Defence or Midfield

Midfield by a long, long distance. No other top half team has as bad a midfield as we have.
 
Midfield. Harder questions next time please.
 
Midfield easily. Not one of the three that start for us are good enough. Fred, at a stretch perhaps, with some good players with him.
 
croadyman said:
Just think Defence is shaky so that's the reason for putting question out there
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It comes down to midfield. They dont offer any passing options. So they CBs spray the balls on opposite flanks or to the FBs. Both FBs are wank and cant carry the ball forwards. Passing range of that midfield is worst in the league(along with other metrics). So yeah, improve the midfield, the defence will look much improved.
 
It's very obviously the midfield followed closely by the GK. Your defense is being squeezed at both ends and buying yet another CB to paper over the cracks hasn't worked for the second season running.

McFred is a championship level CM pairing - and the fact that there are no other viable options is incredibly damning. United genuinely have a bottom 2-3 central midfield in the league as a collective.
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
It's very obviously the midfield followed closely by the GK. Your defense is being squeezed at both ends and buying yet another CB to paper over the cracks hasn't worked for the second season running.

McFred is a championship level CM pairing - and the fact that there are no other viable options is incredibly damning. United genuinely have a bottom 2-3 central midfield in the league as a collective.
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It’s been 1 out of 38 games. Wouldn’t call it a season.
 
Midfield by a country mile. A great midfield would instantly improve attack and defence as well. If we ver play McFred again, well we will deserve all the shit thrown at us by the fans and media.
 
Chief123 said:
It’s been 1 out of 38 games. Wouldn’t call it a season.
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Yep that's very true - apologies for being hyperbolic. Martinez looked fairly tidy but I think it's entirely fair to say he also looked a bit raw - certainly reasonable to suggest he needs time to bed in but I'm doubtful he's some sort of defensive saviour? Varane with his pedigree seemed a far more noteworthy signing but now he's not even picked a year later. For me that suggests it's not a matter of personnel in defense.

Obviously as a Chelsea supporter I'm absolutely hurling stones out of a flimsy glass house at this point given our track record of binning signings but I find it mad that a defender of Varane's class is being replaced a year on when he had injuries and it was chaotic last year to say the least. Is Martinez really such an upgrade over a 4x CL winner who is still in his prime at 29?
 
McFred can work as a pair of water carriers, as evidenced by the last few seasons. But even with that in mind, EtH got it completely wrong today. He put Fred at the base of the midfield, where he's super vulnerable to any physical challenge and has the positional awareness of a doorstop. And he told McTominay to play high up the pitch and dribble every time he got the ball, which is also a poor use of his physicality. With a role reversal, they've shown themselves to be useful in certain systems. But Ten Hag's system seemingly isn't one of them.

That said, RB is also a huge issue. Dalot is the single weakest player in our XI (yes, even weaker than the midfield). But unlike a lot of other top teams these days, EtH's tactics seems to put more playmaking emphasis on the CMs than the FBs. So within that context, you'd have to say it's McFred is the bigger problem.

I think a Martinez+Eriksen midfield needs to be tried at some point. Not that Martinez looked particularly great himself. But he should theoretically give a more secure platform to Eriksen next to him.
 
Dante said:
McFred can work as a pair of water carriers, as evidenced by the last few seasons. But even with that in mind, EtH got it completely wrong today. He put Fred at the base of the midfield, where he's super vulnerable to any physical challenge and has the positional awareness of a doorstop. And he told McTominay to play high up the pitch and dribble every time he got the ball, which is also a poor use of his physicality. With a role reversal, they've shown themselves to be useful in certain systems. But Ten Hag's system seemingly isn't one of them.

That said, RB is also a huge issue. Dalot is the single weakest player in our XI (yes, even weaker than the midfield). But unlike a lot of top teams these days, EtH's tactics seems to put more playmaking emphasis on the CMs than the FBs. So within that context, you'd have to say it's McFred.

I think a Martinez+Eriksen midfield needs to be tried at some point.
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Yeah water carrying should be literally all they do
 
Midfield, by a long long way. Perhaps Martinez should be played in midfield with Eriksen and Bruno/VdB/Garner/Hannibal/Zidane. Martinez gets the game time to settle in the new league, we also have some bite to the midfield and I would say he’s technically better than McFred combined.
 
jeepers said:
Midfield, by a long long way. Perhaps Martinez should be played in midfield with Eriksen and Bruno/VdB/Garner/Hannibal/Zidane. Martinez gets the game time to settle in the new league, we also have some bite to the midfield and I would say he’s technically better than McFred combined.
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Midfield

If you watch that McT yellow card properly, you can see if he had some skill he would have spotted Dalot on the right..
His many times today did we lost the ball and get countered..
Better use of the ball is required..
Watch last year's champions league, and you will realize how far behind we are..
Out midfield cannot do a simple passes..
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
Yep that's very true - apologies for being hyperbolic. Martinez looked fairly tidy but I think it's entirely fair to say he also looked a bit raw - certainly reasonable to suggest he needs time to bed in but I'm doubtful he's some sort of defensive saviour? Varane with his pedigree seemed a far more noteworthy signing but now he's not even picked a year later. For me that suggests it's not a matter of personnel in defense.

