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2023-24 Performances


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6.2 Season Average Rating
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5
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It's not odd at all, it's a formation widely adopted by coaching staff who aim to play the game in the opponent's half. So in that particular formation a back 4 turns into a back 3 with Dalot providing width and Shaw tucking in to form a back 3 in a 3241 shape. So a 4231 changes to a 3241 just by tweaking the fullback positions.

Ok, right, yeah. My bad.

It’s the 4231 we’ve been playing for years, only written down in a really odd way. With Dalot at right back (who’s been woeful this season) and Amrabat and Mainoo in central midfield.

I’d be ok with that at some point but am starting to wonder if Amrabat might be a busted flush and I really don’t like sticking Bruno on the right to play Mount at 10.

I’ll give it a 6/10.

I thought you reckoned Hannibal was the future, why isn’t he there somewhere?
 
Ok, right, yeah. My bad.

It’s the 4231 we’ve been playing for years, only written down in a really odd way. With Dalot at right back (who’s been woeful this season) and Amrabat and Mainoo in central midfield.

I’d be ok with that at some point but am starting to wonder if Amrabat might be a busted flush and I really don’t like sticking Bruno on the right to play Mount at 10.

I’ll give it a 6/10.

I thought you reckoned Hannibal was the future, why isn’t he there somewhere?
I think Dalot has been fine this season. If we have a right sided CB behind him who has the ability to defend the channel in 1v1 situations, then Dalot won't be as occupied in defensive transitions as he is currently. I think we can upgrade at RB but that upgrade shouldn't come at the expense of signing a CB or midfielder. And the priority for this season was striker and GK and I think the priority for next season could well be a CB and midfielder.

I don't think Bruno is as good as he's made out. I think in the EPL it's important to have the ability to resist and evade pressure in possession aswell as being able to retain possession at a requisite level. And I don't believe Bruno is as good in that regard and we would benefit by having a different profile of attacking midfielder who is more team oriented in possession with a higher physical and athletic level. Bruno was signed in a season where it was reported that the scouts informed the club that Bruno is too erratic on the ball and Solskjaer would be better served signing a different type of midfielder. Why Solskjaer and Phelan went ahead and signed him and how Woodward allowed them to scout the player in Lisbon where they were pictured in the Alvalade stadium watching the player is still a little odd to me after the scouts had given the player the the thumbs down per reports. A midfield of Pogba and Bruno was never going to work but attempting to save the season by making it into the champions league was seen as 'saving the season'. This is how you sacrifice the mid to longer-term development of the team to save the season in the present. I think ten Hag needs him right now, because he's said to be a ally of the manager in the dressing room. But I don't see Bruno being a first team regular beyond next season.

Hannibal is still the future and I'm sure he must've got a lot of stick from posters for almost getting sent off in his last appearance. But his game needs a tweak and if he can add that bit of discipline without sacrificing his high energy then we need players of his profile potentially who have the physical and athletic capabilities to close off space quickly.
 
I think Dalot has been fine this season. If we have a right sided CB behind him who has the ability to defend the channel in 1v1 situations, then Dalot won't be as occupied in defensive transitions as he is currently. I think we can upgrade at RB but that upgrade shouldn't come at the expense of signing a CB or midfielder. And the priority for this season was striker and GK and I think the priority for next season could well be a CB and midfielder.

I don't think Bruno is as good as he's made out. I think in the EPL it's important to have the ability to resist and evade pressure in possession aswell as being able to retain possession at a requisite level. And I don't believe Bruno is as good in that regard and we would benefit by having a different profile of attacking midfielder who is more team oriented in possession with a higher physical and athletic level. Bruno was signed in a season where it was reported that the scouts informed the club that Bruno is too erratic on the ball and Solskjaer would be better served signing a different type of midfielder. Why Solskjaer and Phelan went ahead and signed him and how Woodward allowed them to scout the player in Lisbon where they were pictured in the Alvalade stadium watching the player is still a little odd to me after the scouts had given the player the the thumbs down per reports. A midfield of Pogba and Bruno was never going to work but attempting to save the season by making it into the champions league was seen as 'saving the season'. This is how you sacrifice the mid to longer-term development of the team to save the season in the present. I think ten Hag needs him right now, because he's said to be a ally of the manager in the dressing room. But I don't see Bruno being a first team regular beyond next season.

