Im talking about which manager exactly?? People are quick to point out sacking the manager and instating who? No point just saying appointment ‘another manager’, who exactly?
Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24
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Im talking about which manager exactly?? People are quick to point out sacking the manager and instating who? No point just saying appointment ‘another manager’, who exactly?
Buzzing with the win especially so late
Awful performance yet again though. 90 minutes of absolute shite in all honesty but we get the 3 points.
Awful performance yet again though. 90 minutes of absolute shite in all honesty but we get the 3 points.
It is not about the position but recruiting. I am sure we would have found an excellent 40-50m winger
Rashford carried the team last season. It was still a talking point, but it didn't matter as much because, ultimately, we were still scoring goals, albeit mostly from the boots of a single player.
Nothing much has changed in this sense other than Rashford is no longer scoring goals, so now it's no longer a middling concern, but a major one.
If the ball isn't been threaded through to the attackers frequently enough, they are feeding off scraps and can't get any concerted final 3rd work done. Compare that to those high scoring teams in the league, and they practically camp in the final third and half spaces into it, until the dam bursts, and once it does, they then have a team chasing the game who has to open up, which leads to those cricket scores we look on with envy at.
As individuals, our attackers don't do enough, either. The load is shared so much more evenly at other clubs and we've not had that since the days when Martial, Rashford and Greenwood were equal threats across the frontline.
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@mintyred so you’re saying if a team has first team players injured it affects their performances?
Glad we agree
That’s just not true. We’ve had injuries to the following:
Shaw
Malacia
Martienz
Mount
Højlund
Amrabat
Casemiro
Varane
Lindelöf
AWB
And now Rashford too.
We’ve never played our best XI as a result.
Also @Valencia Shin Crosses (love the name btw)do you understand how attacks are built? You can’t just have Bruno, Rashford, Antony and Højlund and expect goals galore. It has to get to them in good places and to do that you need effective build up. Which comes from deeper and if you lose your best players from defence AWB, Varane, Shaw and Martinez it’s going to massively change how you can play.
I'd take a right footed rw, give us some much needed crosses for our striker to feed of.
He’s shown enough to prove he ain’t never making us challangers regardless of if we take away his transfer power. He can’t pick a balanced midfield to save his life neither seT them up to dominate in an away win.
Martinez and Casemiro last year were terrific signings but everyone else has been absolutely atrocious, particularly Antony and Mount who look completely disinterested, changing managers every eighteen months is not the answer and we know the problems above him but there comes a time when there's little other choice left.
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At this point the only reason to not accept that the injuries have impacted our team structure in defence midfield and attack is ignorance or agenda.
If you accepted it and then made and argument as to how Ten Hag could have improved the structures despite it then I’m all ears.
If you accepted it and then made and argument as to how Ten Hag could have improved the structures despite it then I’m all ears.
On a personal level, he's been terrible.
New leaders like their own people in. Even if Qatar brought us they would have likely sacked ETH even with another top 4 finish.
Also him turning it around is us getting Top 4. He’s never turning it around to the extent we will look to challenge for the league. He’s proving he isn’t an elite manager.
Yeah, I agree with this. Olise and Diaby would have both been better and less expensive.
On a personal level ETH is terrible and is crushing the self esteem of our players
So would I but Doku is not a rw.
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Give him a squad like Man City and I think you’d find he could.
100% true but he doesn't help himself with the selection. Antony starting every game, Evans at CB, a midfield 2 of Eriksen and McT there's better players on the bench.
Before injures we seen his plan against Wolves. It was a shire of shite with Bruno and Mount expected to be our 8’s. It makes no difference if he gets his players back his tactics and plan for our team was amateurish.
If he got Man City’s team. Liverpool or Arsenal would be winning the league.
The two aren't mutually exclusive. Rashford has had spells of looking fecking shite under other managers too.
We barely create any decent chances so once someone finally gets the ball in a good position they probably think "feck, I won't get another opportunity like this" and then they panic and feck up their shot.
The only reason is that ETH hasn’t crack it. He doesn’t really know what to take to truly dominate in this league. It’s the reason that his grand plan failed emphatically after the summer reinforcements.
Again, I think it really difficult task to understand what’s the winning formula and how to set it up. I am not sure if ETH can eventually crack it. Maybe he can.
Rashford's lack of quality far precedes ten Hag.
Last season you were playing pragmatically to get the best out of the players you had because you couldn’t develop your field game with DDG stuck on his line and unable to distribute.
This season you’re going through a very difficult change process as TH starts to implement modern progressive football and your players are struggling through the learning curve.
