Fergie lost a lot of his ruthlessness in his latter years, look at some of the players he kept on well past their sell by date. Anderson should have been moved on years before he finally left, he was kept around because Fergie liked his personality. It's a symptom of age i think, ruthless ambition gets replaced with sentimentality.
Fergie’s the problem!
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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Fergie lost a lot of his ruthlessness in his latter years, look at some of the players he kept on well past their sell by date. Anderson should have been moved on years before he finally left, he was kept around because Fergie liked his personality. It's a symptom of age i think, ruthless ambition gets replaced with sentimentality.
Nobody got more points in the league than us in his final four seasons. He lost nothing
Don't you think that's down to our previous managers? We've gone down the Mourinho route and it didn't work for example. Then Ole got lucky and became a permanent manager and with that a different direction? I'm sure the next man in charge will do something different.
Maybe Ferguson wasn’t the best to learn from as he wasn’t very close to the players as well.
No team has played Fergies way since he left and we have played with inside forwards rather than wingers since Nani left . It’s all nonsense
We already know the manager is the problem.
Cameras show Fergie shaking head and then **n* Kenny smiling, which is no great surprise…..but the media make a huge deal out of it……..
Fergie changed his way depending upon the opposition and players he had. It is called management, set your team up with the best chance of beating whatever opponent you face.
In fairness that is literally his job. Find an angle and support it. Those slightly longer, opinion-based pieces pretty much demand that kind of one sided exposition.
His point is logical but it naturally only discusses one of the factors that’s holding you back, not every single one.
That is hyperbole, but the key issue is the Glazers came in during Sir Alex's time and he personally did very well out of it (and he still does). The horse issue was not the whole story, but it was a significant part of it*.
The problem at United is that within the club (and many fans on the outside looking in) just cannot bare to criticise Sir Alex Ferguson. How many fans who stormed the ground in May to get the Utd. vs Liverpool match postponed - disgracefully so - actually knew about how the Glazers first came to their club? Not many, I bet. They need to know about it and if the protests against the Glazers are to continue, SAF himself should not be bulletproof, just because of his achievements. If you build something wonderful, but then put a few booby-traps in place so it all comes tumbling down, should you be held in quite such high regard? That is my point.
*see Roy Kean's autobiography.
And what about the 4 seasons before that? Was that as close as the 4 you’re talking about?
I think the point is that, Fergusonism if you will, requires Ferguson. In the absence of the God himself, we should move on. Trying to recreate that is killing this club. His greatness covered a lot of failings at the club and now they're being laid bare. We need a modern structure, we need to stop hoping we land another 26 year manager and get with how things are today.
Dearie me! Journalism must be the easiest occupation in the world. Just write any piece of shite you want and have it published.
Manchester United would simply be a “nothing club” if you take Sir Alex’s legacy away and what he has done for this club.
SAF isn’t the problem, far fecking from it! It’s the spineless, inept, cowardly owners who are too afraid to pull the trigger on Ole & his coaching staff. Hoping the situation will get better when performances show it’s going downhill and no evidence that we look like challenging for major honours. Especially when it shows now that the management have lost the dressing room.
Manchester United would simply be a “nothing club” if you take Sir Alex’s legacy away and what he has done for this club.
SAF isn’t the problem, far fecking from it! It’s the spineless, inept, cowardly owners who are too afraid to pull the trigger on Ole & his coaching staff. Hoping the situation will get better when performances show it’s going downhill and no evidence that we look like challenging for major honours. Especially when it shows now that the management have lost the dressing room.
There’s an easy trap to fall into by thinking SAF tactics were outdated. If he were 60 when he left us then nobody would be talking about ripping up a successful blueprint just 8 years later.
We do, but is that in any way connected with 'Fergusonism' and not the monolithic corporate ownership structure? I don't think anyone is actually entertaining the idea we will find another Fergie.
One element of Fergie's genius, like Bob Dylan's, was always having another voice in the room. It was always a dialogue, I imagine it was heavily weighted but a dialogue nonetheless, so his bow had many strings.
Since last weekend the media and social media have now managed to identify both the greatest footballer to play in the premier league and greatest manager to manage in the premier league, as the reason a Manchester United side managed by someone who got sacked from Cardiff due to being rubbish, lost 5-0 to Liverpool.
So here's the thing, even if we are trying to mould ourselves around Sir Alex Ferguson, Sir Alex Ferguson would never, in a million years, set up against a side like Liverpool to have his forwards not track their runners. He would also never, in a million years, pick someone like Maguire to play when they had cost the team 4 goals the previous week, and even if he had, he would have subbed them off in the first half.
Trying to blame a legacy on the stupidity of the present is just lazy analysis or drivel for the sake of wanting to have something to say.
If you put your new shoes on back to front, the reason you suddenly can't walk properly isn't because your parents never taught you how to.