Hannibal is still the future and I'm sure he must've got a lot of stick from posters for almost getting sent off in his last appearance. But his game needs a tweak and if he can add that bit of discipline without sacrificing his high energy then we need players of his profile potentially who have the physical and athletic capabilities to close off space quickly.

That's really just a damning indictment of our scouts. Arguably the one and only signing in the post Fergie era to have an indisputably positive effect on the team and they tried to block it. Where were they when we needed them to block the signings of Bailly, Lukaku, Antony, Van Der Beek and Sancho?
 
That's really just a damning indictment of our scouts. Arguably the one and only signing in the post Fergie era to have an indisputably positive effect on the team and they tried to block it. Where were they when we needed them to block the signings of Bailly, Lukaku, Antony, Van Der Beek and Sancho?
What was the purpose of signing a #10 when it made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder to play with the existing midfielders in the team?? It's not a surprise that we can't develop a playing style with a narrow minded approach to recruitment.

Bout and Lawlor were in charge of recruitment before they were fired in April 2022. But both Mourinho and Solskjaer were afforded the luxury of having personal scouts by Woodward.
 
That's really just a damning indictment of our scouts. Arguably the one and only signing in the post Fergie era to have an indisputably positive effect on the team and they tried to block it. Where were they when we needed them to block the signings of Bailly, Lukaku, Antony, Van Der Beek and Sancho?

Bruno has been a ‘successful’ signing in many respects. But in a temporary sort of fashion. What Adnan has mentioned is that the signing lacked longer term consideration about the development of the team. Bruno has helped us to win games. But he doesn’t really help us ‘play better’. And ultimately, he/we won’t win enough games to win big titles anyway, not without actually addressing what we need to do to actually ‘play well’ and like maybe try being the better team on the pitch in the majority of football matches we play, as opposed to the second best/equal best that we are more often than not, irrespective of result.

If we had approached the market with a view of how we were going to develop a team that could dominate games as opposed to how were we going to win enough points to get into the top 4, we’d have been better off long term. In the short term, Bruno came and helped us in to the CL, and has invariably done so since then, but as a team, we have a clear ceiling on us. In comparison, Arsenal took the more patient route, and finished 8th back to back while building a team on the right foundations.

One of the big problems post-Fergie with all of our managers is that no matter where we had finished the season before, they all approached the summer with the mentality of trying to sign a big player or two that would get us right back challenging for the title the following season. Especially earlier on post-Fergie. After all, we had only won the league a couple of years prior. So I don’t think they saw the reality of where we were, it was always ‘add Di Maria/Falcao‘ or ‘add Pogba/Zlatan’ and go and try and win the league next season. The short-termist in me was happy with the uptick in form when Bruno joined. But in reality, the team needed more than just a ‘shot in the arm’.
 
What was the purpose of signing a #10 when it made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder to play with the existing midfielders in the team?? It's not a surprise that we can't develop a playing style with a narrow minded approach to recruitment.

Bout and Lawlor were in charge of recruitment before they were fired in April 2022. But both Mourinho and Solskjaer were afforded the luxury of having personal scouts by Woodward.

The purpose was presumably to improve the team to a point where we secure CL football. Which was duly achieved, thanks largely to an incredible personal contribution from Bruno. At this point our amazing scouting team had the opportunity to sign some really top players - who might be holding out for CL football - and build from a position of strength. If Bruno is as poor a player as you seem to think then these world class players signed by the brains trust in charge of transfers could have seen Bruno relegated to a squad player. A versatile attacking player who can make something happen in the final third when he's brought on off the bench. Even his harshest critic would agree that this is something he'd be well suited for and all the top teams have big names like Bruno on the bench. How did that work out?!
 
