It was a wonder that Louis van Gaal’s face did not turn as scarlet as his team’s shirts.
After preaching the need for discipline and calm-headedness in the furnace of the Manchester derby on Sunday, all the new United manager got for his pains was the match-losing brainlessness of Chris Smalling.
There could be little argument that at a moment when United’s defence, which has looked so rickety and vulnerable all season, needed proper resolve in a game low on quality and high on passion, it was undone by the England defender’s two yellow cards, which ultimately proved the key for City's 1-0 triumph.
On Friday, Van Gaal had made it clear that he expected the right form of self-control from his players on his Manchester derby debut, if they were to arrest the sequence of five City wins in the previous six Premier League meetings.
"We don’t want a red card because when it is 11 v 10, it shall be very difficult to win this game. So that is also part of our preparation," had been his public warning.
So how did Smalling respond to this message?
First, in the 31st minute, when trying to stop Joe Hart with ball in hand from making a swift clearance from his box, he muscled in to block the quick delivery and received a quite needless yellow card.
Then, just before halftime when United seemed to have weathered City’s storm of attacks, which saw David de Gea making one brilliant save from Jesus Navas and one extremely brave one from Sergio Aguero, Smalling stormed in to intercept a James Milner run down the left both late and recklessly.
He had to go. "The first (yellow card) I didn’t see. I don’t know why the referee has given it but as a player when you have a yellow, you have to deal with it, you know that.
"You cannot do what he (Smalling) did for the second one. It’s not very smart. What can I say?" shrugged Van Gaal.
Smalling had shown humility when apologising to his team mates, the Dutch coach told reporters.
"You can only accept it (the apology). Nevertheless, in my opinion, this (the second yellow) is not so smart."
Not so smart? It was a good job perhaps then that Van Gaal had missed the original yellow card offence, which had immediately put Smalling under untold pressure.
Once Marcos Rojo also had to come off with a dislocated shoulder early in the second half, it meant United were reduced to repelling the waves of blue attacks with one of the weakest-looking back fours they can have ever fielded in the Premier League.
On an afternoon when hosts City had three very decent shouts for penalties turned down, the goal was just begging to be scored and when it was, the hopelessness of United’s defensive crisis was laid bare.
Yaya Toure slipped the ball inside, cutting out Antonio Valencia, and when the first-time cross from Gael Clichy was fired in, neither of the two substitute centre backs, Michael Carrick and Paddy McNair, was anywhere near the predatory Aguero.
This, in truth, did not seem much of a surprise at a point when United’s back four featured a holding midfielder and an absolute beginner as centre halves and a winger at right back.
United showed considerable resolve in staying in the uneven contest and even came close to snatching an equaliser, when Wayne Rooney rekindled old memories in his new central midfield role with a surging run into the box, including an audacious nutmegging of Vincent Kompany.
Angel di Maria subsequently forced a terrific save from Joe Hart, at least bringing Van Gaal some satisfaction amid the general red gloom.
"As a coach, you can be proud of the last 20 minutes because they showed unbelievable willpower in my opinion. We could have scored at that moment," he said.
Ultimately, though, willpower was again not enough. City manager Manuel Pellegrini, happy purely to have avoided all the pre-match muttering about the prospect of him losing back-to-back league matches with the champions for the first time, reckoned the result was all that mattered.
He would not even bring himself to criticise referee Michael Oliver for the failure to award any of the three penalty appeals involving Aguero and Toure.
"It’s a very difficult profession being a referee," he said, understandingly. Victory in the Manchester derby has a habit of making you magnanimous.
