Are Bruno’s Hollywood passes no longer coming off because we no longer have pacy players to get on the end of them?

JPRouve said:
He hasn't been unlucky. Last season our goals scored were way above our expected goals.
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In terms of our team yes but not particularly our goals scored from what Bruno specifically created. As I said, he was returning 0.35 assist from 0.32 expected assists. Whereas this season it has switched to a bigger margin of underperformance. He could quite easily regress to the mean and bag a bit more from the same output.

Another side point worth noting is the effect loss of penalties had on his goal output. 0.45 xG down to 0.28 xG. But it's not just him not having penalties, the team as a whole has a lot less this season:

18/19 - 12 league penalties, scored 10.
19/20 - 14 league penalties, scored 10.
20/21 - 11 league penalties, scored 10.
21/22 - 4 league penalties, scored 2.
 
sullydnl said:
In terms of our team yes but not particularly our goals scored from what Bruno specifically created. As I said, he was returning 0.35 assist from 0.32 expected assists. Whereas this season it has switched to a bigger margin of underperformance. He could quite easily regress to the mean and bag a bit more from the same output.

Another side point worth noting is the effect loss of penalties had on his goal output. 0.45 xG down to 0.28 xG. But it's not just him not having penalties, the team as a whole has a lot less this season:

18/19 - 12 league penalties, scored 10.
19/20 - 14 league penalties, scored 10.
20/21 - 11 league penalties, scored 10.
21/22 - 4 league penalties, scored 2.
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I think 10 plus penalties is quite high anyway isn't it?
Anyway we don't get as many penalties, because we also do not create as many opportunities in the opposition box.
 
He's a high-risk, high-reward player, so there are going to be periods where it doesn't happen for him. Ten Hag will probably either build the team around him or sell him this summer I suspect.
 
Cassidy said:
I think 10 plus penalties is quite high anyway isn't it?
Anyway we don't get as many penalties, because we also do not create as many opportunities in the opposition box.
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Yep, we were top or second for penalties in each of those seasons.
 
I'd just say he's always been quite a high attempt rate/low success rate player, but now his confidence has taken a hit his success rate has dropped to rock bottom

If he's simply just trying the same passes irrespective of the physical attributes of his teammates then I'm more worried about him than ever
 
sullydnl said:
In terms of our team yes but not particularly our goals scored from what Bruno specifically created. As I said, he was returning 0.35 assist from 0.32 expected assists. Whereas this season it has switched to a bigger margin of underperformance. He could quite easily regress to the mean and bag a bit more from the same output.

Another side point worth noting is the effect loss of penalties had on his goal output. 0.45 xG down to 0.28 xG. But it's not just him not having penalties, the team as a whole has a lot less this season:

18/19 - 12 league penalties, scored 10.
19/20 - 14 league penalties, scored 10.
20/21 - 11 league penalties, scored 10.
21/22 - 4 league penalties, scored 2.
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The context of that stat is important for the topic of this thread. Last season in open play Bruno xA was inferior to the goal scored, our strikers outperformed it. The difference in xA essentially comes from corners even though had no assists last season or this season.
 
tjb said:
People also forget, Bruno is a great scorer from midfield as well. ETH is not as strict in his system as someone like Pep. There is room for consistent risk taking. Ziyech and Tadic have been massive parts of his teams, both can be termed as mercurial. In addition to that, the no.10 in ETH's teams are usually not the link up players that people seem to think ETH wants there. They are usually expected to stay high and be part of the attack. Bruno would actually bring far more to the role than anything ETH has ever worked with prior.
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I know which is why I find it funny when people think Bruno will not suit ETH's style of play.

Like you say, ETH will have another midfielder who can link the defence and midfield together, meaning the ball will get to Bruno in areas where he is dangerous alot more.

What I notice about him, when he is involved in the game alot he plays better, when he is isolated and rarely getting the ball, he tries too hard knowing he has to make this count.

I can see him being important under ETH.
 
Because his short passing and movement off the ball and keeping possession is not upto the standard of ETH.
 
