How transfers appear to be further depleting and weakening our squad

sixdwarf

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When we lined up against Wigan in the FA Cup third round on Monday night, we played a pretty much full strength team, but the bench in terms of quality and experienced outfield players was bereft, made up purely of young players while other first team players were rested or injured. On the bench was Shola Shoretire, Joe Hugill, Willy Kambwala, Omari Forson and Rhys Bennett. We are currently relying on another young player in Rasmus Højlund to lead the line up front and it is fair to say he has struggled.

This season alone, so far, we have lost 16 first team players either through being released, sold or on loan. On top of those mentioned you can add Dean Henderson, Anthony Elanga, Fred, Matej Kovar, Alex Telles, Zidane Iqbal, Eric Bailly, Alvaro Carreras, Brandon Williams, Mason Greenwood, Teden Mengi, David De Gea, Axel Tuanzebe and...(deep breath) Phil Jones. The amount we have brought in from these depature is a meagre £48m
But we have brought in just SEVEN - including Reguilon who has now left - at a club total cost of £174m. They are Højlund, Mason Mount, Andre Onana, Sofyan Amrabat, Altay Bayandir and Jonny Evans.

The squad issue becomes more apparent when you consider the players that could well be leaving in this transfer window, with not a sign that we will be bringing any in, even though we know that we do not have strength in depth in key areas. One of the 'kids' on the bench last night, Hannibal Mejbri is expected to go off on loan, Martial who was seen as cover for Højlund looks to be leaving, Van de Beek and Sergio Reguilo have already gone. Jaydon Sancho, as we know, is Dortmund-bound and Uruguay international Facundo Pellistri appears to be heading for the exit door either through loan or sale. Raphael Varane, appears surplus to requirements beyond this season unless he takes a pay cut and it is felt Casemiro could go also, while bizarrely our best defensive full-back by far, Aaron Wan-Bissaka could also follow.

The issue for me is the lack of cover where it matters - in the forward areas. Even with Martial there, there was nobody really threatening Højlund's place, so is it any wonder that he has managed just one Premier League goal all season We are also too reliant on Marcus Rashford, whose seemingly untouchable position has seen his form drop off a cliff. And if Fernandes got injured, do we have anyone who can pull the strings of creativity to cover other than Eriksen who does not appears to be able to complete 90m these days.

While I acknowledge that we are now out of Europe and the League Cup and so there are fewer games, the concern for me is that as we continue to say goodbye to players, there is little sign [SO FAR] that we are looking to bring in any quality reinforcements to supplement a dismal season so far.

What are your thoughts?
 
The last 4 years have been an absolute shitshow. 2019 onwards our recruitment has been a mess.

Before that we were poor/underachieving but sometime after that the club just lost it's fecking mind at some point in 2019.
 
It looks like we're seriously trying to bring the wage bill down. That's probably a good idea, but no doubt we'll do it in a reactive and kamikaze way.
 
It's unforeseen that a team and manager has regressed as far as it has with furtherance of resources and investment with any other manager given what we have experienced under Eth this season. The lack of impact from new players is not only influenced by transitioning from other leagues but also has stemmed being lacklustre in being tactically implemented. Whenever a team has a successful and defined system it's easier to draft new players in and the repetition of whatever is being done in training replicates itself on the field. There's a clear issue between those phases and that's why time isn't really healing the performances there's a certain stagnancy between the manager and the team and it's evident having seen reports of players being unable to do what they are being instructed, but this I feel reflects negatively on Erik more than the players.

I can't think of many if not any players that the manager can acquire in future windows and prospectively say these individuals will raise the teams standards significantly. This is another reason why I'm anticipating that the return of injuries will not see the teams level increase to anything of note.
 
We have also had to cope with 11 senior team injuries, many of them long term.

The squad depth is fine when we only have three or four injuries, any more then that and it's stretched.

But what I find strange is United has always been a club for blooding youth and relying on youth, people on here have been crying out for the young players to be given a chance.
Why are we now moaning about that?

A squad with three or four academy/ young players on the bench or involved is a good thing.
 
If transfers were depleting/weakening our squad, you should be able to put out a lost 11 that would be stronger than the incoming (transfers or academy) 11. In praxis, not in theory. (We are loaning out the Sancho and Greenwood that cannot play a game or even train for us, not the Sancho and Greenwood we were salivating at the prospect of forming an attack together a couple of years back).