Obviously as a Chelsea supporter I'm absolutely hurling stones out of a flimsy glass house at this point given our track record of binning signings but I find it mad that a defender of Varane's class is being replaced a year on when he had injuries and it was chaotic last year to say the least. Is Martinez really such an upgrade over a 4x CL winner who is still in his prime at 29?
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Not sure Varane has been replaced. He just had less of a preseason from what I saw and so he’s behind the other guys fitness wise. I think he’ll be playing plenty.
 
acnumber9 said:
The attack and defence will both look better with a competent midfield.
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The attack simply needs us to make a decision on Ronaldo and bed in Garnacho. I'd suggest selling him, as we clearly need a press from the front.

Our defence got exposed by our midfield today. Preseason was one thing, but Fred got exposed today in the DM role. The good thing though was that we learnt that Eriksen should operate as a CM and can function well with Bruno. Getting a DM is necessary this window.

Defensively, I will say, Shaw needs to be benched for Malacia. It's not an obvious deficiency, but it has been affecting us for years. He's far too slow in possession, and his lack of athleticism/motor hurts us. He was supposed to be supporting our midfield in getting the ball high up the pitch, but his lethargy and stiffness limited our CB's options to move the ball forward. He also failed to provide defensive support to Fred and Mctominay in midfield. Dalot was more effective than him.
 
sparx99 said:
Not sure Varane has been replaced. He just had less of a preseason from what I saw and so he’s behind the other guys fitness wise. I think he’ll be playing plenty.
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Fair - but you now have at least 5 decent quality centre halves and zero decent central midfielders. I find it astonishing that you haven't bought an actual CM since Matic.
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
Fair - but you now have at least 5 decent quality centre halves and zero decent central midfielders. I find it astonishing that you haven't bought an actual CM since Matic.
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Why it's such a blind spot at this club, hell even Fergie neglected it for years
 
Midfield - nobody in top 4 has so many average midfielders (you know names).
 
croadyman said:
Why it's such a blind spot at this club, hell even Fergie neglected it for years
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Fergie had an unbelievable talent for coaching up and drilling mediocre players to the point where they were serviceable - Darron Gibson, Tom Cleverley, et al. I think also to be fair though, some of the midfield talent that he had that was looked down on at the time was clearly underrated in retrospect - for me the likes of Fletcher, Park, Anderson, and O'Shea would all run rings around what you have now and wouldn't be out of place as at least squad players at any side in the country.

A bit off topic this, but I genuinely think that Fergie's legacy of making chicken salad out of chicken shite has resulted in an impossibly high bar being set for your subsequent managers - until the Glazers accept that Fergie was a one of one in terms of making something out of nothing your ambitions will be blunted.
 
Midfield by a country mile, it's not even close. Defence wasn't great yesterday but most of the problems came from our midfielders having no composure on the ball, and our defenders subsequently refusing to pass to them because they can't be trusted
 
The whole team. GK, Defence, Midfield and Attack. Nobody has done their job over the last season. We don't score enough, we don't control the game, we make individual mistakes to concede cheap goals, and the goalkeeper is dubious.

It all needs surgery and restructuring. Sometimes people talk as if solving midfield would rectify everything. It doesn't stop DeGea palming it in front of the striker, or defenders playing people onside, or strikers that don't score apart from a 38 year old. You can say that midfield might have the biggest impact on the structure of the side but you still need more than one bloke capable of putting a bell in the net and you can also go pretty far if defenders actually do their job.
 
Abraxas said:
The whole team. GK, Defence, Midfield and Attack. Nobody has done their job over the last season. We don't score enough, we don't control the game, we make individual mistakes to concede cheap goals, and the goalkeeper is dubious.

It all needs surgery and restructuring. Sometimes people talk as if solving midfield would rectify everything. It doesn't stop DeGea palming it in front of the striker, or defenders playing people onside, or strikers that don't score apart from a 38 year old. You can say that midfield might have the biggest impact on the structure of the side but you still need more than one bloke capable of putting a bell in the net and you can also go pretty far if defenders actually do their job.
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That's more the response I was hoping for
 
ayushreddevil9 said:
Midfield. Harder questions next time please.
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GledTheRed said:
The attack is wank too, we barely score any goals.
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GledTheRed said:
DDG is a problem too attempting to play football.
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So the defence is OK then....

Oh. hang on....

sparx99 said:
Not sure Varane has been replaced. He just had less of a preseason from what I saw and so he’s behind the other guys fitness wise. I think he’ll be playing plenty.
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Last season he played only 22 times, why do you think he will be 'playing plenty' this season?
 
The_Midfielder said:
Midfield

If you watch that McT yellow card properly, you can see if he had some skill he would have spotted Dalot on the right..
His many times today did we lost the ball and get countered..
Better use of the ball is required..
Watch last year's champions league, and you will realize how far behind we are..
Out midfield cannot do a simple passes..
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Yeah our ball retention across the first eleven, under pressure, is horrible. No composure. They absolutely crumble under pressure and even lose the ability to even think about the simple stuff like pass and go, making themselves available for a return pass and whatnots. I think McT is not technical enough as well, he always receives the ball the same way and there’s no flair/composure to feint or turn the opposing player. He only knows how to use his size/frame to protect the ball and he doesn’t even do that well, like a Fellaini or Pogba.
 
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