Richard Kurt: Manchester United's darkest hour of the night comes just before the dawn

Here we are yet again, in ‘new season = new manager’ mode for the third time in three years, wondering whether this is now going to be A Thing.

“Repeat to fade” is the phrase that springs to mind: isn’t this how the former Manchester City died away, in the good old/bad old days of the ’70s and ’80s?

Actually, I’m proposing that purely for rhetorical effect. Nobody I know is thinking along these lines — we’re all too excited, repeatedly banging the ‘11’ button on the Giddy-O-Meter like e-numbered kids at the funfair.

But you could easily make the case, should you be so inclined, that we hyperventilating Reds are getting ahead of ourselves.

After all, “you’re only as good as your last job” runs the cliché, and José’s last job was a total disaster. Zlatan was last seen making no impact whatsoever on Euro 2016, and even less of one on the European Cup quarter-finals before that.

Pogba has tramped lazily through most of the last six months and then signally failed to do the Great Player duty of rescuing his country in its two hours of need.

Ditto Rooney.

Yet these are the leaders who are now going to guide us out of the Vale Of Tears (prop. Moyes & Van Gaal), are they?

Well, let’s just assert “erm, yes, yes, they are”, and move on. For there is no better month than August for banishing negative thoughts, donning the garb of Dr Pangloss, and singing from Polyanna’s songbook. (“We’re unbeaten and joint top of the table!” chimes in August’s innocent child.)

The fact is that I, like almost other Red I know, am jumping up and down like a Christmas kid and cannot wait to open this gleaming gift of a season.

Not since the afterglow-bathed summer of 2008 have we felt so generally up for the cups, and not since the start of that decade have we had such a thrilling transfer season, Veron being the last Pogba-size star deal the club had done.

Yes, we know Zlatan is a ridiculous prima donna but he’s an excitingridiculous prima donna — and after the three seasons we’ve just been through, that’s almost all that matters. Pogba’s rappy swagger and cocky attitude may put some backs up but the prospect of him rampaging through midfield like a continental Keane has us salivating.

And Mourinho is, well, Mourinho: The name encapsulates a multitude of well-documented sins as well as obvious talents, there’s no denying it.

But after three years of the crazed Van Gaal and the cringing Moyes, a dose of Mourinho magic, no matter how black, is what we crave.

Most importantly of all, weare what he craves .

Here is someone whose desperate drive to give us what we all want will never be in doubt.

He has panged for this job for a dozen years, ever since he first danced down the Old Trafford touchline to celebrate his Oportan charges’ success.

That’s a long time to keep a torch aflame in this day and age — especially when it burns your fingers, as it did in 2013. We Reds are only human, after all: It is hard for us not to desire that which so desires us.

We’re currently playing ‘guess the ideal team’ and compiling lists of those we’d like to see shipped out, most of which feature Fellaini, and some dare include Rooney. Kremlinologists speculate that José is not fooled by Rooney, and will give him enough rope with which to hang himself before letting someone else take the ‘10’ role.

On that score, the Armenian whose name we cannot spell lurks in the wings, though may have to play on the wings first.

As for what we want, the title dominates all other silvery contenders. Last season’s FA Cup triumph has sated any particular desire for the domestic cups.

Those of a stamp-collecting mindset may hanker for the Europa League to ‘complete the set’, as it were, but to most of us it’s little more than an amusing sideshow offering the chance to visit some unexpected bywaters.

Above all such considerations, as ever, reigns the simple Red desire to be proud of the way we play, because that is how we wish to be represented to the world: As fans that prize being over having, poetry over prose, and memories over material.

We have suffered three years of boredom, smacks in the face, and outright embarrassments; three years, in fact, of not being the famous Man United anymore.

Enough, already. Bring back the fear and the loathing, the goals and the passion, and the roar of a crowd that has something to roar about at last. And if it involves giving City the odd good hiding along the way, so much the better.