Bye bye Van Gaal | Really enjoying managerial retirement

@Alex99 @Pogue Mahone

Alex - did you watch us that year? That not what we did, we were good at building the play forward but had next to zero penetration when we got around their box, LVG supposedly banned players from risky shots and his expectation was that if you pass the ball quickly enough and have the right movement, an opposition player would make a mistake or be too tired and a gap would appear for a ball into an area we could shoot from. The irony was because we were so bad at this part Fellaini started coming on as a Hail Mary option and was actually quite effective.

At Pogue at least it seems like you watched us but I don’t agree we had no progression, we just never shot or threatened the opponents goal. It was like there was a magnet in the ball and an opposite poled magnet around the opponents box. I do think we were too rigid as a team but then I look at how we performed in big games with quite an average team and we generally performed well against the best opposition out there and he’s really the only manager we’ve had who has been able to do that and it’s because of how the CMs worked as part of the build up. We knew how to recycle (too much in hindsight) the ball, rebuild attacks and mitigate the risk of counters.

As boring as it was I’d kill for us play that way again whilst just being way more direct and aggressive in the final third.
 
tomaldinho1 said:
@Alex99 @Pogue Mahone

Alex - did you watch us that year? That not what we did, we were good at building the play forward but had next to zero penetration when we got around their box, LVG supposedly banned players from risky shots and his expectation was that if you pass the ball quickly enough and have the right movement, an opposition player would make a mistake or be too tired and a gap would appear for a ball into an area we could shoot from. The irony was because we were so bad at this part Fellaini started coming on as a Hail Mary option and was actually quite effective.

At Pogue at least it seems like you watched us but I don’t agree we had no progression, we just never shot or threatened the opponents goal. It was like there was a magnet in the ball and an opposite poled magnet around the opponents box. I do think we were too rigid as a team but then I look at how we performed in big games with quite an average team and we generally performed well against the best opposition out there and he’s really the only manager we’ve had who has been able to do that and it’s because of how the CMs worked as part of the build up. We knew how to recycle (too much in hindsight) the ball, rebuild attacks and mitigate the risk of counters.

As boring as it was I’d kill for us play that way again whilst just being way more direct and aggressive in the final third.
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Yes, I did waste my life watching us that year.

We weren't good at building the play forward. Our opponents just knew we'd piss about with it going sideways and backwards so were happy to sit back. LVG's idea of "they'll eventually make a mistake and leave a gap" worked the other way too. They could just sit back because eventually we'd misplace a pass or someone would have a loose touch and allow a tackle to be made.

There's literally no point in being good at getting the ball near the opposition box.
 
tomaldinho1 said:
@Alex99 @Pogue Mahone

Alex - did you watch us that year? That not what we did, we were good at building the play forward but had next to zero penetration when we got around their box, LVG supposedly banned players from risky shots and his expectation was that if you pass the ball quickly enough and have the right movement, an opposition player would make a mistake or be too tired and a gap would appear for a ball into an area we could shoot from. The irony was because we were so bad at this part Fellaini started coming on as a Hail Mary option and was actually quite effective.

At Pogue at least it seems like you watched us but I don’t agree we had no progression, we just never shot or threatened the opponents goal. It was like there was a magnet in the ball and an opposite poled magnet around the opponents box. I do think we were too rigid as a team but then I look at how we performed in big games with quite an average team and we generally performed well against the best opposition out there and he’s really the only manager we’ve had who has been able to do that and it’s because of how the CMs worked as part of the build up. We knew how to recycle (too much in hindsight) the ball, rebuild attacks and mitigate the risk of counters.

As boring as it was I’d kill for us play that way again whilst just being way more direct and aggressive in the final third.
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The whole Van Gaal era is a bit of a bug bear for me because I found the way we played football absolutely excruciating, so I always get triggered by him getting praise. Even faint praise!

I think the "performance in big games" stuff gets overstated a lot. Let's not forget that in his second season, the league was a shoot out between Spurs (!) and Leicester (!!!) so that tells you all you need to know about the true strength of the "big teams" at the time. In his first season we played Chelsea (title winners) twice drawing one match and losing the other. Against City (second place) we won one and lost one. A win and a draw against both Arsenal and Spurs, which were decent results but they were not very good teams and Arsenal made it one win apiece by knocking us out of the FA Cup. We did beat Liverpool twice but they finished 6th that season. And let's not forget this season was extremely unusual in us not having any European football to play, unlike most of the other big teams.