Explanation 1: Rashford is a shadow of himself, James, Greenwood and Martial are out.

Explanation 2: Ole tried to implement high pressure in the beginning, but soon realised our back four wasn’t solid enough to play with a lot of backroom. At the same time “the high pressure” influenced our counterattack negatively. We didn’t have legs for powerful transition play. Ole made a choice to defend deeper in order to rest in defence and save energy for explosions forward. Ole decided to play on the team’s strength and not expose our vulnerability in defence. Efficient strategy agains attacking minded (good) teams. Not so agains low block or inferior teams.

Rangnick will sooner than later realise United doesn’t have the right players to play high pressure or dominate games (good possession play).

People should stop dreaming about high pressure or dominating games until we have another composition of players. Managers tactical skills, game management or how he wants the team to play is only half the answer, but people seems to think it’s the only answer.
 
He’s capable of a stunning pass even on his worst day. The issue is his general performance though, not whether one pass makes it or do we need to buy faster players. He needs to play better within the context of the team.
 
When the feck was the last time we even scored on a counterattack breakaway?

Our players like Rashford just dont seem to need to sprint anymore.
 
Vidyoyo said:
I said the same thing in his performance thread. Sancho, Ronaldo and whatever version of Rashford we have now prefer the ball played to feet and Bruno's passes aren't accurate enough. They aren't looking to run onto long balls anymore, like Martial wasn't last year.

Only solution I see is either Bruno adapts his game, or we buy some attackers who like to run.
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Even when we played Rashford every fecking game (who's only trick for the past year has been constantly making the same run in behind for a long ball over the top), for every Bruno pass that found him there was 5 that would just give the ball back to the opposition. He isn't that great of a long passer in general, he just tried a feckload of them so enough would come off. Bruno's best passing attributes are his crossing and vision around the box.
 
I think we've just lost all attacking ability. We have basically only got one player who can finish and he's a 37 year old who can no longer find space the way he used to, instead relying on instincts to get his goals. That's quite hard for a creative player to feed into.
 
tjb said:
I'm not sure his game is a problem. He is an active no.10, plus his general play was always good for us prior to this season. His movement combination plays and through balls were really good. I think the issue is that fue to us as a team not having any creativity outside of him and the inability of our midfield to move the ball forward quickly enough, he's having to play theee long balls to connect to our forward line. People will tell you that Rangnick's football is on par with Ole's, it's not. It might be tighter in the middle and we do attempt to press more, but our movement and spacing of our attack has been terrible. Our attackers are struggling as a result of this.
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I think so, there has been a current of relying on a particular player in form to rescue poor performances. The team might not be consciously thinking it but I think it's there. They're not realising that it doesn't matter how good you are individually, that will only hide the cracks temporarily; just look at PSG. If someone told me a few years ago that a team with Neymar, Messi and Mbappe would struggle in Europe, I wouldn't have believed it.

If players are now blatantly disregarding manager's orders, that should be a disciplinary offence. I've never really understood why players would disregard instructions, it's an easy way to make the manager accountable. If the player says he/she followed orders exactly then that's on the manager.
 
Bruno masked his poor performances for a while with penalties, assists and goals. Now that's dried up you're just seeing his general play and it's obvious he lacks a lot of the fundamentals required for a 10 in a title winning team.

I struggle to see how someone like Bruno can play in a team that wants to control possession, hopefully I'm wrong.
 
sullydnl said:
In terms of our team yes but not particularly our goals scored from what Bruno specifically created. As I said, he was returning 0.35 assist from 0.32 expected assists. Whereas this season it has switched to a bigger margin of underperformance. He could quite easily regress to the mean and bag a bit more from the same output.

Another side point worth noting is the effect loss of penalties had on his goal output. 0.45 xG down to 0.28 xG. But it's not just him not having penalties, the team as a whole has a lot less this season:

18/19 - 12 league penalties, scored 10.
19/20 - 14 league penalties, scored 10.
20/21 - 11 league penalties, scored 10.
21/22 - 4 league penalties, scored 2.
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The penalties dried up the moment Klopp opened his gob and started whingeing about the number we were getting.
 