The purpose was presumably to improve the team to a point where we secure CL football. Which was duly achieved, thanks largely to an incredible personal contribution from Bruno. At this point our amazing scouting team had the opportunity to sign some really top players - who might be holding out for CL football - and build from a position of strength. If Bruno is as poor a player as you seem to think then these world class players signed by the brains trust in charge of transfers could have seen Bruno relegated to a squad player. A versatile attacking player who can make something happen in the final third when he's brought on off the bench. Even his harshest critic would agree that this is something he'd be well suited for and all the top teams have big names like Bruno on the bench. How did that work out?!
I didn't say Bruno is a poor player but rather aI asked you a simple question which you seem to have deflected by having a go at the former heads of scouting who have been sacked.

Would it have made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder with a view to developing a playstyle for the mid to long-term instead of signing Bruno at the time to save our season and finish in a champions league spot?
 
I didn't say Bruno is a poor player but rather aI asked you a simple question which you seem to have deflected by having a go at the former heads of scouting who have been sacked.

Would it have made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder with a view to developing a playstyle for the mid to long-term instead of signing Bruno at the time to save our season and finish in a champions league spot?

Why do you seem to think it was a binary decision? Bruno was a very good player, who was available and had a very positive and immediate impact. He was a successful signing. Serious clubs are capable of working on more than one area of the squad at the same time. There was nothing stopping us signing one or more world class deeper lying midfielders as well as Bruno, either back then or more recently. The fact we haven't yet done this (despite spending hundreds of millions of pounds since we signed Bruno) is completely irrelevant to your opinion on Bruno but doesn't reflect well at all on the people in charge of improving our squad.
 
The purpose was presumably to improve the team to a point where we secure CL football. Which was duly achieved, thanks largely to an incredible personal contribution from Bruno. At this point our amazing scouting team had the opportunity to sign some really top players - who might be holding out for CL football - and build from a position of strength. If Bruno is as poor a player as you seem to think then these world class players signed by the brains trust in charge of transfers could have seen Bruno relegated to a squad player. A versatile attacking player who can make something happen in the final third when he's brought on off the bench. Even his harshest critic would agree that this is something he'd be well suited for and all the top teams have big names like Bruno on the bench. How did that work out?!

This is very true. But typically of us, we underestimating the gap between our team and the likes of City. It wasn’t a band aid job.

And to be fair, we also ran into covid that summer.
 
Why do you seem to think it was a binary decision? Bruno was a very good player, who was available and had a very positive and immediate impact. He was a successful signing. Serious clubs are capable of working on more than one area of the squad at the same time. There was nothing stopping us signing one or more world class deeper lying midfielders as well as Bruno, either back then or more recently. The fact we haven't yet done this (despite spending hundreds of millions of pounds since we signed Bruno) is completely irrelevant to your opinion on Bruno but doesn't reflect well at all on the people in charge of improving our squad.
There was no need to sign a #10 when Pogba was already at the club and Solskjaer wanted to keep him by all accounts. Pogba was was best utilised at club level as the most advanced midfielder in a 3 man midfield at Juventus. And when you make a decision to sign a #10 on top of trying to keep Pogba and also want to play in a higher defensive line, then you've created a problem which will eventually rear it's head and cost you.

It made no sense to sign Bruno with the players we already had. The correct decision was imo to sign a deeper lying midfielder and hence plan to develop a proactive attacking approach to playing the game where we could play out of a press. But instead we developed a reactive approach to playing the game with McTominay and Fred being fixtures in midfield.
 
There was no need to sign a #10 when Pogba was already at the club and Solskjaer wanted to keep him by all accounts. Pogba was was best utilised at club level as the most advanced midfielder in a 3 man midfield at Juventus. And when you make a decision to sign a #10 on top of trying to keep Pogba and also want to play in a higher defensive line, then you've created a problem which will eventually rear it's head and cost you.

