FA Premier League

Sunderland 1:1 Manchester United

Stadium of Light

Kick-off
Sun, 24 August 2014 @ 4:00pm BST
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    fordemonk said:
    Mata was our best player? What game did you watch??
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    Not much to choose from. Maybe Jones. Otherwise Mata was better than the rest. Also disagree with some of the points about Fletcher. He suffered from being next to Cleverley. His job is more defensive. Without a partner in midfield, Fletcher did look a bit lost but he made some tackles and attempted a pass, more than can be said for Cleverley. Obviously LVG disagreed
     
    Really having second thoughts about this 352 formation. Understandable really because we haven't had the best starts, but Van Gaal did say it would take time.
     
    Great interview from the manager. He instills confidence. I like Yorke too. He doesn't pull punches. Players not good enough.
     
    Barnslig said:
    Same, he didnt seem on today. He didnt fight for the ball the way he used too, nevertheless he was acceptable today. Actually think Januzaj was close to MOTM for us, as he was last match. He's still one of the few bright spots for us.
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    No just no. Januzaj was poor
     
    Rooney should be dropped he needs a wake up call, all the senior players need to be reminded who they play for, sit them down and make them watch what made this club great.

    Jones was good today and was better as the middle of the 3 CB than Smalling has been. Keane and Blackett did well.

    Zero creativity too slow in passing and gave the ball away easily and the corners in the last 2 games have been very poor.

    I had hopes of a top 4 finish unless we find 2 decent centre mids and another CB who can play most of the games we are going to be in trouble.
     
    We're shit - it's true. Without one midfielder who can run, or control a ball without it bouncing off his shin or turning it over we will always look shit.
     
    Any one out there who played professional football at some point in their life, can you answer " How can any footballer , when he gets the ball. wants to pass backwards rather than forward, even when in situations former is more risky". I thought any footballer , either defender or even a goal keeper, wants to play forward pass and take ball to opposition half rather than maintaining possession in their own half.

    Cleverley , unless it is final third( towards opposition goal) , never goes for forward pass. Always looks to pass backwards to defenders. Same to some extent by fletcher. Same by carrick very often last season
    It kept me wondering while watching this match, did our shitty midfield turn our decent backline into worse? Because when I watch blackett, it reminded me of jones/smalling in their starting days with united, who want to push/pass ball forward , rather than backward.

    Now, our defenders think , their role is to pass to midfielders and expect them to receive the ball back , get it , pass it back to goalkeeper. From this game ,atleast for me , I realised problem with our squad is with those 2-3 players controlling the midfield and it is making whole team play ridiculously bad no matter how good/wordclass the other part of team is.

    Not a knee-jerk reaction, but we are making investment at the wrong sides of the pitch , while growing cancer in the centre midfield. If it is not replaced , I literally mean replace where you just dont use/plan with current midfield, it doesnot matter whom we buy at other positions , we are still gonna play bad.
     
    manichester said:
    I had hopes of a top 4 finish unless we find 2 decent centre mids and another CB who can play most of the games we are going to be in trouble.
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    If we are going to play the 3-5-2, we need at least one good CM more than di Maria.
     
    DB07 said:
    Not a knee-jerk reaction, but we are making investment at the wrong sides of the pitch , while growing cancer in the centre midfield. If it is not replaced , I literally mean replace where you just dont use/plan with current midfield, it doesnot matter whom we buy at other positions , we are still gonna play bad.
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    We need Carvalho not di Maria.
     
    Can't believe people rating Mata's performance today.. I think he was really poor. But so was the rest, so who cares.
    You can hate him all you want, but I think Young had a decent game. Nothing special, but I think he did his job today.
    Carrick/Herrera would make a world of difference compared to Fletch/Clev, that's for sure...
     
    Absolutely shocking. Didn't lose but it was one of the worst performances I've seen as a United fan personally.

