'You crossed a line' - dealing with Manchester United players over player ratings

Eight years ago, the MEN football desk phone rang and this reporter was on hand to pick up the handset.

"Hello?"

"Is Samuel Luckhurst there, please?"

"Yes, speaking?"

"What was that 3/10 all about?"

Despite that inauspicious start, the exchange with the player's PR adviser was light-hearted. Reasons were outlined for what was, in retrospect, too harsh a mark for a goalless game that Manchester United had dominated.

Nearly two years later, I followed the player's brother on Instagram. Almost immediately, he tagged me in an Instagram Story, referring to the rating.

What is apparent with a lot of footballers and staff at clubs is they are more negative than the journalists who cover them. They home in on the negative. You do not hear a peep from them when positive pieces are published.

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I was banned from a press conference last season and denied questions at three consecutive press conferences for criticism of Erik ten Hag. I was not expecting a one-on-one with him for writing United were considering keeping him two days after the FA Cup final.

Ten Hag also gets a manager rating. He does not check it but it is occasionally brought to his attention. Like the 1/10 for the FA Cup semi-final farce against Coventry. Hence the enforced silence at successive press conferences. United felt the rating had "crossed a line".

You cannot blame a United press officer for keeping Ten Hag in the loop. The communications department are duty-bound to keep him abreast of the headlines and Ten Hag is presented with cuttings of the prominent United-related stories and pieces every morning.

But back to the player ratings. What most journalists consider to be an afterthought are taken very seriously by many supporters.

A besuited member of staff from Aston Villa approached me on Sunday and introduced himself. Automatically fearing the worst, this correspondent wondered what he had done or said to have offended Villa in the past.

It turned out the Villa employee is a United fan. Rather flatteringly, he told me that after a United result the first thing that is posted in his family's WhatsApp group are my player ratings.

An erstwhile colleague at the MEN and United season-ticket holder confessed that the first thing he did when he got into the car with his father after a United match was to play a guess-the-rating game.

One of the dilemmas the MEN football desk used to have was which article to publish immediately after the final whistle. After some trial-and-error and a change of sport editor in springtime 2016, it was apparent that it had to be the player ratings.

It is easy to zone out if there is any hassle from supporters over a rating. But not relatives. It was not appreciated when my father messaged to query a rating while I was trying to make head or tail of United's FA Cup quarter-final for the ages against Liverpool in March.

Two months later, United had just won the FA Cup against City, their sweetest domestic cup win in nearly 30 years. Almost every player scored an 8/10 or 9/10. Rather than popping a cork, my father took umbrage at Andre Onana's score.

"Everything spot on, but you need to increase the Onana rating to a 7. His save from Walker was exceptional and whilst he should have saved from Doku, he was very good apart from that." Reading those final 21 words, perhaps a late career-change beckons.

Searching 'rating' in my WhatsApp history, he pops up again: "You need to change Maguire's rating. He was excellent." That was also post-Liverpool cup tie. My mother rebuked me for giving Onana a six in Porto last week. He was upgraded to a seven - after the final whistle.

"How can you give X that?" tends to be a popular query. Those of us in the press box are fixated on our laptop screens for such a sizable portion of games that our subjective summaries can differ markedly from those whose eyes are fixed only on the pitch.

The story goes that John Terry once complained to a journalist in the mixed zone about a 6/10 he had received. "John, it's simple," Terry was informed. "If you stop afterwards you're a 7/10 every week."

Sky Sports published my ratings from United's 4-0 thumping at Liverpool in April 2022. Paul Pogba cried off that evening shortly after the first goal went in on five minutes and he never played for United again. He is one of a handful of players to have got a zero.

During my appearance on Sky, I suggested the sole positive from a galling night was that Pogba would not play for United again. His cousin swiftly vented at me on Twitter, before deleting the post.

Pogba earned a few 9/10s and he is not the sole recipient of a 0. The 4-0 hammerings at Everton on Easter Sunday 2019 and Brentford in Ten Hag's second match in charge chalked up five more 0s.

David De Gea is the only United player to have earned a 10 - twice. The first was for his 13 saves in the 3-1 victory at Arsenal in December 2017. The second was for his 11 stops in the 1-0 defeat of Tottenham in January 2019. The latter mark was, in hindsight, excessive. The win was United's sixth in succession under caretaker manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and beating Mauricio Pochettino made his upgrade to permanent manager an inevitability.

A member of Marcus Rashford's entourage sent an email complaining about two ratings 18 months apart. There was no correspondence expressing gratitude whenever Rashford got 9/10.

There was some charming fan mail after United's opening weekend defeat to Brighton in August 2022. Within minutes of the final whistle, an email dropped in my inbox from Valtteri Visama. The subject: "Do you have a relationship with Harry Maguire?"

"Honestly just f**k you. You are damaging the club so much with the pr you are giving to the fridge. F*****g Glazer lover English bias t**t!!!" He did not get in touch regarding Maguire's rating six days later at Brentford (1/10).

In January 2020, a confidant of Andreas Pereira's got in touch. Pereira's media team had signalled "red flags" in my coverage, highlighting Pereira's ratings.

The discussion was cordial and benefited all parties. My view that Pereira did not have the requisite quality to be a regular for United was unchanged but his ally provided enlightening context that partly accounted for his struggles.

United bought Bruno Fernandes the following week. Pereira started only three more games for the club and spent the next two years out on loan before his sale to Fulham.

Phil Jones complained to United's main press officer after his 4/10 at Arsenal in May 2017. A marketing agency that handled Fred shared his positive end-of-season player rating in an Instagram Story.

When our press team was getting battered by the United staff during the end-of-season game at Old Trafford last year, a smug opponent enquired how harsh my ratings would be.

That was a day to phone them in.