Ok. This is getting tedious. Let me spell it out for you. Di Maria had a very disappointing season. Assist are important. But assist stats do not tell the full story of a player's performance over the season. He had a nice spell at the start where he scored and assisted plenty and played well. After that he scored less, assisted less and generally played very badly resulting in him spending a lot of time on the bench. For any player it must be considered hugely disappointing to start the season as the teams best player and finish it outside the regular starting XI. Agreed?
Ah ok, I get you, you're saying his season is disappointing because he started well but then in the second half of the season he wasn't as good and in that sense it's hugely disappointing, just like Cesc Fabregas who started well, was on form and then in the second half of the season his influence dropped drastically evident by very few assists in the second half of the season but he was the highest amount of assists in the premier league and I'd say overall his season was good and in the same way when we assess Angel di Maria's season overall he wasn't that bad considering he was the second highest assist maker.
Angel di Maria scored 3 goals and got 10 assists in 1645 minutes, Cesc Fabregas 3 goals and 18 assists in 2890 minutes.
Obviously assists aren't everything but as you say 'Assists are important'. Fabregas averaged an assist every 161 minutes compared to Angel di Maria's assist every 165 minutes.
Whilst I accept both Fabregas and Angel di Maria started well but ended poor, I do think it's unfair to say their season was disappointing as a result.
As for the assists themselves; I agree that Di Maria has had a good number of assists. 5 or 6 of them were beautiful passes/crosses. He's got a great delivery when he wants to. I'm also pretty sure at least 2 maybe 3 of the assists were off target shots that worked out.
Well that's true of anybody, Ashley Young who you keep mentioning scored a lucky goal against City because of how it rebounded off him, he was lucky that could have gone anywhere but it doesn't mean it's any less of a goal.
2 maybe 3 maybe even more beautiful passes or crosses probably weren't put in the net denying Angel di Maria assists so it works both ways, according to Opta Angel di Maria had the highest chances created compared to the passes made ratio, they said 25%, 1 in 4 of his passes led to a chance for United.
I don't have the stats to hand but I would suggest you dig a bit deeper. Have a look at the sheer volume of crosses he put in this season. Then have a look at the amount which found United players. The amount of times he seemed to just whip aimless balls into the box this season was staggering. If every time you get the ball you cross it or go for the killer pass you are bound to have a good number of assists. It doesn't mean that's the right thing to do. He lost his place because he was consistently giving the ball to the other team in the form of sloppy passes and aimless crosses.
Well one in four of his passes led to chances therefore I don't think he was 'just whip aimless balls into the box', they most likely were not aimless. I've also already explained why Louis van Gaal preferred Juan Mata, keeping possession was important to protect our defence, he doesn't mind players like Angel di Maria or Robben doing risky things but he needs a team that is effective at quickly winning the ball back.
I don't know whether it was caused by him struggling to adapt to the lack of space he was being afforded in the PL or just a complete lack of confidence but being a top class footballer means knowing when to go for the killer pass and when to keep possession. Di Maria is not exempt from this expectation. No team can afford to carry any player, even a winger who constantly coughs up possession.
I don't think the premier league leaves less space for him than La Liga, also teams in Spain close players down too. He did poor passes but also excellent passes, overall it was probably quite neutral, certainly not as bad as you made out but obviously he does need to improve on the things that he did that were poor.