I think it's a combination of factors.

Bruno is not in good form. Yet he's the type to continue trying the same complicated passes rather than going back to basics.

We do lack some movement. We've got an aging striker that comes alive when he sniffs a goal around the box. Sancho wanting everything to feet. Young Elanga who is still learning the game.

Then you've got a failing structure that isn't really creating much. This is a vicious cycle because Bruno will always take responsibility and force things, when it isn't on. This breaks down our play and creates turnovers which we're weak against. It also frustrates players like Sancho that would thrive in less individualistic play.

Overall, the new season can't come quick enough. We need to reset Bruno, reset our midfield composition, make sure everyone actually understands their role and movements in attack. Work harder, get fitter. Get some new faces in. I think what's happening ahead of Bruno will start to look different and then if he's still messing up then you drop him.
 
I think the reason is our midfield:
- with the mc-fred combo Bruno has to often return in our final third to play a quality out-ball (because passing isn't mc-fred's forte).
- when either Matic or Pogba start, Bruno has to be the more athletic player and run-back to compensate for lack of legs (Matic) or willingness (Pogba).

Either way he spends too much time compensating for our frailties and so too much time in our half.
I think it has all left him a bit drained and unable to influence our attack.
 
Drz said:
I think the reason is our midfield:
- with the mc-fred combo Bruno has to often return in our final third to play a quality out-ball (because passing isn't mc-fred's forte).
- when either Matic or Pogba start, Bruno has to be the more athletic player and run-back to compensate for lack of legs (Matic) or willingness (Pogba).

Either way he spends too much time compensating for our frailties and so too much time in our half.
I think it has all left him a bit drained and unable to influence our attack.
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That is a new one. Bruno spends too much time i. Our half? He’s the one picking the ball up from our defence because Fred and Scott can’t? This just isn’t the case.
 
Rozay said:
That is a new one. Bruno spends too much time i. Our half? He’s the one picking the ball up from our defence because Fred and Scott can’t? This just isn’t the case.
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Seemed that way to me.
If that's not it then he has been poor and I for one don't know why.
Would still love a heatmap comparison of his this season vs last season's.
 
The Oracle said:
Last season we had several pacy forward players:
  • Dan James
  • Martial
  • Greenwood
  • Rashford (when he used to bust a gut for the team)
Now that three of those four players aren’t here, and the fourth one has downed tools, that is a lot of pace missing from our forward play – is it any wonder that none of our players get on the end of Bruno’s Hollywood passes anymore?

We no longer have any pacy forwards left in the team to get on the end of them!
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There’s elements of this I agree with as the lack of pace in our attack recently is a downgrade on what we had the last couple of seasons.

Also, the first season when he had the biggest success was when we were set up as a v good counter attacking team under Ole. The combination of counter attacking and pace on the break was a perfect fit for Bruno to keep trying these high risk passes and getting our players in behind defences. Even when they didn’t come off, we were always starting from a deeper position so the loss of possession wasn’t as hurtful as it is now where we are trying to play with a higher line and further up the pitch. Those passes that were working for him in the first season aren’t coming off because we aren’t set up to counter any more and we don’t play from deeper as a team. In fact we are more suited to being a crossing team now considering our focal point Ronaldo is a bigger threat in a crossing set up than a counter attack one.
 
I think it's simply a case of having too great a workload and we're seeing a symptom of mental exhaustion, and I don't mean in a snowflake kind of way.

Any player should be able to play over and above their normal style of play, like overclocking a computer. It can't go on forever like that though and then injuries, mistakes and poor form start creeping in.

ETH will be good for him I think as he'd benefit from a more disciplined system which delineates his responsibility.

He's been carrying the expectations of his colleagues which has lead to him trying to do a lot of things that aren't consistent for the role he's been given.
 
Nothing is coming off at all because the team is a dejected train wreck right now.
 
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