Would the Henderson that leaks and stinks up the place be a better bench option than Bayindir? Or would a disenchanted, waning De Gea?

It makes little sense to count hypothesized future loans/sales without accounting for future loans/buys/promotions, but let’s look at what has happened so far since May.

Fielding under Ten Hag

A)
De Gea

Williams
Tuanzebe
Bailly
Telles

Fred
Iqbal
Van de Beek

Elanga
Greenwood (not playing)
Sancho (not playing)

vs

B)

Onana

Lindelöf (shifted to back as third RB option)
Kambwala
Evans
Reguilon

Mainoo
Amrabat
Mount

Pellistri/Diallo
Højlund
Garnacho (promoted to first choice)

Given that it would be 11 against 9, I would fancy the odds on that B team …
 
Attacking depth could be significantly down if Martial, Sancho and Pellestri all leave. That would leave Rashford, Hojlund, Garnacho, Antony and Amad as the only options with barely any of them in decent form. I'm sure there is one attacking signing, probably a loan, arriving this month.

Midfield wise, we have enough numbers and can actually sell a couple if the team can negotiate. Mainoo, Casemiro, Bruno, Mount, Eriksen and Amrabat are significant numbers. We can probably sell Mctominay and raise some funds for an attacking signing but can't really expect the club to do some smart business.
 
Recruitment aside looking at our bench to determine squad depth is a bit silly when the following players were injured or unavailable

Amrabat
Antony
Casemiro
Amad diallo
Lindelof
Maguire
Malacia
Martial
Martinez
Mount
Sancho
Shaw

I would say three of them are nailed on starters in Shaw, casemiro and Martinez, meaning Evans, mctominay and dalot or AWB would be on the bench. Then you have mount who could well be a starter (hopefully at some stage), Maguire who has been pretty decent overall this season and malacia, amrabat and lindelof who are not bad squad players imo. Jury is out on amad and antony.

But yeah recruitment has been shit, we also have a season long injury crisis.
 
pacifictheme said:
Recruitment aside looking at our bench to determine squad depth is a bit silly when the following players were injured or unavailable

Amrabat
Antony
Casemiro
Amad diallo
Lindelof
Maguire
Malacia
Martial
Martinez
Mount
Sancho
Shaw

I would say three of them are nailed on starters in Shaw, casemiro and Martinez, meaning Evans, mctominay and dalot or AWB would be on the bench. Then you have mount who could well be a starter (hopefully at some stage), Maguire who has been pretty decent overall this season and malacia, amrabat and lindelof who are not bad squad players imo. Jury is out on amad and antony.

But yeah recruitment has been shit, we also have a season long injury crisis.
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Yup OP conveniently left out the fact that the majority of that bench wouldn't have been on the bench if we didn't have pretty much a whole 11 out injured.
 
sixdwarf said:
When we lined up against Wigan in the FA Cup third round on Monday night, we played a pretty much full strength team, but the bench in terms of quality and experienced outfield players was bereft, made up purely of young players while other first team players were rested or injured. On the bench was Shola Shoretire, Joe Hugill, Willy Kambwala, Omari Forson and Rhys Bennett. We are currently relying on another young player in Rasmus Højlund to lead the line up front and it is fair to say he has struggled.

This season alone, so far, we have lost 16 first team players either through being released, sold or on loan. On top of those mentioned you can add Dean Henderson, Anthony Elanga, Fred, Matej Kovar, Alex Telles, Zidane Iqbal, Eric Bailly, Alvaro Carreras, Brandon Williams, Mason Greenwood, Teden Mengi, David De Gea, Axel Tuanzebe and...(deep breath) Phil Jones. The amount we have brought in from these depature is a meagre £48m
But we have brought in just SEVEN - including Reguilon who has now left - at a club total cost of £174m. They are Højlund, Mason Mount, Andre Onana, Sofyan Amrabat, Altay Bayandir and Jonny Evans.

The squad issue becomes more apparent when you consider the players that could well be leaving in this transfer window, with not a sign that we will be bringing any in, even though we know that we do not have strength in depth in key areas. One of the 'kids' on the bench last night, Hannibal Mejbri is expected to go off on loan, Martial who was seen as cover for Højlund looks to be leaving, Van de Beek and Sergio Reguilo have already gone. Jaydon Sancho, as we know, is Dortmund-bound and Uruguay international Facundo Pellistri appears to be heading for the exit door either through loan or sale. Raphael Varane, appears surplus to requirements beyond this season unless he takes a pay cut and it is felt Casemiro could go also, while bizarrely our best defensive full-back by far, Aaron Wan-Bissaka could also follow.