IMO you should be careful what you wish for because regressing back to last seasons style of play would be the the opposite of progress.
Be brave, stick with the task and it’ll pay dividends in future seasons.
It's truly amazing that Jose, Ole, Ralf and now ETH, have gotten us to play the same directionless tripe. This must be the new 'United way', because we're touching on a decade of playing utterly dire football.
The only manager that made us look like we were coached was LvG. But, his football was insomnia inducing. How we never thought about implementing a proper footballing structure after endless failure, is beyond me.
The only manager that made us look like we were coached was LvG. But, his football was insomnia inducing. How we never thought about implementing a proper footballing structure after endless failure, is beyond me.
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Ok so explain what is the solution to:
- Antony - Who do you play instead and why?
- Evans - Who was fit enough to play?
- Eriksen - Who else give us his passing ability and control (that was fit)
- McTominay - Who else gives his physicality and goal threat that was fit?
One of the managers who is currently available or someone who is willing to move.
The current 'unemployed manager' pool is not so great, so it might be worth waiting.
If you're looking for the specific name of United's savior, those usually don't exist. and when they do, they're not so obvious.
The excuses our fans make for our managers and players is quite something.
Ah I know, just in general.
Want to keep him but I wouldn't shed a tear if the opposite happened. He just came in and went against every warning, every hard learned lesson. Seemingly believing he was going to turn our shite to gold. Murtough and Co must also answer for creating such a noobish environment. Basing hundreds of millions on one guy's incredibly limited personal scouting knowledge. Also wonder who exactly asked him to build direct. Most fans are over the "United way" thing so why is it still holding us back in 2023?
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Yes he is.
Rashford who has proven himself in the PL against a manager whos CV is in the dutch league + a SF of the CL one season? Where was this understanding in the Pogba vs Mourhino case?
1. Honestly Antony has been that bad you could pretty much put any alternate there (apart from Bruno!). Id like to see Mount given a game or 2 off the right side. Pellestri came on today and got the assist for example.
2. He was playing because of 'tactics' 7 days ago and Varane has sat on the bench. Not sure what's happened there but this Evans >Varane thing is fecking insane.
3. What control? what passing? we was absolutely dreadful today. Lucky for us Fulham was the worst team we've faced this season. He can't complete 60 minutes these days regardless.
4. You see McTominay and goal threat.....he's had a purple patch of goals but I've watched this player for 5?+ years he's nowhere near good enough. He's given away just as many penalties as goals by the way. I would like to add that out of all the players that are in the side though I could see why he's been picked recently, at least he's showing some fight for the team.
I accept we have injuries, theres no doubt its causing issues but his team selections are just plain confusing. We've played shit all season regardless of result I dont understand what he's trying to get out of this line up.
My feeling is that we allow managers to feel comfortable. We promise them too much support and don't start to scrutinize them until things become untenable. We almost give them a free reign on the club. It's not cursed, we've just been making very distinct mistakes that other clubs don't make because we've experience a level of success with one manager that no other club has experienced with any manager.
Before even starting the job, the club, rather than the manager, is under scrutiny for how much support they are going to give the manager. Without even having a game, the manager is already treated as an expert with the club being the incompetent client that needs to follow everything the manager wants. When performances initially aren't great despite transfers, it's the club/players, not the manager. One or two specific positions are scapegoated as being the main reason why we aren't playing well. This despite other clubs missing key pieces or having average personnel in similar positions. With ETH, it's been the right flank, the striker position and now the left back position. Once the manager makes the signing and it doesn't work out, then the club is again to blame for making a poor signing or not signing enough players when evidence suggests that they have. The tide only starts to turn on the manager when he's been given all the players he's wanted and the team starts to lose games. This despite barely getting good performances from the team throughout the manager's tenure. Where other teams lambast the performances prior and start scrutinizing the manager, we are the club that actually gives them time like the media proposes. Then when we start losing an unbearable amount of games in a row, when the job becomes untenable, instead of immediately sacking the manager; as the good natured club we are, we let them get by thier sell past date. When this continues, we sometimes fire them or in the worst case ( Moyes and Van Gaal), we let them waste our seasons.
So what's actually the problem here and the difference between us and some other clubs?