    So toothless going forward, no pace, urgency or anything resembling creativity. Sunderland are not a good side.

    Valencia, Young, Cleverley and Fletcher are not good enough for this club. Get Rafael/Shaw at wingback, Carrick/Herrera in the middle and Di Maria behind the front two and there should be a massive difference but the squad depth in certain positions gets shown up for how woeful it really is when we have so many injuries.
     
    Neil Lennon anyone? Steward at the Sunderland game :lol:
    goKzavF.jpg

    I think he saw me taking it too. Uncanny imo!
     
    Rooney needs to be called out for 2 poor games in a row.

    Sadly Blackett looks like one of better players at the moment... sad coz he'll likely get dropped with Rojo is available or Evans is back.

    Starting to worry about Mata and Januazj
     
    swissgenius said:
    Can't believe people rating Mata's performance today.. I think he was really poor. But so was the rest, so who cares.
    You can hate him all you want, but I think Young had a decent game. Nothing special, but I think he did his job today.
    Carrick/Herrera would make a world of difference compared to Fletch/Clev, that's for sure...
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    He's the caf's lovechild for some reason.
     
    GRon said:
    We need Carvalho not di Maria.
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    We dont need a hulk to just sit there. We need someone dynamic, with pace, someone who will run at players in midfield , get momentum, get players ahead of him making runs. Thats di Maria. Hes a great box to box player. Regardless, what we DEFNITELY do not need is someone like Carvalho sitting pretty in midfield making bad passes similar to what we had today
     
    Fully Fledged said:
    We did last week. We couldn't this week Fellaini was injured. We won here last year.
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    There and yes we won, but this the second year after SAF has left. We looked better than last year, we looked like the players know what they are doing. . just wasn't good enough this time. LVG works like a data analysis it's all numbers and players hopefully once he has all the data 'three months' then we can kick on.

    And Moyes still huffed ball when Fellaini wasn't on the patch VS Fulham = 80 ish crosses
     
    and one last thing...

    anyone else remember the good old days when starting the season with Swansea, Sunderland and Burnley would be 9 banked points?
     
    Mata was fine, won some fouls, dropped deep, defended and scored. RvP was awful, Rooney wasn't much better. The less said about the midfield the better. Welbeck came on and changed the pace of our game, I will be depressed if he leaves.

    Tbf hardly any team will get 3 points at the Stadium of Lights with Poyet as manager, but still a depressing performance and result for us.
     
    Blah... We're so lucky to get a point from that match! Even though we've only played 2 games that count, I'm very worried. Honestly, I don't like this 3-5-2 system. I don't think our players like it, and some of them do not look like they are willing, or are capable of playing in it. I think that our defense is too inexperienced, our wingers lack the pace, and our central midfield is desperately lacking pace, quality and leadership (with exception of Mata and Herrera).

    I think that instead of trying to force players to play in this system, that van Gaal should play them in a system that they are experienced and comfortable playing in. What worked for van Gaal in the Dutch national team might not work here. He says it will take at least 3 months for the team to get use to it. In my opinion, we could be battling bottom of the table teams in 3 months if he waits. Van Gaal needs to be able to adapt to the team as much as they have to adapt to him. He needs to be willing to let go of his national system if he has to. Another thing that worries me a little, I have yet to see him get up out of his seat and go into the technical area to scream/motivate/inspire/criticize players.

    Today, Valencia was good defensively, but failed to get forward enough to influence the game, as he has in the past. I think he only had 3 or 4 crosses all game, though one did end with Mata's goal. Young was almost useless in defense, causing pointless fouls and again not getting forward enough to impact the game. Fletcher seemed great in preseason, but he simply looks outclassed versus everyone in the league. If he went down a tier or 2, I think he'd be outstanding. After his battle with UC, he just isn't the same player. Cleverley actually had a better game than Fletcher in my opinion! Not to say he had a good game though. Mata was good, easily MOTM for me. Rooney and RVP were not effective. Overall, I see the problem as: our defense is poor, forcing our wingbacks and CM's to play deeper to help out. That puts a huge gap between the midfield and our attackers (big enough to literally park a bus). Our attackers can't get decent service through the middle, and by the time the wingbacks get forward, the opposing team has put 9 or 10 men in the box to defend.
     
