The point was, if you know you are going to play a 3-4-2-1 at the start of the season, then you buy players that are capable of playing more of the specialist positions in that system. I.e. wingbacks.
Dan "The Gardener" Ashworth Has Left | Venit, vidit, non vicit
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The point was, if you know you are going to play a 3-4-2-1 at the start of the season, then you buy players that are capable of playing more of the specialist positions in that system. I.e. wingbacks.
I get the impression they will be this ruthless with underperforming players, within reason. It’s a lot more difficult when you have players on long term deals with a high wage, they can’t sack a player just because they’re shite. Someone has to buy them. I very much feel like they’ll be encouraging players out the door in the summer if they’re deemed surplus to requirements. We got a taste of it this past summer.
We can’t sack underperforming players mate. Best we can do is try to sell them if someone is willing to buy, and not renew them when the time comes.
Amad has been stellar as RWB and if Shaw managed to be fit he would have been outstanding at LWB. Far too much is made of this “specialist” position stuff for this formation.
Would would De Ligt be a Ten Hag signing and Mazraoui not? I dont get it.
In terms of CB numbers, yes we have a lot. But Maguire, Lindelof and Evans have contracts that expire at the end of the season. Martinez has injury issues. As does Maguire and Lindelof. I dont think it was a poor decision to sign two CBs over the summer.
And as i said previously, reports were that Zirkzee was not a ETH signing...
https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/manutd-erik-tenhag-signing-zirkzee-34036269
How true that is, we dont know.
There are leaders who are hands-on and there are leaders who has good supporting that do all the good work for them. In the few months that he has been in United, the employer start to realise he isn't as strong as deem to be. Ratcliffe and Berrada decided to give him the boot.
Its funny how our fans over the years have all been about how United are slow and reactive... they decide to be proactive, knowing something is not working, instead of saying its all fine, took the ruthless decision to get rid...
Behold United fans, have a problem with that too.
Stellar? That is a reach. He has played well all thing considered, but for me, he looks good because the rest of the side are awful.
Will Amad be the right wing back in 12 months time? Im not so sure.
Shaw outstanding? Err, a) we havnt see that so that is a reach. and b) he is never fit.
Firing Ashworth is the right decision you're right. Hiring him was the wrong one however and shows that Ratcliffe did no research on how Ashworth operates and just picked his name after googling best DoFs. If INEOS had talked to people at any of Ashworth's former employers I'm sure that how he was at Man Utd was he was at those other places. Better due diligence needed in the future to not have us waste time and money. It messed up our summer window with him coming in late and also messed up finances having to pay compensation to Newcastle and now him.
I am slightly concerned with that if I'm honest.
A lot of these same briefings are saying he was being phased out, so your gradual removal was already taking place, we just only got the end game
It's not that simple though, is it? We really don't have much information here; "The new owners are ruthless and quickly rectify their mistakes" is just one interpretation of what happened, and a very generous one at that. Another possible interpretation is that they're clueless and making it all up as they go along.
We really don't know.
I am just surprised how many posters are absolutely sure of the bolded part and using it as a fact. Also stuff like Ashworth could handle Newcastle maybe, but United was too big a job for him.
All that is at best assumptions that can be made only if you are convinced rest of Ineos decision makers, including Sir Jim, are absolutely competent in running a football club as big as United.
I feel it is all still up in the air. I am just not convinced everyone is so awesome at their jobs that they are making really good decisions. It is way too early to make convincing arguments. Especially the sacking should put further doubts on the competency of the club's new decision makers. They chased Ashworth for months if not a year and then recruited him. Lost millions in the process.
That's how I see it. We've heard all this talk of a game model and how the style of play needs to be the same regardless of manager, yet we've never been shown this game model or what the style of play is. We went into this season with the same old ETH sytle of play and now Amorim's, and it is yet to be seen if this style of play or the formation will survive Ruben himself.
It's not exactly a secret that we only kept him due to failing to identify an alternative as well.
The issues with that for me are making it so obvious it completely undermined the manager we were still employing and also why we waited until the fecking summer to start a process that must have been decided on a fair bit before.
Neither of those things would have had anything to do with Ashworth.
Yup, jury's still out on everyone really.
I'm sure the posters shouting down discussion and telling us to "trust the master plan" are the ones who were doing the same thing when Arnold and Murtough were in charge.
Don’t think there’s anything funny about that, to be honest. First of all, United fans aren’t a single person. So an opinion voiced by some fans doesn’t make those of others any less relevant. You’d have to find actual people who actually criticised both those things in order for your criticism to be applicable.
And even if those were the same people, that still wouldn’t render their criticism wrong. It’s absolutely possible to criticise the club for a lack of ruthlessness and still be upset about what happened. Especially if that criticism doesn’t concern a lack of ruthlessness, but rather a lack of due diligence in the process of signing your sporting director.
So a fan can absolutely criticise United for sticking with their managers for too long, while also believing that they screwed up with this signing, as they could have known before that there are different strategical philosophies at work that don’t mix well, thus meaning Ashford should not have been signed to begin with.
The way I see it, fans criticising United for keeping up with their managers have a very good point. And I believe those who say that investing so much into Ashworth, only to find out a few months later that he doesn’t fit into your power structure at all, was wrong and should not have happened have a good point as well. And if they happen to be the same people, that would still not be „funny“ as you put it. I think that is actually well articulated and fair criticism in both instances.
