Palace reserves. Awesome performance.
8
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Palace reserves. Awesome performance.
Unfortunately, people over here just like to complain. A lot will not recognise his passing or pressure on opponents. They’ll pick a moment where he complained about something and start firing at him.
A couple of dangerous passes today, but you simply cannot have a player in a midfield 3 to play in moments.
In his role, he should be, as Ten Hag describes it - ‘ball secure’. A player who gets on the ball more than most and has some of the most touches as he has the quality to take it in various scenarios and invariably ensure it gets back to a United player, even under pressure. Instead he’s this first time swing in behind merchant who doesn’t seem to be willing/able to actually get his foot on the ball and play. Just take it, give it, move into space and take it again, turn away from a man, and give it again and keep moving into space. That’s the role for me. And would make us so much better as a team and bring everyone in to the game more frequently and in overload situations. I’m tired of him, and he will never create enough chances to placate me from the total absence of these fundamentals, nor will he ever create enough chances for us to still be a top team in spite of the absence of these things.
What he’s good at, he’s better than most at, but what he’s poor at is too much and he’s poor at it to such levels that his positives cannot compensate. And you can’t make a team with a consistent rhythm and patterns out of what he’s good at. At the very best, you can make a chance.
In his role, he should be, as Ten Hag describes it - ‘ball secure’. A player who gets on the ball more than most and has some of the most touches as he has the quality to take it in various scenarios and invariably ensure it gets back to a United player, even under pressure. Instead he’s this first time swing in behind merchant who doesn’t seem to be willing/able to actually get his foot on the ball and play. Just take it, give it, move into space and take it again, turn away from a man, and give it again and keep moving into space. That’s the role for me. And would make us so much better as a team and bring everyone in to the game more frequently and in overload situations. I’m tired of him, and he will never create enough chances to placate me from the total absence of these fundamentals, nor will he ever create enough chances for us to still be a top team in spite of the absence of these things.
What he’s good at, he’s better than most at, but what he’s poor at is too much and he’s poor at it to such levels that his positives cannot compensate. And you can’t make a team with a consistent rhythm and patterns out of what he’s good at. At the very best, you can make a chance.
De Bruyne in this team we'd be top 4 - 100%
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Everything. We couldn't control the midfield, our wingers consistently ran into a wall or made the wrong decision (Rashford in particular) and our defenders shat themselves.
I expect nothing from him anymore.
I did watch the game. And I haven't asked to sell him. I am just suprised that his usual fans (at least two of them) think he did well.
We need to control the football first, we have a 18 year, 31 Erickson (who wasn't quick at 25) and a midfielder with 59% pass rate.
Im just saying his positioning is poor.
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Man he was bad today. Ineffective everywhere. I thought his defensive/turnover work was proper laughable.
I actually think Mount could very easily keep him out the team if he’s able to put in a few 6/10 performances. He’s just regressed so much from his first 18 months here. He’s undoubtedly one that this new board need to sanction an exit for at some point over the next year. You simply do not win big games big trophies with this kind of player in your team.
I actually think Mount could very easily keep him out the team if he’s able to put in a few 6/10 performances. He’s just regressed so much from his first 18 months here. He’s undoubtedly one that this new board need to sanction an exit for at some point over the next year. You simply do not win big games big trophies with this kind of player in your team.
All he fecking does is launch 1 in a 100 passes, all the time. Sick to death of him.
It’s like people don’t understand simple team football. We were outplayed today, and conceded far more shots at our goal. Spurs had no ‘chance-creating machine’ in their midfield - nor have any of the teams that have played us off the park and beaten us this season as far as I can return. This ridiculously elementary idea that we’ll simply ‘put this player in there and he’ll create all the chances’ has, and will continue to take us absolutely nowhere. The setup we are occupying is consistently levels below our opponents, and when we beat a good team, it is invariably down to us summoning up the strength to outwork them and outrun them on any given day. But outpass them doesn’t seem to be in our thinking or capabilities.
How the feck have we allowed Spurs to become a better football team than us ffs?