It made no sense to sign Bruno with the players we already had. The correct decision was imo to sign a deeper lying midfielder and hence plan to develop a proactive attacking approach to playing the game where we could play out of a press. But instead we developed a reactive approach to playing the game with McTominay and Fred being fixtures in midfield.

Pogba was horrible in advanced positions. Way too slow on the turn and always wanted far too many touches before releasing it. Like watching a brontosaurus being swarmed by velociraptors. So it was no great surprise that Bruno immediately improved us massively as soon as he took that role. I honestly have no idea how we could have made best use of Pogba, he was almost good in loads of positions but never made one his own. Despite multiple managers bending over backwards to accommodate him. The only real positive about Pogba is that he's no longer our problem.

It's bizarre to me the way you're obsessing about a single transfer made several years ago as some sort of irresolvable issue, while also glossing over the hundreds of millions of pounds we've spent since then.
 
Pogba was horrible in advanced positions. Way too slow on the turn and always wanted far too many touches before releasing it. Like watching a brontosaurus being swarmed by velociraptors. So it was no great surprise that Bruno immediately improved us massively as soon as he took that role.
Pogba was definitely slow on the turn but he was a far superior to Bruno at carrying the ball in a midfield three. But that's not the point, the point is what was Solskjaer trying to do by creating a midfield composition with both Pogba and Bruno in it?
 
Pogba was definitely slow on the turn but he was a far superior to Bruno at carrying the ball in a midfield three. But that's not the point, the point is what was Solskjaer trying to do by creating a midfield composition with both Pogba and Bruno in it?

I guess he thought Pogba + 1 could play at the base of midfield. That was how he was being used for France anyway.
 
I guess he thought Pogba + 1 could play at the base of midfield. That was how he was being used for France anyway.
Pogba was being utilised by France in a deeper role with Matuidi covering one side and Kante the other. His job was to create and Deschamps was intelligent enough to have athletic players like Kante and Matuidi (fullback) to plug the gaps out of possession.
 
Pogba was definitely slow on the turn but he was a far superior to Bruno at carrying the ball in a midfield three. But that's not the point, the point is what was Solskjaer trying to do by creating a midfield composition with both Pogba and Bruno in it?
For the majority of the first half of the 19/20 season, Pogba was on one of his many lengthy injury lay offs in Dubai. Before covid hit, the presumption was that he wouldn't return from injury until April/May and then he'd join Zidane's Madrid in the summer. The signing of Bruno was partly due to planning for life without Pogba.
 
For the majority of the first half of the 19/20 season, Pogba was on one of his many lengthy injury lay offs in Dubai. Before covid hit, the presumption was that he wouldn't return from injury until April/May and then he'd join Zidane's Madrid in the summer. The signing of Bruno was partly due to planning for life without Pogba.

Presumption from who? Probably mouth-frothing interneters - but it appeared that wasn’t the case for Ole. He seemed very keen for him to stay, and immediately integrated him back into the team (well, after one game when he started him on the bench against Spurs and he came on and changed it). Real Madrid were supposed to sign Van de Beek that summer, a move which was pretty much done if mot for covid.

The whole thing was handled short-sightedly. And even before Bruno joined, Pogba didn’t really play as a 10 for us anyway, so very unlikely Bruno was Pogba’s replacement. Bruno was a clear upgrade on Lingard/Pereira. For my money, we should have targeted Nicolo Barella in that January instead of Bruno, who would have been a quality box-to-box upgrade in the team. He went to Inter later that summer. But then again, I didn’t really want us to play with a pure #10 and preferred a 6 and two 8s.
 
Presumption from who? Probably mouth-frothing interneters - but it appeared that wasn’t the case for Ole. He seemed very keen for him to stay, and immediately integrated him back into the team (well, after one game when he started him on the bench against Spurs and he came on and changed it).
Reliable journalists at the time were reporting that Madrid were preparing a bid for Pogba. If memory serves, it was only the impact of Covid on Spanish clubs finances that prevented them coming in for him that summer. Considering Ole played a 4-2-3-1 for most of his tenure, I can't imagine there was a plan to integrate both Pogba and Bruno in that system, as demonstrated by the fact that he would sometimes drop Pogba for the bigger games and never dropped Bruno (whereas he never dropped Pogba pre Bruno signing).
 