The issue for me is the lack of cover where it matters - in the forward areas. Even with Martial there, there was nobody really threatening Højlund's place, so is it any wonder that he has managed just one Premier League goal all season We are also too reliant on Marcus Rashford, whose seemingly untouchable position has seen his form drop off a cliff. And if Fernandes got injured, do we have anyone who can pull the strings of creativity to cover other than Eriksen who does not appears to be able to complete 90m these days.

While I acknowledge that we are now out of Europe and the League Cup and so there are fewer games, the concern for me is that as we continue to say goodbye to players, there is little sign [SO FAR] that we are looking to bring in any quality reinforcements to supplement a dismal season so far.

What are your thoughts?
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Rashford/Garnacho/Sancho for left wing
Antony/Amad/Sancho and apparently Garnacho for right wing (+ Pellistri but I don't think he's anything more than reserves player)
Bruno/Mount/Eriksen for the #10/attacking #8

Casemiro/Mainoo as #6/#8

Pellistri, Hannibal as reserve players

Hojlund and Martial are not enough for the CF position, but that is mostly because neither is a good footballer at the moment. What isn't a surprise as far as Martial is concerned, but I don't know really what ETH thought will happen with Hojlund I'd say the fanbase isn't really that surprised with his lack of goals.

Injuries and poor form are killing us, I don't think it's lack of cover.
 
While the points about there being a lot of injuries are valid, our options off the bench, particularly in all 3 attacking positions are horrendous.
Borys said:
Rashford/Garnacho/Sancho for left wing
Antony/Amad/Sancho and apparently Garnacho for right wing (+ Pellistri but I don't think he's anything more than reserves player)
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Those are decent numbers, not decent players. Sancho's also not an option, he's been excluded from selection so it's disingenuous to include him in discussions such as this.
 
We need to push on and get rid of more. Don't obsess over pointless depth. It's a waste of wages. We have 1 game a week, we don't need a 30 man squad (which you don't need anyway). You need 2 XI's for the most part of players who can be relied upon to stay fit. So we have a lot of selling to do and replacing. City don't ever use more than a squad of about 20 players for example, and they play more games than anyone.

Right now we still have an injury crisis.
  • Martinez
  • Maguire
  • Lindelof
  • Shaw
  • Malacia
  • Eriksen
  • Casemiro
  • Mount
  • Amad
  • Antony
  • Martial
All out. Yes our bench is kids, but that tends to happen when an entire 2nd 11 is out injured. Guys like Sancho and Van Den Beek are inconsequential to release, they don't play anyway. Really we should be trimming the squad down to a squad of 20, fix our FFP situation as the league is a wasted season anyway. FA cup is all we have to play for this season. We shouldn't be getting more injury issues once this clears.

I'd be fully in favor of selling off the likes of (I'd we can get better money now than in the summer):
  • Varane
  • Maguire
  • Casemiro - only if we can replace now
  • McTominay
  • Mount (not a bad player, but I see no starting role for him in a balanced side and he's injury prone)
  • Antony
That's something like 1.25 million per week on wages on players who we can remove and we'd still have a normal squad depth for our needs this season. Martial will stay til the end of the season then leave on free. That gives us a squad of:

Onana, Altay
Dalot, Wan Bissaka
Lindelof, Martinez, Evans, Kambwala
Shaw, Malacia
Mainoo, Eriksen, Casemiro/new DM, Amrabat
Bruno
Amad, Garnacho, Rashford
Hojlund, Martial

Obviously Mount and Antony aren't going anywhere, but I don't think it'd be problematic if they did. Bruno plays every game anyway, but if not we could just keep Hannibal as his backup. Or can just keep Pellistri as a deeper backup on the wings. We have 2 players per position otherwise everywhere apart from Bruno cover and the wings in the plan above, and that's not a big deal given the lack of games we'll have. Just need to wait for injuries to clear. In reality with our current squad, we are closer to 3 players per position which is overkill anyway.
 
pacifictheme said:
Recruitment aside looking at our bench to determine squad depth is a bit silly when the following players were injured or unavailable

Amrabat
Antony
Casemiro
Amad diallo
Lindelof
Maguire
Malacia
Martial
Martinez
Mount
Sancho
Shaw

I would say three of them are nailed on starters in Shaw, casemiro and Martinez, meaning Evans, mctominay and dalot or AWB would be on the bench. Then you have mount who could well be a starter (hopefully at some stage), Maguire who has been pretty decent overall this season and malacia, amrabat and lindelof who are not bad squad players imo. Jury is out on amad and antony.