    Messi and vidal is trending world wide! feck sake LVG send twitter into meltdown.:lol:
     
    Levi1 said:
    Not much to choose from. Maybe Jones. Otherwise Mata was better than the rest. Also disagree with some of the points about Fletcher. He suffered from being next to Cleverley. His job is more defensive. Without a partner in midfield, Fletcher did look a bit lost but he made some tackles and attempted a pass, more than can be said for Cleverley. Obviously LVG disagreed
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    Still mata was not better than the rest. I wish he was but he created nothing which is his role in the team
     
    AndyMUFC said:
    Absolutely shocking. Didn't lose but it was one of the worst performances I've seen as a United fan personally.

    So toothless going forward, no pace, urgency or anything resembling creativity. Sunderland are not a good side.

    Valencia, Young, Cleverley and Fletcher are not good enough for this club. Get Rafael/Shaw at wingback, Carrick/Herrera in the middle and Di Maria behind the front two and there should be a massive difference but the squad depth in certain positions gets shown up for how woeful it really is when we have so many injuries.
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    So bench our current record signing, Mata?
     
    Utter shite, let down again by our piss poor midfield of whom none can pass a ball forward or take it themselves forward... Also what was with the testimonial pace to the game argghhhhhh, so annoying.

    Can someone please tell me how Cleverley is playing when he's a bag of wank?! Van gaal said kagawa didn't impress him on the tour - he'll add way more than Cleverley/Fletcher... It's just frustrating how we seem stuck with so many average players :( What can the likes of Mata do when all the rest of the dross just stand still watching him.
     
    Oo0AahCantona said:
    1 of rooney or van persie should play, 1 of mata or kagawa should play. its that simple. if someone having a abd game you replace them and give the other a run.
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    And one of Welbeck or Januzaj should play.
     
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Post-match discussion

Man of the Match

Phil Jones image Phil Jones 49% of 727 votes

Runners-up

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Player Ratings

4.8 Total Average Rating

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Compiled from 459 ratings.
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Score Predictions

741,167,143
  • Man Utd win
  • Sunderland win
  • Draw

Detailed Results

  • 27% Sunderland 1:2 Man Utd
  • 13% Sunderland 1:3 Man Utd
  • 12% Sunderland 0:2 Man Utd
  • 8% Sunderland 1:1 Man Utd
  • 7% Sunderland 0:3 Man Utd
  • 7% Sunderland 2:1 Man Utd
  • 5% Sunderland 0:1 Man Utd
  • 4% Sunderland 2:2 Man Utd
  • 3% Sunderland 1:0 Man Utd
  • 3% Sunderland 2:0 Man Utd
  • 2% Sunderland 0:5 Man Utd
  • 2% Sunderland 0:0 Man Utd
  • 2% Sunderland 5:0 Man Utd
  • 2% Sunderland 0:4 Man Utd
  • 1% Sunderland 3:1 Man Utd
  • 1% Sunderland 2:3 Man Utd
  • 1% Sunderland 1:4 Man Utd
  • 1% Sunderland 1:5 Man Utd
  • 1% Sunderland 3:0 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 2:4 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 2:5 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 4:5 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 5:5 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 3:2 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 3:3 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 3:5 Man Utd
  • 0% Sunderland 4:0 Man Utd
Compiled from 1051 predictions.
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Match Stats

  1. Sunderland
  2. Man Utd
Possession
45% 55%
Shots
11 10
Shots on Target
3 3
Corners
4 4
Fouls
10 15

Referee

Martin Atkinson

Man Utd Lineup

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