Reliable journalists at the time were reporting that Madrid were preparing a bid for Pogba. If memory serves, it was only the impact of Covid on Spanish clubs finances that prevented them coming in for him that summer. Considering Ole played a 4-2-3-1 for most of his tenure, I can't imagine there was a plan to integrate both Pogba and Bruno in that system, as demonstrated by the fact that he would sometimes drop Pogba for the bigger games and never dropped Bruno (whereas he never dropped Pogba pre Bruno signing).

I understood Van de Beek to be Real’s primary target. Real made a bid for Pogba the previous summer, which was dismissed by us as derisory and I can’t imagine they would have had him as a primary target by January as he had been injured for a while by then.

Anyway, perhaps you are correct in terms of his longer term vision. We should have been looking to improve on the ‘2’ in the 4231 as a bigger priority IMO. Certainly if Pogba stayed, but once Bruno joined, then Ole should have at least improved the 2 in the summer rather than add VDB to the ‘1’, although I appreciate that covid probably ruined a lot of plans. But then even the following summer, he didn’t improve the 2, which suggests his plan still involved a Bruno/Pogba pairing in midfield. He got Varane, Sancho and Ronaldo but no CM. This is what I mean about our managers. They all seemed to have this notion was that we were always one ‘big’ signing away from competing instead of building a winning machine from the foundations. We’ve spent a lot of band-aid money on big names while others were working more smartly and deliberately.
 
What was the purpose of signing a #10 when it made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder to play with the existing midfielders in the team?? It's not a surprise that we can't develop a playing style with a narrow minded approach to recruitment.

Without any context, I thought we were talking about Mason Mount.

Which goes to show, our club keeps making the same mistakes again and again.
 
Given the present circumstances it would seem now is the right time to give Kobbie is a run of game, starting with a second half substitution but the starts have to start coming. If he proves to be substandard so be it but the potential is there and we have to give him a shot.
 
I think he'll get some minutes against Copenhagen - very much doubt a start, but have a feeling it will be a perfect game to see if he's ready.
 
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Presumption from who? Probably mouth-frothing interneters - but it appeared that wasn’t the case for Ole. He seemed very keen for him to stay, and immediately integrated him back into the team (well, after one game when he started him on the bench against Spurs and he came on and changed it). Real Madrid were supposed to sign Van de Beek that summer, a move which was pretty much done if mot for covid.

The whole thing was handled short-sightedly. And even before Bruno joined, Pogba didn’t really play as a 10 for us anyway, so very unlikely Bruno was Pogba’s replacement. Bruno was a clear upgrade on Lingard/Pereira. For my money, we should have targeted Nicolo Barella in that January instead of Bruno, who would have been a quality box-to-box upgrade in the team. He went to Inter later that summer. But then again, I didn’t really want us to play with a pure #10 and preferred a 6 and two 8s.

It’s the system that is often wrong at United. Not the players. Although recruitment has also been fecked. But Bruno for example, Jurgen Klopp once said that he was the perfect midfielder. He could do everything. Run, press, tackler, shoot, pass. He desperately wanted to sign him and would have done if not for finances. And you can easily see how he would’ve fit in to his whole heavy metal football approach.

At United he has become a pure #10. But in a true hardworking midfield 3, he was originally an 8/10 hybrid.
 
We're in a position where every game is a must win so he's unlikely to get chances.
 
We're in a position where every game is a must win so he's unlikely to get chances.

Must win games do not lead to the conclusion that we must play an under-equipped McTominay and declining Eriksen. Mainoo is no guaranteed prospect but he has to be given his chances.
 