But yeah recruitment has been shit, we also have a season long injury crisis.
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Add Eriksen to your list too. 13 senior players out. Ridiculous and still not enough said of it
 
AltiUn said:
While the points about there being a lot of injuries are valid, our options off the bench, particularly in all 3 attacking positions are horrendous.

Those are decent numbers, not decent players. Sancho's also not an option, he's been excluded from selection so it's disingenuous to include him in discussions such as this.
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Our problem is not the quality of the second-string players, it's the quality, form, and injuries to our first string attackers.
Second string defense and midfield + misfiring FIRST string offensive formation got us up to 8th place in the league, but it's actually Goals FOR (not against) that is our main issue.

Doesn't help that we're playing kamikaze system.

I don't see a reason not to include Sancho, he was part of the squad when we started the season, it could not be predicted he will go on a strike so it's stupid to moan about lack of proper planning in getting the players in since this was not something we could prepare for.

Edit: just to make it clear, our squad at the moment is fine and not the reason we're doing so poor. It's too soon to tell what will happen with Casemiro and Varane, seems like this season is already lost and we are thinking of the future and I would not be surprised that both of them are not part of it. Question is however how we replace them.
 
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Cutch said:
Add Eriksen to your list too. 13 senior players out. Ridiculous and still not enough said of it
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Oh yeah or course. it's hard to keep track of them all.

Media discourse doesn't help it, Newcastle and spurs injury crisis have been brought up a lot more than ours.
 
pacifictheme said:
Oh yeah or course. it's hard to keep track of them all.

Media discourse doesn't help it, Newcastle and spurs injury crisis have been brought up a lot more than ours.
Click to expand...

I don't expect much sympathy having 13 players out v Wigan but this is all season long minimum 8 out and people have stopped talking about it but still berating our bench/squad depth and wondering why the like of McTominay keeps starting
 
Cutch said:
Add Eriksen to your list too. 13 senior players out. Ridiculous and still not enough said of it
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Sure its a long list. But how many are good enough? Amrabat, Martial and Antony awful, Mount and Sancho are invisible when they did play, the manager was keen to sell Maguire in the summer.
 
sixdwarf said:
When we lined up against Wigan in the FA Cup third round on Monday night, we played a pretty much full strength team, but the bench in terms of quality and experienced outfield players was bereft, made up purely of young players while other first team players were rested or injured. On the bench was Shola Shoretire, Joe Hugill, Willy Kambwala, Omari Forson and Rhys Bennett. We are currently relying on another young player in Rasmus Højlund to lead the line up front and it is fair to say he has struggled.

This season alone, so far, we have lost 16 first team players either through being released, sold or on loan. On top of those mentioned you can add Dean Henderson, Anthony Elanga, Fred, Matej Kovar, Alex Telles, Zidane Iqbal, Eric Bailly, Alvaro Carreras, Brandon Williams, Mason Greenwood, Teden Mengi, David De Gea, Axel Tuanzebe and...(deep breath) Phil Jones. The amount we have brought in from these depature is a meagre £48m
But we have brought in just SEVEN - including Reguilon who has now left - at a club total cost of £174m. They are Højlund, Mason Mount, Andre Onana, Sofyan Amrabat, Altay Bayandir and Jonny Evans.

The squad issue becomes more apparent when you consider the players that could well be leaving in this transfer window, with not a sign that we will be bringing any in, even though we know that we do not have strength in depth in key areas. One of the 'kids' on the bench last night, Hannibal Mejbri is expected to go off on loan, Martial who was seen as cover for Højlund looks to be leaving, Van de Beek and Sergio Reguilo have already gone. Jaydon Sancho, as we know, is Dortmund-bound and Uruguay international Facundo Pellistri appears to be heading for the exit door either through loan or sale. Raphael Varane, appears surplus to requirements beyond this season unless he takes a pay cut and it is felt Casemiro could go also, while bizarrely our best defensive full-back by far, Aaron Wan-Bissaka could also follow.