In his second season we were thrilled to do the double against Liverpool again but they beat us over two legs in the Europa League. We drew with Chelsea twice, making it zero wins against them for the whole of his reign. Arsenal hammered us 3-0 away but we beat them at home. Won one and drew one against City, who had an awful season by their standards (4th with 66 points) Drew with Leicester twice and win and a loss vs Tottenham.

By our recent standards these aren't bad results but you have to consider them in context with how very poor the usual big clubs were in those seasons. Pep''s City and Klopp's Liverpool are a class above and miles tougher opponents than anyone we played in those two seasons. When you take into account the horribly negative risk averse approach, I don't that's a set of results which reflects very well on him.
 
@Pogue Mahone oh I’m not defending LVG as some kind of misunderstood great for us. We were not a good team to watch but I was responding to a poster saying his tactics would be easy to coach, which is the opposite of what I think is true and probably why we ended up struggling to make them work.

@Alex99 of course it is beneficial to be able to progress the ball towards an opponents box, how would it not be? I agree teams could wait for us to make mistakes but we didn’t concede that many and the issue was offensive not defensive. Anyway your post was about coaching tactics and I think any of the Ajax/Barca group of Michels inspired managers tend to try the more complex midfield setup which generally are much harder to train.
 
tomaldinho1 said:
@Pogue Mahone oh I’m not defending LVG as some kind of misunderstood great for us. We were not a good team to watch but I was responding to a poster saying his tactics would be easy to coach, which is the opposite of what I think is true and probably why we ended up struggling to make them work.

@Alex99 of course it is beneficial to be able to progress the ball towards an opponents box, how would it not be? I agree teams could wait for us to make mistakes but we didn’t concede that many and the issue was offensive not defensive. Anyway your post was about coaching tactics and I think any of the Ajax/Barca group of Michels inspired managers tend to try the more complex midfield setup which generally are much harder to train.
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Because the point of the game is to score goals? Getting near the box and not finishing the job by actually creating a chance to score is pointless. You may as well just lump it long and try and win the knock down.

We didn't concede many either because we were so regimented and risk averse.

I'm looking at his time at United. There was little evidence of anything complex going on there. We spent two years waiting for some sort of tactical progression and it didn't happen.
 
Alex99 said:
Because the point of the game is to score goals? Getting near the box and not finishing the job by actually creating a chance to score is pointless. You may as well just lump it long and try and win the knock down.

We didn't concede many either because we were so regimented and risk averse.

I'm looking at his time at United. There was little evidence of anything complex going on there. We spent two years waiting for some sort of tactical progression and it didn't happen.
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I can only say we watched the games and saw completely different things in that case.

Re getting near the box, do you not see how it’s easier to score goals the closer you are to the opponent’s goal?
 
Alex99 said:
Because the point of the game is to score goals? Getting near the box and not finishing the job by actually creating a chance to score is pointless. You may as well just lump it long and try and win the knock down.

We didn't concede many either because we were so regimented and risk averse.

I'm looking at his time at United. There was little evidence of anything complex going on there. We spent two years waiting for some sort of tactical progression and it didn't happen.
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One extra season and i think things would have worked. He wanted Mane frm Southampton, Eriksen from Spurs and someone else on the other wing opposite to Mane.

His biggest mistake by far was selling players who were Utd through and through: Evans, Wellbeck, the Da Silva twins, etc
 
Andycoleno9 said:
Meanwhile Rooney said this;
Van Gaal is by far the best coach I have worked with - one hundred per cent,".
"His tactical skills, his way of preparing and his attention to the finest of details, I found amazing. I admired that in him. I had never looked at stuff like that before.

lvg's career shows that he was world class manager whos teams played attacking football (Ajax especially). Tbh, why and how he failed in United is a mistery to me.
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Because he didn’t adapt his tactics to playing in England where attacking teams are more successful
 
United obviously failed under Van Gaal, because Manchesterers are too thick to understand how to properly play football. Take Mike Smalling for example. He's nothing but a lumberjack playing with boxes over his shoes.

It was clear the lack of hornyness resulted in a flacid midfield lacking any deep form of penetration. I also have it on good authority that Philosophy isn't taught in English high school, because you reject Greek wisdom since brexit. So a football philospher like Louis is hardly appreciated over there.

I'm still convinced that given time eventually one sheep would be over the dam and the rest would have followed. Once the bullet was through the church he would have won many titles.
 
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tomaldinho1 said:
I can only say we watched the games and saw completely different things in that case.

