Are we ready for the start of the season?

ETH is going to have to show that he can coach a team to play above the sum of its parts cause we are going into the season with a worse squad than last year in my mind. Having to rely on the same players who have let us down consistently over the last 5 or so years is very depressing. I’m not sure ETH can get us playing well, we will hear the same excuses and I think we’ll have a very poor start to the season.
 
Jericholyte2 said:
So that’ll be:
- no De Ligt if they don’t get Tah
- no Mazraoui if we don’t pay off AWB
- Both McT and Casemiro staying
- no Ugarte / Zubimendi because of the fees
- main midfield target now Sander Berge

Call me a knee-jerker but I’m ready to write this season off already!

Team looking like:

Onana
Dalot Evans Martinez Shaw
Casemiro Mainoo
Garnacho McT Rashford
Bruno as false 9

feck me!
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INEOS are close to starting off with failure.
 
bosnian_red said:
The city game won't indicate how we'll do this season nor should Ineos react to a glorified friendly. They should have a plan which I'm sure they do. The reason they can't act on that plan is that to take the next steps, we need other clubs to purchase some of our guys while paying respectable fees to set a standard so you can't just force them out for nothing. So as of now, we can't do anything other than wait for other teams.
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It does. What else gives an indication if not a football game?
 
Escobar said:
It does. What else gives an indication if not a football game?
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Great question.

Not all football games are created equal. My opinion only but I would rather win the first three PL matches and sacrifice the Community Shield than win the Community Shield and take only 3 of the first 9 points, which seems right now very likely. Our current first choice XI won't be ready against for the match against City whereas it very likely will be -- absent Hojlund -- against Fulham.

But we do not have the new blood that we need and at this point even if they all came in this weekend they're not going to be ready for the match against Fulham.
 
Escobar said:
It does. What else gives an indication if not a football game?
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It's a charity shield game with 1 month left of the transfer window and multiple injuries, combined with half of our squad not part of pre season at all due to the international tournaments. Nothing in August will be any indication for how we'll be in October and later.

In all likelihood, Saturday will go very badly. It doesn'tean the whole season will.
 
Are we ready to go into next season... the only thing that has changed in this team is we signed a teen who is now injured for 3 months.

And a striker. Is it too early to pull the plug on this season?
 
We're obviously not ready. We needed to sign at least one midfielder and one more defender and get them somewhat integrated.

I am still happy we've finally started buying younger players though.
 
Almost happy I'm missing out on the community shield on Saturday

It's not looking great
So annoying that new season is underway and it's looking so bleak and uninspiring
 
Yes, I’m ready, just a shame our team is not. Desperately need 2 more additions as a minimum. If we get a CB and DM I can just about live with that, more is obviously needed though. DM needs to be top priority, Maguire can stand in for Yoro until he’s fit again. It is what it is given the alleged cash flow issue? Shame we have tight fisted majority owners.
 
Reminds me of the start of Mourinhos third season. Business not done despite starting off on the ball like it was gonna get done. And it was obvious we’d start badly that season and it’s obvious we’re going to start this season badly too.
 
bosnian_red said:
It's a charity shield game with 1 month left of the transfer window and multiple injuries, combined with half of our squad not part of pre season at all due to the international tournaments. Nothing in August will be any indication for how we'll be in October and later.

In all likelihood, Saturday will go very badly. It doesn'tean the whole season will.
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In terms of fitness, style of play, being compact and defending, creating chances, it always gives an indication and also confidence. If we lose 4-0 do you really think that has zero effect?
 
lex talionis said:
Great question.

Not all football games are created equal. My opinion only but I would rather win the first three PL matches and sacrifice the Community Shield than win the Community Shield and take only 3 of the first 9 points, which seems right now very likely. Our current first choice XI won't be ready against for the match against City whereas it very likely will be -- absent Hojlund -- against Fulham.