The issue for me is the lack of cover where it matters - in the forward areas. Even with Martial there, there was nobody really threatening Højlund's place, so is it any wonder that he has managed just one Premier League goal all season We are also too reliant on Marcus Rashford, whose seemingly untouchable position has seen his form drop off a cliff. And if Fernandes got injured, do we have anyone who can pull the strings of creativity to cover other than Eriksen who does not appears to be able to complete 90m these days.

While I acknowledge that we are now out of Europe and the League Cup and so there are fewer games, the concern for me is that as we continue to say goodbye to players, there is little sign [SO FAR] that we are looking to bring in any quality reinforcements to supplement a dismal season so far.

What are your thoughts?
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Isn’t this the clear out the fans have been asking for for years?

The bigger issue is our inability to sell players for an appropriate value, which has been made hard by 1) high salaries, 2) underperformance for an extended period, 3) constant leaks about of activity, plans, dressing room, 4) fecking crap negotiators.

As you said, we only have the FA Cup and League to play for now and we still have a large numbers of first trainers injured. I also imagine if we were still in Europe half of the rumoured outgoings wouldn’t be happening. Also, so what if our bench is full of youth? We have a good crop of young players in our midst so let’s give them a chance or at least a platform to maybe get them a decent loan or perm move.
 
Champ said:
We have also had to cope with 11 senior team injuries, many of them long term.

The squad depth is fine when we only have three or four injuries, any more then that and it's stretched.

But what I find strange is United has always been a club for blooding youth and relying on youth, people on here have been crying out for the young players to be given a chance.
Why are we now moaning about that?

A squad with three or four academy/ young players on the bench or involved is a good thing.
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I am all for giving young players a chance if ready. But they should not be thrown in as a needs must due to a lack of strength depth (imho).
 
I’ve said a few times that we often overlook what we already have in order to bring someone else in with a foreign name just to spend money or attempt to boost commercial activity and some examples are,

Henderson is a bit of a prick but he’s better than Onana and Bayandir in every aspect other than long range passing

Tuanzebe and Mengi would be better than Lindelof

Alvaro Fernandez was a better option than bringing Regulion in and better than Malacia

Mejbri is a better option than VDB or Amrabat

Elanga and Diallo are better than Antony

Our recruitment in general post Sir Alex has been abysmal with the last few years being catastrophic, it’s mind blowing how bad we are with recruitment and effectively just burning money.

The bench against Wigan is a perfect example of how bad our recruitment has been and our coaching added to training facilities being piss poor means we constantly have multiple injuries to deal with.
 
This is why i dont understand anyone defending Ten Hag. His recruitment has been so disastrous it will set us back years.

We are stuck with the failures he has signed until their contracts run out or we can pay them off.
 
lsd said:
This is why i dont understand anyone defending Ten Hag. His recruitment has been so disastrous it will set us back years.

We are stuck with the failures he has signed until their contracts run out or we can pay them off.
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I think that's overly harsh. Vidic and Evra had shocking starts to their careers at Manchester United. I still think Onana and Hojlund are going to be good players for our club. Eriksen was an undoubted success, and Lisandro Martinez - and arguably Casemiro - were successes too, at least in the context of last season.

The most questionable decision was the one to spend our entire budget on Antony, which on its own seems to cast a dark shadow over the rest of our business.

I'm not sure that any of our business is defensible, exactly, given the fees involved but there's still a lot of asterisks around the reputations of the players we've signed, and there's still time for them to show us what they're all about.

None of what I've said is a hill I'll die on of course. It's more the players we've struggled to remove that have been problems for me personally.
 
sixdwarf said:
The issue for me is the lack of cover where it matters - in the forward areas. Even with Martial there, there was nobody really threatening Højlund's place, so is it any wonder that he has managed just one Premier League goal all season
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Yeah somehow I don't think lack of challenge for his position is what's stopping Hojlund from scoring.

It's the fact that he barely gets a sniff from anyone else in the team.

If we signed another forward they'd have the exact same issues.
 
matherto said:
Yeah somehow I don't think lack of challenge for his position is what's stopping Hojlund from scoring.