He wanted Southgate
If this is true, that itself is disqualifying. There was room for disagreement as to whether Amorim was the right man for the job, but Southgate clearly was not the right man for the job.
No its not, we can only speculate either way unless we get credible information. To say they are clueless and making it up is not true is it? They have owned businesses before and sporting businesses too.
I mean most if not all reports have suggested difference in views. Either its he wanted x manager, he wasn't in favour of the manager or the structure, or he felt sidelined, it all points to it not working out.
They chased him because they thought he was the right man, it turned out it didnt fit. Are you trying to say if you chase something and spend money on it, it will 100% work? Thats not how life works.
We chased Sancho for 2 years and thought he was the guy.... only to turn out the way it did.
There are always doubts, no one is certain to be the right man. Its the same as the manager... nothing is certain. So what do you do? keep at it because they spent money on it?
Also, on competency, go have a look at all their CV's... Berrada, Wilcox, Brailsford, SJR, Claude. They have way more idea how to run a football club / sporting structure than you and I.
They’ve had some ups and downs and it’s a learning process for everyone. The club has been rotten from the insides for years, this was never going to be smooth. The summer transfer business was impressive in terms of speed and execution of the deals. Keeping Ten Hag in to this season was a misstep, but the quality and efficiency of replacing him was excellent. Some good, some bad. It would seem that recruiting Ashworth was an error, but letting him go is the correction of that mistake. I definitely would not say they’re clueless, but a well-oiled machine we are not. At least not yet.
Oh, so you prefer finishing 8th with a negative GD and sitting 13th in the PL to finishing 4th and 2nd in the league and regularly featuring in the Champions League?
That is how life works. If a top level executive recruits someone or buy something that cost's the company millions and that doesn't work out, his job is on the chopping block. The company would find him not trust worthy of taking decisions that involves big money, and could possibly fire him for being incompetent.
So making a bad recruitment is a sign of incompetency.
This is a ridiculous line of argument on a fan forum. You can as well shut the forum if every one of us has to be better than the club admins or the first team or the youth team to comment on them.
According to the new Atlethic article that Ratcliffe/Berrada/Wilcox wanted Ten Hag to be sacked and Ashworth convinced them that he should stay.
If true then it reflects very badly on Ratcliffe. Little to no due diligence.
That is a very simplistic view... that means every time a manager doesn't work out, the structure who hired him is sacked?
Does that mean if a player doesn't work out, the whole recruitment team is sacked and replaced?
There is no one in football that has got 100% recruitment right.. I challenge you to find me one executive that gets 100% decisions correct.
This seems to be the crux of it.
He wanted ETH to stay. And let's be honest about it, as did most of the fans post the FA Cup final. Not that the fans are the ones to be making a decision.
We don't know the exact discussions that were had by Ratcliffe, Berrada, Wilcox and Ashworth , but the fan sentiment was that there was no one better available to take the role. So maybe it is safe to assume that was also Ashworths point in the summer and that may very well have been a valid point.
Ten Hag is backed in the summer and the team look worse than they did last season, so it stands to reason that Ashworth gets the finger pointed at him. Even though his logic may have been correct at the time.
If this is true, and the reports of him wanting to replace ETH with Southgate or Potter are true, good riddance.
Well Ratcliffes`s point was apparently that he did not like Ashworth`s identified targets wich i agree on. All were boring and safe targets with PL experience.
Yep I have the exact same concerns.
If true i fully agree.
Yeah probably martinez too, good shout
It makes a lot of sense because Ashworth was seen in the stands this season looking increasingly agitated as the side fell apart under Ten Hag.
Maybe Ashworth have relied on others doing the good decisions for him in other places he worked and he got found out this summer about not making his own good decisions.
Yeah he looked a tad worried too i felt.
I would say he's been pretty close to stellar - he has what 3-4 assists already during the time he's played there.
Personally I think the idea that the style of play needs to be the same regardless of manager is fecking stupid, especially with a club and team as poorly performing as ours.
Now that's not to say there can't be certain principles that stay the same regardless of manager and squad. Being technically sound, athletic, working hard on and off the ball, and looking to attack and score plenty of goals are all foundational parts of a good football club. But just outright saying you will only play an exact certain style/formation regardless of who is in the dugout is bizarre. No other top club in the world puts that sort of restriction on their team.
I think the 3421 has been exaggerated. Chelsea switched to it in November under conte and ended up winning the league.
You don’t need specialist players. You just need players who can follow instructions. Look at Young & Valencia they’d make great WB.
The players in the other positions are no different to any other formation. Your two 10s ideally you’d want 1 like a Odegard and one like a Saka.
My personal hunch is that Ashworth was mainly targeted because Jim's best buddy Brailsford was very high on him, so he took him at his recommendation without really considering other options or fits.
Quite frankly it doesn't matter in the long run anyways as long as recruitment improves and negotiations go well with players.
I think that's exactly it. Look at Amad: playing a new position and actually playing very well because he's not only skilled, but also has a functioning brain and works his socks off. Contrast that with the likes of Garnacho, Dalot, Rashford, and Bruno.
Doesn't sound like much of a power struggle to be honest, sounds like one guy didn't assert himself and the others did. Berrarda shouldn't really be flying around the world trying to convince people to join us, I thought we had a Sporting Director for that very reason? I read that he felt undermined or like he wasn't listened to, but if you're going to seriously walk into a board room and pitch Howe or Potter as the next manager of Manchester United then you've undermined yourself by showing everyone that you don't have a clue.