There was no need to sign a #10 when Pogba was already at the club and Solskjaer wanted to keep him by all accounts. Pogba was was best utilised at club level as the most advanced midfielder in a 3 man midfield at Juventus. And when you make a decision to sign a #10 on top of trying to keep Pogba and also want to play in a higher defensive line, then you've created a problem which will eventually rear it's head and cost you.

It made no sense to sign Bruno with the players we already had. The correct decision was imo to sign a deeper lying midfielder and hence plan to develop a proactive attacking approach to playing the game where we could play out of a press. But instead we developed a reactive approach to playing the game with McTominay and Fred being fixtures in midfield.

To this day the most confounding decision of the past 10 years of transfers for me is never targeting a true ball winner/Anchor DM to play next to our record midfield signing when that exact setup won France a world cup with Pogba pulling the strings. Just shows how fractured our squad building approach has been forever, simply buying "quality" players without every considering how they fit within the framework of a cohesive side.
 
With Casemiro injured I’m surprised he’s not getting any game time! Not sure if minutes with the U19’s is doing him any favours other than raising fitness levels
 
Yeah if a game is a must win, the last person I want in the midfield is McTominay
I think he gets in on virtue of Hag being in damage control mode and McTominay being our biggest goal threat other than Fernandes (another player he will play at every opportunity he can)
 
With Casemiro injured I’m surprised he’s not getting any game time! Not sure if minutes with the U19’s is doing him any favours other than raising fitness levels
Seriously what kind of post is this ? He just came back from injury last week. He got some academy minutes last week . It's literally just one week since he is back from a long layoff. Are you saying he should have played Tuesday Wednesday and Saturday?
 
I didn't say Bruno is a poor player but rather aI asked you a simple question which you seem to have deflected by having a go at the former heads of scouting who have been sacked.

Would it have made more sense to sign a deeper lying midfielder with a view to developing a playstyle for the mid to long-term instead of signing Bruno at the time to save our season and finish in a champions league spot?
Probably all the recruitment was compromised by quite a few factors. We didn’t have a manager with quite such a developed vision and detailed master plan as what we’ve got with EtH. Almost certainly EtH wouldn’t have signed Bruno but it’s hard to see it as a mistake because he delivered product (on a pretty spectacular scale).

The problem then, as now, is identifying players suitable for a modern style who are at the required (elite) level and then being able to acquire them. A pre-requisite is a single-minded manager, and the whole structure around him working in harmony.

People say the coach / manager shouldn’t have absolute power. It is not a problem giving such power to the manager as long as the end goal (or continuing goal) and the whole strategy to achieve it is agreed across the whole football department. I personally have no problem with the manager being at the head of the pyramid, in fact I prefer it because accountability is clear and, in my view, in the right place. The coach / manager is responsible for results and also every decision that contributes to that.

It follows that the coach / manager should be effectively in charge of recruitment albeit he should delegate as much of the legwork as possible. The scouts should all be working to the same script and the advice they give should reflect that. In that case the manager may rely on the scouts but confidence in the framework and the individuals working within it will not be immediate. Long and short, our recruitment should be better next year and beyond (I have a feeling you said this before, probably in fewer words!).
 
To this day the most confounding decision of the past 10 years of transfers for me is never targeting a true ball winner/Anchor DM to play next to our record midfield signing when that exact setup won France a world cup with Pogba pulling the strings. Just shows how fractured our squad building approach has been forever, simply buying "quality" players without every considering how they fit within the framework of a cohesive side.

Mourinho signed Matic to be that player and then after that we just stopped trying despite Matic clearly being past his best.
 
Every game is a must win but the players havent been winning so why stick with the losing players when its must win?
Why are you asking this question? The players aren't getting dropped in any situation
 
To this day the most confounding decision of the past 10 years of transfers for me is never targeting a true ball winner/Anchor DM to play next to our record midfield signing when that exact setup won France a world cup with Pogba pulling the strings. Just shows how fractured our squad building approach has been forever, simply buying "quality" players without every considering how they fit within the framework of a cohesive side.
We always wait for that mystical player that never exists.
 
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