It's the fact that he barely gets a sniff from anyone else in the team.

If we signed another forward they'd have the exact same issues.
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He had more than a sniff against Wigan and didn't convert. My concern is that even without the ball his workrate/attempts to look for the ball are way down. So much that if he has been Ronaldo people would say he doesn't press enough .
 
With Reguilon, Van de Beek, Hugill, Sancho and potentially Hannibal out of the door in January, I did wonder whether we are doing it to lighten the squad due to the drop in fixture congestion (out of Europe and league cup) - or whether we are making some squad space for some loans this window?

Naturally optimistically hoping for the latter, but doubtful given the lack of obvious candidates/realistic links.
 
Skills said:
The last 4 years have been an absolute shitshow. 2019 onwards our recruitment has been a mess.

Before that we were poor/underachieving but sometime after that the club just lost it's fecking mind at some point in 2019.
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The same year the club was happily leaking to the media that our scouting was completely revamped and we went over 804 right backs before deciding on AWB for £50m.

It was poor before but whatever they did has made it considerably worse.
 
Nickelodeon said:
Attacking depth could be significantly down if Martial, Sancho and Pellestri all leave. That would leave Rashford, Hojlund, Garnacho, Antony and Amad as the only options with barely any of them in decent form. I'm sure there is one attacking signing, probably a loan, arriving this month.

Midfield wise, we have enough numbers and can actually sell a couple if the team can negotiate. Mainoo, Casemiro, Bruno, Mount, Eriksen and Amrabat are significant numbers. We can probably sell Mctominay and raise some funds for an attacking signing but can't really expect the club to do some smart business.
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Are we really loosing that much given the contributions of Martial, Sancho and Pelistri? (bit harsh on Pelistri) but the other two may as well stick a youngster or any other player in their position to achieve at least the same level of output.

I am more concerned about Reguilon going TBH doesn't seem like we can keep any defender fit for more than a couple of games
 
Borys said:
Our problem is not the quality of the second-string players, it's the quality, form, and injuries to our first string attackers.
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The form of first choice players is often directly impacted by pressure from the guy fighting for your spot. If all the backups are injured then there is no competition for places.
 
sparx99 said:
The form of first choice players is often directly impacted by pressure from the guy fighting for your spot. If all the backups are injured then there is no competition for places.
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OK. And who has been pushing Rashford, Casemiro and Martinez last season? Our best players last year, 2 if which have massive drop in form.
 
Borys said:
OK. And who has been pushing Rashford, Casemiro and Martinez last season? Our best players last year, 2 if which have massive drop in form.
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Rashford had Garnacho pushing for first-team opportunities last year. This year with Antony missing at times and playing poorly and Sancho banished we've seen no real competition for Rashford and Garnacho playing on the wings. Once Antony was back Rashford got dropped for his poor play. Garnacho took his LW spot prior to the recent switch to the RW.

Martinez has had Lindelof, Maguire and Shaw competing for his place. Shaw himself lost his LB spot to Malacia at times last season. Even if you don't necessarily rate Maguire and Lindelof they are committed professionals who seem to put in 100% effort and are mainstays of their national teams.

Casemiro hasn't had any real competition that's true but then he is one of the most decorated players in the world so one you would rather hope can self-motivate. His drop off this season has been in part a tactical issue, in part a myriad of other injuries affecting team structure (particularly Martinez) and in part just a poor start to the season before injury. He took a while to get going last season and again after his 4-game ban. He seems to need 3-4 games to get fully up to speed.
 
Seems to me that we've needed a proper reset for years. The lack of midweek football coupled with new owners and the current league deficit kind of gives us an unfortunate opportunity to do so.

We can run super thin for the rest of this season - maybe even not qualify for Europe - dramatically reduce the wage budget, sort our FFP and then hit the summer with new owners, a new vision and a new plan. Say what you want about Chelsea's insanity, but they've shown it is possible to recruit significant numbers in a single window.

At least, that could be what we're up to. One can hope. Otherwise I agree with the OP, we're outrageously thin.
 
Beachryan said:
Seems to me that we've needed a proper reset for years. The lack of midweek football coupled with new owners and the current league deficit kind of gives us an unfortunate opportunity to do so.