But we do not have the new blood that we need and at this point even if they all came in this weekend they're not going to be ready for the match against Fulham.
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The season starts 5 days later. There is not much time left and I doubt we will be able to make huge progress in between
 
Don't worry lads all this panic talk is just a smokescreen. We'll get rid of all the deadwood and De Ligt, Mazraoui and Ugarte will all be our players come Aug 31st. #TrustInINEOS
 
bosnian_red said:
It's a charity shield game with 1 month left of the transfer window and multiple injuries, combined with half of our squad not part of pre season at all due to the international tournaments. Nothing in August will be any indication for how we'll be in October and later.

In all likelihood, Saturday will go very badly. It doesn'tean the whole season will.
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Meh, we played Wolves at home last August and that was an indication about how our season went. Conceding more chances to opponents, keeper making rash decisions, zero control in midfield etc
 
I am ready because I've got me new United jersey, original and all that. Imported because I bought it from United store. First game I'll go to a cafe that often show matches as a full kit wanker.
 
Short answer: No.
Long answer: Nope!
 
It's another disaster of a start to a season.. Injuries at the back again.. striker injured again don't know how this Zikzee is going to go in the prem?? CBs doubtfull , Shaw ? Again? Loom out Maguire who's usually injury free is either ill or injured so is Evans ..not confident at all
 
Isotope said:
Good post, man. I was absolutely blind to this employment laws. Anyway, it's probably the right thing to not have him on tour. There's some "injury bug" in the tour squad, reading the news.

Sorry for my "out of place" joke, mate. That's the only post out of 24k that I didn't put much thought on!
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Thanks for the kind response, no worries mate! Sorry for my unnecessary quip as well.

Yeah I think you're right, it's probably best to just let them go on their vacation and not worry about football for a few weeks every year. Some players are just monsters though, and will train as much on their free time as possible. I can't imagine young Ronaldo taking much real time off when he was young.

Agree with people who are saying we are not ready for this season.

A lot of fans are hoping Rashford will just magically become a consistent performer all of a sudden. I see no indication of that ever happening.

We hardly won't be able to sell any of our players, because almost all of them are on bigger wages than they deserve and what any other reasonable, well functioning club would be willing to offer them. Most of them are virtually unsellable, and it's our own fault for throwing stupid contracts at them. Same was true for players like De Gea, Varane, Martial, Pogba and Lingard. So we're stuck with most of them until their contracts run out and they can leave on a free, giving us nothing in return.

Tactically we're still miles behind our rivals, who all favor a more possession-based system that gives them more control, leading to more reliable and predictable results. Ten Hag seems dead set on continuing with his counterattacking project, which simply isn't stable enough to provide a good goal difference. It's a style that leads to low value chances, and high value chances for our opponents. It's also a style that frequently isolates the attack from the rest of the team, leading to poor attacking and equally poor defending.

The best teams defend with 11 players, and attack with 10 players (11 in some cases where the keeper is acting like a passing center back). We attack with 5-6 players, and defend with 5-6 players.

It's a tactical shit-show. Works well in a few matches of the season and in cup runs, but has absolutely no consistency over a long league season.

Not to mention the quality of our players. Martinez, Mainoo, (a fit) Shaw, and many would argue Bruno (I won't, but I totally get why many do) are the only players in our squad who would be good enough to warrant starting in a side that regularly challenges for the title. I'd argue Onana and Mount has the quality as well, but Mount hasn't had the chance to prove it, and probably won't because Bruno starts anyway. And Onana is pretty much our version of Ederson, albeit on a tier below. Both excellent with their feet, but far from the best shot stoppers. Feet is more important these days if you're a possession-based team, although having both is ideal, like Alisson.

We like to think players like Garnacho and Rashford are world class players. They simply aren't. They are prone to brilliant moments, but that's it. It's just moments.
They can't or won't defend or press.
They can't or won't go in for tough challenges.
They can't or won't pass to better placed team mates.
They just want to run and finish.
That's literally moments.
Their overall game both in and out of possession is nowhere near the consistency you need from all of your 10 outfield players to properly function as a cohesive unit.

And we like to think that players like Hojlund has the potential to be world class. No way, he is not that good. He is very decent, quite good at best. But he is our main man up top, and we paid a fee for him that suggests he is one of the biggest talents out there. It's just insane. He would be 3rd or 4th choice up top for any other quality team. And in a few years, he probably won't be our top striker. He'll likely be replaced by someone better.

