At the risk of this sounding like spin, sometimes when there appears to be a setback you have to remember where you were just 2 or 3 years ago. For MAN, that was having no service to the US West Coast or to Boston, let alone Seattle. For Summer 2019 (still not fully finalized) it looks like we'll have 5 per week to Los Angeles (up from 3 per week this year), 3 per week to San Francisco (down from 5), 3 per week to Seattle (up from 2), 3 per week to Boston (down from 4) and an extra flight per week to JFK in peak Summer. That's the changes we know about. Overall I think it is roughly neutral, there's less choice on some routes and more on others. No destinations have been lost from the portfolio. So no need for gloom, just a little realism. Again, look back at where MAN was just 3 years ago.
The two main players to the USA from MAN have taken a look at the market and worked out independently what they can best do. It made no sense having both of them flying thin frequencies to Boston and San Francisco on the same days of the week, which is what we've had thus far. For 2019, MT will have San Francisco to themselves and VS, Boston. They go head to head only on JFK and LAX (of the big city hubs), and those destinations ought to be strong enough for this competition and capacity to be healthy. And sensibly they fly on complementary days to LAX, not on the same day! 2019 may be a consolidation year on the MAN-USA scene, but it re-groups and strengthens for the future as MAN-TP will, from 2020 onwards offer a much-improved connecting hub product with or without a pre-clearance facility..