The pessimism on here has definitely surprised me when you consider the changes that have occurred at the club in the last 18 months. The following people have left the club: Sir Alex, David Gill, all the coaches Steele, Rene, Phelan, Scholes, Giggs, Rio, Vidic, & Evra. All that experience leaving from all levels of the club.
The club was always going to struggle, like it or not. If there is anything that has been handled by the club badly I would say it was that such a transition occurred so suddenly. So much experience walking out the door in such a short period of time was always going to hurt us. The club really should've planned the Gill/SAF exit better, i.e. have SAF retire, then when the new manager is settled, let Gill go as well. Ditto with the squad, losing the on-field and off-field leadership and experience of Rio, Vidic, and Evra was always going to leave us struggling at the back. So the fact that we haven't won a game thus far isn't hugely surprising, LVG is having to gel together a whole new squad.
I don't share a lot of the pessimism expressed on here. Cast your mind back to De Gea signing. His first 6-8 months at the club were like a microcosm of what's going on now at the club. It was clear he was a talented player but he struggled big time when he started out. He's now one of our most important players, it just took a while for his class to shine through and find his feet. LVG is clearly an excellent manager with experience at the highest level and he is managing a squad that whilst at the moment not playing good football has a lot of talent. Once all the signings start to bed in and our players come to grips with the new game plan I think United will be a much different proposition for opposition teams.
Make no mistake this is the biggest transition the club has been through his SAF took over and it was never going to be plain sailing. I think the most important thing for the club now is to stick to their guns and persist. Persist with the game plan, the players, the manager. You look at a club like Tottenhan. A constant revolving door of managers reminds me of that old saying "don't confuse motion with progress, a rocking horse doesn't stop moving but goes nowhere." Tottenham constantly change managers and as a result they go no where.
I'm definitely optimistic that LVG can get us back to challenging for the title in the three years he is with us.