How the feck have we allowed Spurs to become a better football team than us ffs?
People go on about Rashford all the time but Bruno is just as much to blaim, if someone offers £100m sell, get rid and rebuild. We need to sell Bruno and get Florian Wirtz plus a young English player like Alex Scott.
I wouldn't be so keen to move Bruno on given the myriad other issues we have to deal with. Yes he has some major flaws but the guy works his socks off, is always available and can play fecking football.
What he needs - and I hate saying this, having flashbacks to Pogba as I do - is a functioning system like what Ange has put in place at Spurs. ETH is clearly all over the place at the minute when it comes to this.
If he still can't round his edges then sure, move him on. As things stand though I'd like to see how he does in a functioning system, if we ever get there..
What he needs - and I hate saying this, having flashbacks to Pogba as I do - is a functioning system like what Ange has put in place at Spurs. ETH is clearly all over the place at the minute when it comes to this.
If he still can't round his edges then sure, move him on. As things stand though I'd like to see how he does in a functioning system, if we ever get there..
Bad Bruno back again
This is why when we have a fully fit squad, ETH has been trying to force Bruno out wide..
It drives me mad watching him do this over and over again with no reproach. He doesn’t even have the intelligence to slow the game down when we’re struggling to string 3 passes together and gain some possession. Considering the number of touches he gets, his decision making is unforgivable.
So you think staying a countering team is the way to go?
I'm not too sure about his always available, take the dummy today, he was available but left the ball and this was the second time in as many games.
Still fuming about the last one before this game.
You don't think there were any other problems?
But in anycase Bruno was poor today.
I don't get what's going on. There's no way Bruno is playing like that against the managers wishes. ETH must be asking for the ball to be played early. Problem is that's already Bruno's natural inclination. It needs holding back a bit not encouraging further.
Which is much worse.
But ETH loves him and he will play every game he's fit for as long ETH is here. My only hope get a ruthless DOF in and clears players like Bruno out to make funds available and send a real singal to everyone at United
Yeah I agree and I think a lot of people don't understand he's pretty obviously been told to do that kind of pass and it's a tactical instruction. 100% get why people don't like it- i don't particularly like us playing this way either- but that's an EtH/club structure issue.
Think Rangnick and maybe Ole did the same too. I reckon it's because of how volatile he is with the ball. Unfortunately ETH has doubled down on Moments FC football this season (said as much at the start) which was a red flag for me.
And I am surprised that someone who has only posted in the Bruno threads in the last few days has jumped on the first two people who said something positive about him. Fancy contributing to any other thread at some point?
He doesn’t have the ability to either. Not in the face of a press like Spurs’ today. He is the extremely strange case of a #10 that is not known for being comfortable in possession. In all my time watching football, that’s almost been the whole point of them. They were always the most talented players and the ones who could take it and keep it under all pressures. Instead Bruno is like someone deciding to play Leighton Baines at
#10 or something.
To me he’s the biggest mistake we’ve made in the market for a long time. Not because he’s the least talented footballer we’ve signed, but because he’s the sand we’ve decided to build on and the opportunity cost of that has been too big. I think if we had gotten a different TYPE of player back in 2020 there’s a very good chance that this team goes in a totally different direction. Even of that player himself was eventually sold and upgraded by now in terms of quality, it would have been a far more beneficial signing if it had meant our team was built on different principles. This nonsense that we’re turning out every week is so clearly and obviously not going to take us anywhere. Let’s scrap it and become a team that can pass and move the ball under pressure. Because until we do, we can forget it.
I agree that it probably comes from Ten Hag but it's not like he has many options with Fernandes, he can't really carry the ball, he can't shield the ball so he can either try a high risk long pass for a runner or play the safer possession based pass which usually results in his teammate passing it straight back to him, because for all his faults Bruno does make himself available to receive the ball. It's all getting predictable, we just need to move on, it's not working, it won't work if we build a new team around Bruno.
Evans who we sold for 7 mil and is 36 playing left CB, WAN who is a RB playing left back meant that he came in narrow but did support Rashford.