Re getting near the box, do you not see how it’s easier to score goals the closer you are to the opponent’s goal?
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Obviously you need to be near the goal to have a better chance of scoring, but it's not as simple as just being near the goal, otherwise, as I said, you'd just lump it long and hope to win the knockdown. You'd get close to the goal, but at least by doing it that way you might have a fighting chance of their being some space to exploit.

LVG had us playing so slowly and rigidly that the build up to get us "near the goal" just meant playing it in front of the opposition, where the pitch was congested and space was very hard to find. The complete lack of urgency in our attack meant that we were very good at getting "near the goal" but terrible at actually getting in a position to have a decent shot at goal. It was ultimately a useless thing to be good at.

dinostar77 said:
One extra season and i think things would have worked. He wanted Mane frm Southampton, Eriksen from Spurs and someone else on the other wing opposite to Mane.

His biggest mistake by far was selling players who were Utd through and through: Evans, Wellbeck, the Da Silva twins, etc
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I disagree. We had two seasons of basically no progress in style. Further signings and squad overhaul wouldn't have made a jot of difference.
 
I thought it was painful watching the side under Van Gaal to be perfectly honest
 
I personally think LvGs time is mostly marred by the dismissal of Hernandez and the bringing in of DiMaria. Had both not happened I think we would have seen a more positive conclusion to his time.

Sure footie was quite dull at times but along with off the pitch changes he made to Carrington, policies etc, as well as bringing in more academy folks I think he did about as much as we could expect to stop the bleeding at the time. Like Mou he is a divise figure however and id argue even less equipped to deal with the sensitive souls of today's players. I remember watching a Neville interview with Ruud who basically bemoaned the same thing about managing in today's environment.
 
What is up with United's fans "hate" (dislike) towards former managers?
Moyes, Jose and Lvg are really disliked on this forum. Not many people say something positive about those 3 and when they fail on their next job, fans enjoy in that. Only Solskjaer is not disliked but he has that legendary player aura protection.
 
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Andycoleno9 said:
What is up with United's fans "hate" (dislike) towards former managers?
Moyes, Jose and Lvg are really disliked on this forum. Not many people say something positive about those 3 and when they fail on their next job, fans enjoy in that. Only Solskjaer is not disliked but he has that legendary player aura protection.
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For various reasons they pissed us off and ultimately failed. Why would we have any reason not to dislike Moyes, Mourinho or LVG?

Obviously Ole has legendary status as a player but can you tell us why we should like any of the rest of them? Moyes especially seems a weird one to bring up.
 
Withnail said:
For various reasons they pissed us off and ultimately failed. Why would we have any reason not to dislike Moyes, Mourinho or LVG?

Obviously Ole has legendary status as a player but can you tell us why we should like any of the rest of them? Moyes especially seems a weird one to bring up.
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I don’t really dislike any of them. I think Moyes and Ole fall into the bucket of silly hires who were never qualified. LVG was basically retired and Mou was 5 years too late.
My least favourite time as a fan was the end of Mou and the middle to end of Ole. But I don’t hate any of them although I’d say Mou seems a thoroughly dislikeable person when he’s your manager.
 
Withnail said:
For various reasons they pissed us off and ultimately failed. Why would we have any reason not to dislike Moyes, Mourinho or LVG?

Obviously Ole has legendary status as a player but can you tell us why we should like any of the rest of them? Moyes especially seems a weird one to bring up.
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We signed them, they did their best and they (more or less) didn't delivered. They didn't ditch us for another club (like certain player did). We sack them.
All of them speak highly about club (in general) and especially about fans. Yeah, Lvg and Moyes have some digs but it goes to Woodward. I can't dislike Jose or LVG because they did won something for this club.

You can think that they were awful managers for us but all this animosity is weird to me.
I was shitting on Solskjaer a lot (really a lot:wenger: ) and i think that he is awful manager but still i wish him luck on his next job.
 
Andycoleno9 said:
Meanwhile Rooney said this;
Van Gaal is by far the best coach I have worked with - one hundred per cent,".
"His tactical skills, his way of preparing and his attention to the finest of details, I found amazing. I admired that in him. I had never looked at stuff like that before.

lvg's career shows that he was world class manager whos teams played attacking football (Ajax especially). Tbh, why and how he failed in United is a mistery to me.
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Long time since his Ajax days, no real mystery, LVG was well past best when appointed United manager and the circus ran by Woodward and Judge wasn't set up for any major success.
 