So yeah. We might challenge for top 4, if we're extremely lucky. We've done it under Mourinho, Ole and Ten Hag, while still being miles off City. But our squad and tactics are nowhere near ready, and we effectively will struggle to sell players on the old regime's wages for the next three years.
 
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Not only are we not prepared, we've managed to find ourselves with a worse available squad than we had at the end of a disastrous, injury-filled season.
 
We’re worse off now with the injury to Yoro. Our only hope is for our rivals to fall unexpectedly. Otherwise we’re probably looking at a Top 8 finish.
 
If they cannot shift these players, then unfortunately we will just have to cope with it. If they have to let them walk for free then so be it. Do not take up options, do not give any of them new contracts. The only one whose contract expires next summer I would be giving a new contract to is Amad. Just get the wages off the books. Unfortunately we still then have the problem named Casemiro.
 
Morale among the fans seems to be extremely low. Understandably.

We haven't been able to sell anyone. We can't seem to get anyone else in as a result.

I just saw that Rob Dawson tweet about Evans, Martinez and Dalot potentially being our only fit defenders. That is fecking dire.

A few bad results to begin with and all of that anger will be channeled towards EtH, rightly or wrongly.
 
Judas said:
It just doesn't make logical sense to me the amount of injuries we have and how it seemingly isn't being addressed? I simple can't be fecked to watch another season where half of the squad is seemingly unavailable. Life's too short.
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I don't get it either mate. I assumed part of the rebuild would be trying to sort the injuries from last season, we've not even started and it's already as bad. Hard to summon any enthusiasm at the moment, the squad is worse and lack of outgoings is killing us.
 
It started so good with Zirkzee and Yoro getting done, sensible rumours about some names leaving... here we are almost halfway through august and it's the same old once again. Stuck with Maguire, Lindelöf, McT, AWB and so on... We're gonna play City in a couple of days and can't even put out four senior defenders on the pitch
 
Spurs buying Solanke. Another side that has moved further ahead of us this window.
 
Ludens the Red said:
Reminds me of the start of Mourinhos third season. Business not done despite starting off on the ball like it was gonna get done. And it was obvious we’d start badly that season and it’s obvious we’re going to start this season badly too.
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There's an even more recent parallel. It's exactly what happened last season too.

I remember everyone was optimistic and then we turned down the double bid for Maguire and McTominay and the wheels fell off.
 
We're going into the 'first game of the season' against City with a team that looks worse than last season.

Even with everyone back fit (lol) we would be looking maybe marginally better with Casemiro getting older and Varane gone.

Somehow the manager who set unwanted record after unwanted record and became the laughing stock of the PL has to somehow get an extra 30% at least from this squad of very average players if we're going to get top 6 even.

Many of our issues being unable to shift our dead weight come from rewarding mediocrity with new, fat contracts and we've done the same with the manager. It's not looking great!
 
Ollie Derbyshire said:
ETH is going to have to show that he can coach a team to play above the sum of its parts cause we are going into the season with a worse squad than last year in my mind. Having to rely on the same players who have let us down consistently over the last 5 or so years is very depressing. I’m not sure ETH can get us playing well, we will hear the same excuses and I think we’ll have a very poor start to the season.
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If that is the case we will be talking of a ne manager at Christmas.
The transfer business has stagnated since the two signing and correct me if I’m wrong but we haven’t even managed to sell anyone.
Some things don’t change do they, so no we are not ready for the new season, far from it.
 
Chin up lads, our inevitable spanking against City will allow for a couple of knee-jerk buys
 
We’re nowhere near close. If we had no injuries and everyone was available I’d be a bit more optimistic even though we haven’t added another CB, LB or CDM. But the injuries on top of the lack of transfer activity has me concerned.

In hindsight we probably should’ve taken those AWB and McTominay offers even if they were below our valuation given how desperate we need upgrades in defence and midfield.
 
Hadn't felt such little emotion before the season started. We can write this one off, won't even fight for top 4 everyone can see it'll be a disaster. We have, somehow, a worse squad than last year.

Ineos this or that, same old story nothing's changed still a poor run club that'll get poor results and it won't change.
 
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