We can run super thin for the rest of this season - maybe even not qualify for Europe - dramatically reduce the wage budget, sort our FFP and then hit the summer with new owners, a new vision and a new plan. Say what you want about Chelsea's insanity, but they've shown it is possible to recruit significant numbers in a single window.

At least, that could be what we're up to. One can hope. Otherwise I agree with the OP, we're outrageously thin.
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Sorry gotta correct one thing. We don’t have new owners. We have an investor who is being given control of the football structure, but it’s not new ownership
 
I'm gonna see how the new owners get on in summer before going into panic mode again. The squad needs clearing out, we just need to make sure we're getting rid of the right players and we're replacing them with better ones. If McTominay is still here after summer then something is badly wrong.
 
AltiUn said:
I'm gonna see how the new owners get on in summer before going into panic mode again. The squad needs clearing out, we just need to make sure we're getting rid of the right players and we're replacing them with better ones. If McTominay is still here after summer then something is badly wrong.
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Agggh
 
Apart from Fred and DeGea none of those departed played very much if at all . Its called getting rid of dead wood.

The list of players ill and injured v Wigan was huge. Plus others unabailable
martinez
cazamiro
Erikson
Maguire
Shaw
Amad
Anthony
Mount
Martial
Malacia
Sanchez.

thats of the top of my head.
 
sparx99 said:
Rashford had Garnacho pushing for first-team opportunities last year. This year with Antony missing at times and playing poorly and Sancho banished we've seen no real competition for Rashford and Garnacho playing on the wings. Once Antony was back Rashford got dropped for his poor play. Garnacho took his LW spot prior to the recent switch to the RW.

Martinez has had Lindelof, Maguire and Shaw competing for his place. Shaw himself lost his LB spot to Malacia at times last season. Even if you don't necessarily rate Maguire and Lindelof they are committed professionals who seem to put in 100% effort and are mainstays of their national teams.

Casemiro hasn't had any real competition that's true but then he is one of the most decorated players in the world so one you would rather hope can self-motivate. His drop off this season has been in part a tactical issue, in part a myriad of other injuries affecting team structure (particularly Martinez) and in part just a poor start to the season before injury. He took a while to get going last season and again after his 4-game ban. He seems to need 3-4 games to get fully up to speed.
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Garnacho barely played first half of last season ( he had completed less than 90' in total by the end of 2022). That was also the time when Samcho was out on sabbatical.
Antony never plays on the left so isn't a factor.

If anything, you could make a stronger case for Rashford and Casemiro playing well as star players in the team, players that could NOT BE REPLACED. This season however, they can be replaced and we have backup for them, so this theory of first team players being motivated last season because of competition doesn't hold together.
 
It's critical to reduce the wage bill so the owners of the club can maximize what they can take out of the club for themselves.
 
There’s no long term strategy. We should be waiting patiently for the right players and slowly building a team with a clear standard of recruitment, whilst letting the young players come through, taking 3-4 years to build a brilliant team even if it means finishing 7th for a couple of years.

Instead we either buy players who are good enough for top 4 but not the title, like Fernandes, Eriksen etc. or a total short term punt like Cavani, Ronaldo, most of the time which don’t even work out like every single other player we’ve signed. Any young players that come though we immediately pile expectation on them as our best player.

It might be a good thing to get worse before we get better. Look at Pool and Arsenal who have challenged City in recent years, they went into way worse spots than us before emerging. We haven’t even had one season consecutively outside the top 4 yet. We’re stuck in a rotten cycle.
 
davidmichael said:
I’ve said a few times that we often overlook what we already have in order to bring someone else in with a foreign name just to spend money or attempt to boost commercial activity and some examples are,

Henderson is a bit of a prick but he’s better than Onana and Bayandir in every aspect other than long range passing

Tuanzebe and Mengi would be better than Lindelof

Alvaro Fernandez was a better option than bringing Regulion in and better than Malacia

Mejbri is a better option than VDB or Amrabat

Elanga and Diallo are better than Antony

Our recruitment in general post Sir Alex has been abysmal with the last few years being catastrophic, it’s mind blowing how bad we are with recruitment and effectively just burning money.

The bench against Wigan is a perfect example of how bad our recruitment has been and our coaching added to training facilities being piss poor means we constantly have multiple injuries to deal with.
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Completely agree with the overall point of the post. I might disagree on certain players, but we are so often super excited about players just because they don’t play for United whilst throwing around phrases like “championship level” at our players.
 
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