Andycoleno9 said:
Meanwhile Rooney said this;
Van Gaal is by far the best coach I have worked with - one hundred per cent,".
"His tactical skills, his way of preparing and his attention to the finest of details, I found amazing. I admired that in him. I had never looked at stuff like that before.

lvg's career shows that he was world class manager whos teams played attacking football (Ajax especially). Tbh, why and how he failed in United is a mistery to me.
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He forgot to add:"The way he gave me everything one past it player could ask from a manager".
 
I swear LvG selling the likes of Evans, Chicharito, Welbeck, Kagawa for peanuts had traumatized Ed Woodward so bad that he'd rather kept players till their contract expired than selling them for cheap :lol:

Andycoleno9 said:
What is up with United's fans "hate" (dislike) towards former managers?
Moyes, Jose and Lvg are really disliked on this forum. Not many people say something positive about those 3 and when they fail on their next job, fans enjoy in that. Only Solskjaer is not disliked but he has that legendary player aura protection.
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Bit rich coming from Ole's hater... :lol:
 
Andycoleno9 said:
Meanwhile Rooney said this;
Van Gaal is by far the best coach I have worked with - one hundred per cent,".
"His tactical skills, his way of preparing and his attention to the finest of details, I found amazing. I admired that in him. I had never looked at stuff like that before.

lvg's career shows that he was world class manager whos teams played attacking football (Ajax especially). Tbh, why and how he failed in United is a mistery to me.
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Van Gaal is brilliant coach and manager. Problem is that players lacked discipline to play football he wanted to play. I wouldn't say that he failed. He was let down.

He should have been given more time without question.
 
Rooney in Paris said:
I don't think you understand the term "literally".
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I do, but I didn't think you'd grammar check me on a football forum especially when you know the point I was making :lol:

There's exactly zero logical argument for Van Gaal being our best manager. I'll rephrase it that way.
 
Andycoleno9 said:
Meanwhile Rooney said this;
Van Gaal is by far the best coach I have worked with - one hundred per cent,".
"His tactical skills, his way of preparing and his attention to the finest of details, I found amazing. I admired that in him. I had never looked at stuff like that before.

lvg's career shows that he was world class manager whos teams played attacking football (Ajax especially). Tbh, why and how he failed in United is a mistery to me.
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The guy was playing him every game while being shit. Of course he would think he's the best ever.
 
90 + 5min said:
Van Gaal is brilliant coach and manager. Problem is that players lacked discipline to play football he wanted to play. I wouldn't say that he failed. He was let down.

He should have been given more time without question.
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We were going backwards under him. More time wouldn't have done anything for us or him.
 
Alex99 said:
Nope, LVG. A few players have commented on him basically stifling all flair and creativity, to the point that he was bollocking players that scored or assisted for doing so without first taking a touch.
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Exactly. The guy hated any talented or creative player. He just wanted some chess pieces he moves on his own will without them having any way of thinking. His self proclaimed "philosophy" is the epitome of anti football.
 
90 + 5min said:
Van Gaal is brilliant coach and manager. Problem is that players lacked discipline to play football he wanted to play. I wouldn't say that he failed. He was let down.

He should have been given more time without question.
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It was Total football philosophy without the speed or intelligence. LVG had his day in 1992
 
I always liked LVG, but there's no denying it was dull. I remember one game at OT, I heard a sound from the crowd I couldn't put my finger on and I realised that people were just stood around chatting instead of watching the game. You know when you're at a gig waiting for the band to turn up? It was like that. Remarkable.

Its true that he was probably past the point where he could build a decent team again, but I also feel like he'd established a half-decent platform that another manager should have built on. Ditching LVG and going the extreme opposite under Jose was probably the biggest mistake we''ve made post-SAF. Not only did it waste a shit tonne of money changing most of the team for the second time in a couple of years, but it meant we build a reactive, counter-attacking team at the very moment that all the good teams were going for a proactive and aggressive combination of possession and pressing.
 
Love him or hate him, but the man's been one of the biggest personalities in world footie since the 90s. Few people that provided as much entertainment either on or off the pitch.
 
His football was abysmal but my god is he entertaining, his dive vs Arsenal is still one of the most hilarious things I've seen in football.
 
Redplane said:
Love him or hate him, but the man's been one of the biggest personalities in world footie since the 90s. Few people that provided as much entertainment either on or off the pitch.
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Brilliant manager. For me, that is enough. And you are spot on.
 
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