tenure: Champions United, under new boss David Moyes (centre), should be performing far better

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Making fun: As United's poor form continues, more and more jokes aimed at the Red Devils are going viral – Moyes and Marouane Fellaini (right) and a mock up of the recent documentary 'The Class of '92' (left)

What must he be thinking in his executive seat? Could you imagine a Ferguson side playing counter-attacking football at the soon-to-be-renamed Theatre of Dreams against the side sitting 19th in the Premier League, for heaven’s sake, as they did against Sunderland?

It’s true Moyes has been dogged by horrendous luck. Who knew overrated ref Howard Webb would stop giving penalties to United the day Sir Alex left? Last week at Chelsea, they were undone by Samuel Eto’o scoring a hat-trick. He wouldn’t have been on the pitch if Webb had sent him off against  Liverpool, as he assuredly should have done for his disgraceful tackle on Jordan Henderson.

And what team could cope without combined talents such as Robin van Persie and Wayne Rooney?

Theatre of Dreams? Former manager Sir Alex Ferguson (pictured) would never have played counter-attacking football against a team struggling at the wrong end of the table

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Main men: Most teams would struggle without the combined talents of Robin van Persie and Wayne Rooney

Moyes wasn't spot on…

 

 

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David Moyes penned this for the Sunday Times during the World Cup in 2010. Oops…

Take Suarez and Sturridge out of my team, and they’d probably finish below Newcastle. But whenever fans of all clubs gather, it’s not these things we talk about.

Most of us have a sneaking admiration for Arsenal, and City taking over their neighbour’s mantle as the great entertainers; for Tim Sherwood in exposing AVB as the footballing pseud he appeared and the brilliant job Roberto Martinez is doing at Everton.  When it comes to Man U, alas, all sympathy seems to get left at the door. 

Is it because of a manager who proclaims he tells his players not to dive and yet all of them selected in a forward position have adopted the Tom Daley position at some point this season? Or is it euphoria at seeing the Ferguson jackboot finally freed from the throat of referees?

Perhaps it is just the lot of the biggest club, when finally knocked from their effin’ perch, although I don’t recall such gloating outside the M62 corridor when Liverpool finally met this fate.

Flying high: Most football supporters have a sneaking admiration for table-toppers Arsenal

Goals galore: A shift in power has seen City take United's mantle as the great entertainers in Manchester

 

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High praise: Spurs boss Tim Sherwood (left) and Everton boss Roberto Martinez are impressing this season

‘Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse…’ has become a  well-used refrain among the football-writing fraternity and it’s hard to see how it could, following the comical penalty shootout against Sunderland.

But we mustn’t give up hope just yet. After all, next up is the bottom club Cardiff at home… managed, lest we forget, by former United player Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.   

That would do it, wouldn’t it?

Everybody's laughing at United… Some of the most popular virals

 

 

 

Whoopsie: David Moyes as 'Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em' character Frank Spencer

 

 

Lightbulb moment: Now the joke is on United

 

 

 

Uncharitable: Fans don't want to be seen in the kit

 

Vicious cycle: Moyes apparently has no chance of catching Mourinho, Pellegrini and Wenger