Well it starts with the idea of the manager. Chelsea sack Ancelotti, hire well renowned Andres Villas-Boas, who is known for having a good style of play in Portugal. Unlike United, they don't treat him as a saviour. They understand that moving to Chelsea is a step up for him as a manager and the quality of the league also has a difference. Villas-Boas comes in and the team doesn't adjust well. His high line is ridiculous and Chelsea notice they've become a worse team overall. At the time of his sacking, Chelsea were 5th in the league. They still had a good shot at getting to top 4 and were still in the Champion's League. All of which would have kept him at Old Trafford. Yet, they sacked him since they could recognize that he wasn't the manager that was going to take them forward. He didn't have the urgency, communication skills or playing style to convince them that he was the man for the job. Hence, he was let go. At United, AVB would have been treated like the next Ferguson. Fans would have been anticipating his style of play in Portugal, without realizing that the size of the job, the location of the job and the type of players available to the manager are completely different. United, both the club and the fans, would have blamed the players for not adapting to AVB and requested the older players like Lampard and Drogba were creating a toxic atmosphere in the club. United as a result, would have gone through the full season with AVB, would have finished 7th, would have let Drogba, Lampard and Terry's contract's expire, sold any underperformers and given AVB the chance to bring in any player he wanted. AVB would then have signed a few players from his Porto team. He would also have requested specific players to fit his specfic system ( which wouldn't work btw). If one of these players is overpriced, the club will either sign the player or the fans/media will blame the club for not signing the player and wasting time on negotiations for the player; a sign of the clubs incompetence. The next season, hardly any style of play is evident and the new players signed by AVB either don't play well or he chooses not to play them at all. The fans then start debating if the club or the manager actually got the player signed. As again, the manager cannot be blamed for what the club does. Around November/December, when we start losing to the likes of Norwich and get drubbed by Aston Villa, the fans then start to look for answers. The attitude of the players get called into question. Fans start accusing the players of downing tools. However, due to how poor the results are, the club decide the position is no longer tenable and sack AVB in December 2012. Fans still sing his name, blaming players for what happened, and dream of what could have happened if he was allowed to bring in Benzema and Thiago Silva.
That's the problem:
a. The club doesn't realize that different leagues and clubs present different challenges for the managers and hence expecting one to directly translate to another is ridiculous.
b. Instead of judging performances and scrutinizing issues that are presented eary, the managers are given a free pass for most of the first season.
c. The managers come with an expectation that they'll be given time and support; this makes them comfortable. In the case of Van Gaal, Mourinho and even ETH, it allowed to experiment tactically and make poor signings.
d. The fans get one any players the manager decides isn't their cup of tea or who they've decided to scapegoat and have blamed for poor team performances
e. Only at United are the CEO/DOF's actually blamed for poor transfers. At other clubs, these figures are hidden and the manager is blamed for requesting these players, noone else.
f. Players then feel the need to have leaks as they are scapegoated when things go badly, sometimes unfairly, because people don't want to discuss tactical issues.
g. United don't sack managers quickly enough. There's almost no urgency in making a quick turnaround at times
This is why every manager change feels like a rebuild. It's why every decent player we've had ends up being turned on by the fans. Treat the manager position like a job, not an anointing. No hard feelings. If you do well and show a good playing style, you'll prove that you can work here long term. If you don't, you're out. We're the only club who seems to buy into the media trope of giving managers time and feeling sorry for the manager. I actually feel sorry for the players, who had to go on the pitch and chase shadows because the teams shape and tactical organization is poor, yet then get blamed for underperforming, not scoring goals or conceding.
Our team on the whole isnt a 'small' team though. Look at Pep's teams over the years, the two Silvas, Jesus, Gundogan, Aguero. All must be under 5'9? and yet his teams will constantly outwork and outrun you, win the ball back effortlessly. So its nothing to do with the stature of the players signed, its the mentality and workrate. Stick Mount in the City team and we see a different player.
Imagine benching Varane for Maguire. The guy's on borrowed time and even if I was willing to let him have a go once our injuries settled, he's a goner when we finish 7/8 at the end of the season.
Otherwise, we'd have the Arsenal experience for the next 2 years and it won't end with him challenging for the league but being canned if we have a decent DoF.
Otherwise, we'd have the Arsenal experience for the next 2 years and it won't end with him challenging for the league but being canned if we have a decent DoF.
Did you watch the game or decided on this view before it kicked off and sticking to it?
Last season wasnt all too bad though
Yeah one of his purple patches.
I don't need to watch a game to know the above is absolute lunacy.
Everyone praising Maguire because our level this season has dropped to his (that is to say midtable) is absolutely off their rocker imho.
Same argument as Rashford last season but for a shorter time and lower peak.
If EtH is successful here long-term, it'd be against any logical trend in football.
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