Rashford was again - holding the ball too long and not passing, Erickson was going against stong midfielders that closed him down.
We didn't have the legs in middle to control the game, I've already given my opinion on Bruno
Oh yes and his corners! Feck sake..
I honestly can't stand watching this guy play for us, I can't wait till he's gone. We've had far worse players but everyone knew they were bad, this guy's biggest trick is to make you think his moments are worth it which only keeps us in a state of Brunoball. He's even conned his way to being our captain.
My sentiments exactly. Can’t wait until this is a choice taken out of our manager’s hands and we are tasked with building a team without him. As long as he’s here, it’s clear what sort of team we will try to be, and even at its best, it won’t be good enough.
As much as I appreciate what he can do, I do think we'll struggle to play the football we want to watch us play with our team built around him and Rashford.
Agree with all of this. He’s a bit of a paradox in himself; he puts up good numbers in his so called KPIs i.e. he always does well over a season in terms of chance creation, which adds credibility to the narrative that he’s our most crucial player. I think this pressures managers to keep him in the team but I’m convinced that if he was to adapt his game to a more patient style of play, where he doesn’t create as many ‘chances’, we’d benefit as a team but he may not be viewed as our a key player.
Ultimately though you’re right, he doesn’t possess the ability to play like that.
He is the type of player you need to build your team around to get the best out of. If you don't his qualities are almost completely nullified. If you do you're going to struggle as he has such obvious flaws in his game that aren't conducive to a top team.
Hasn't had a good performance all season but gets lauded for running around a lot and the occasional through ball. In fact I can't remember off the top of my head any good performance during 2023 as a whole (Everton Home is the only one that comes to mind).
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Again, this is due to the weird composition of his skillset. He is more than capable of producing great ‘moments’. But a ‘good performance’ from him over 90 mins is invariably a story about effort rather than quality which is simply uncommon for a player in his role.
This is exactly it. Fernandes is one of our most one dimensional players — it’s just not in the usual way that someone so obvious like Antonio Valencia or Marcus Rashford would be. Fernandes cannot carry the ball that well, he cannot dribble, and he struggles in awkward areas of the field. As a result, his main solution is to instantly attempt the killer pass, or lose the ball and then use his marathon lungs to frantically sprint back for the turnover.
Someone alluded to it being tactical about how Fernandes plays. I disagree — it’s the only way Fernandes can play.
A good manager would have put Bruno in his place by now. He needs to be told to be more productive with the ball and to play his position and stop charging round the field trying his maverick passes.
There is a top player in there, he just clearly feels he needs to carry us which is resulting in his trying the outrageous all the time.
There is a top player in there, he just clearly feels he needs to carry us which is resulting in his trying the outrageous all the time.
It’s been 4 years and I’m still reading this idea that Bruno doesn’t just get his foot on the ball and pass and move it around is because he simply hasn’t been told to do so yet. Nor was he told to do so at Sporting when scouts observed he was wasteful.
Surely he just doesn’t have it within him to play like that?
It’s also a problem with the positions he takes up. There was a time in the second half where we were playing forward from Onana and a pass was eventually made to Bruno who was literally standing on the left touchline. Our player that we want to be comfortable to take the ball in the middle of the park and use it is running away from the congestion in order to avoid confrontation. As a result, you have Mainoo in the centre circle with 3 Spurs midfielders closer to him than his nearest midfield colleague.
I agree with all of the issues, but the more annoying part is that the manager seems completely fine with it, and seems to even encourage it. He never drops him, or subs him, and seems one of his undroppable players.
Saudi Arabia madness aside, there’s no one offering 100M for a spray and pray machine. Hell, I don’t even think Saudi clubs would.
I don't think its confrontation, I think it's to pull the man maker out - but most team just pass him off to the nearest player. With Forden (10) yesterday it pushed the midfield back or pulled a CB out.
I really think mount is meant too replace him.
… which I’m not massively enthused about either. Could’ve used that hefty transfer fee and heavy salary we’ve given him and moved away from these no.10s masquerading in midfield to get a central midfielder in there. A shame. We’ll get it right one day.
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