So here's the thing, even if we are trying to mould ourselves around Sir Alex Ferguson, Sir Alex Ferguson would never, in a million years, set up against a side like Liverpool to have his forwards not track their runners. He would also never, in a million years, pick someone like Maguire to play when they had cost the team 4 goals the previous week, and even if he had, he would have subbed them off in the first half.
Trying to blame a legacy on the stupidity of the present is just lazy analysis or drivel for the sake of wanting to have something to say.
If you put your new shoes on back to front, the reason you suddenly can't walk properly isn't because your parents never taught you how to.
The bs journalists are now writing literally anything. Insane what absolute heaps of shite they come out with just for clicks.
That is precisely the idea that those up above are entertaining.
If you think SAF is the problem, then you might yourself be the problem.
Well, surely that's just nonsense that only exists in the gaps in the 24/7 news cycle where there is nothing happening? Only an idiot would not look to managerial greats, past and present, but likewise, it's quite a stretch to think lightning of that kind will strike again, especially considering how much the football landscape has changed.
Us fans including former players are guilty to a degree of sentimentality. It's simply a desire to return for a period of affection in the past when we were successful and Sir Alex is the closest in that timeline. It's basically nostalgic journalism and punditry.
It would be incorrect if anyone thinks Sir Alex's methods would bring back the success of the past. Too many probabilities in that line of mindset. You can only try as Neville says to get the best in class in every position and even then there are no guarantees of success.
It would be incorrect if anyone thinks Sir Alex's methods would bring back the success of the past. Too many probabilities in that line of mindset. You can only try as Neville says to get the best in class in every position and even then there are no guarantees of success.
Gonna waste 1 of my 5 posts a day to tell you to cut the crap.
Really?
Isn't that exactly the thing that people are sort of advocating for, even if it's not expressed explicitly. This prevailing notion is that we shouldn't keep sacking managers and be like Chelsea (for example). The clamour to give managers time even when it's pretty obvious they're not up to the job. This constant comparison between Fergies early days in charge and Ole's, as if giving Ole the same leeway will somehow lead to the same outcome (i.e., him finally finding a formula that works then going on to great success over multiple years)
Can you waste another and clarify to whom you are speaking?
Giving a manager time is not unique to United or Ferguson, or even football. I think the time and money afforded to Ole are very generous. Getting rid now would not be just arbitrarily sacking someone.
We need a coach so badly now, in 1986 the club needed a manager. The whole landscape has changed. Comparison is to some degree inevitable but risks being overly simplistic as well conversely, being meanderingly romantic.
It's their obsession with the great man and his approach to winning that's the problem.
There's one manager called Ferguson and a lot of average Oles, Nevilles and Giggss out there.
There's one manager called Ferguson and a lot of average Oles, Nevilles and Giggss out there.
The bold part. I mean, yeah - that's what I'm implying!
And while clubs giving managers time is not completely unique to United, you'd have to be disingenuous to think that both the club and a large proportion of its fanbase (particularly the older generation, if I could generalize) have this romantic ideal about how managers should be treated. This notion that a manager should always be given time, regardless of how out of his depth he is, is kind of unique to United and its fans (or at least a certain subset of its fans). That is a remnant from the Fergie era (and back further than that, I suppose). We're sort of always chasing this romantic ideal
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I'm not so sure I agree any set of fans are as unique as we might like to think.
That’s my view as well. That (and the toxic board) is the nub of the problem. OGS would have benefited greatly by letting go of the past, but I guess it’s way too late for that.
As much as I have doubts re Ole, there’s no way he let’s that influence him. At least I hope not!
We won the title in 3 of those 4 seasons. So, yes.
I really have no idea where this idea that Ferguson struggled at the end of his career comes from. Seen it said by multiple people on here lately, absolutely baseless stuff.
In short, Football has evolved we have not. Not Fergie's fault!
Picture anybody thinking they no more about Man Utd than SAF or Sir Bobby. The arrogance of some journalists and fans is incredible.
"Footballs changed its modern times" I remember Bartomeu told FCB similar things. Now look at them.
Clubs who stick to their model rarely get knocked too far off their pivot. If SAF is behind the scenes fixing the mistakes Moyes did by moving around the furniture. Then I'm all for it and as a supporter I'm willing to suffer the journey. The notion what SAF, Sir Matt did was flukes. No thats who we are SAF just nailed the model down correctly. It remains to be seen if Ole and Fletcher can, so far it is not looking great
"Footballs changed its modern times" I remember Bartomeu told FCB similar things. Now look at them.
Clubs who stick to their model rarely get knocked too far off their pivot. If SAF is behind the scenes fixing the mistakes Moyes did by moving around the furniture. Then I'm all for it and as a supporter I'm willing to suffer the journey. The notion what SAF, Sir Matt did was flukes. No thats who we are SAF just nailed the model down correctly. It remains to be seen if Ole and Fletcher can, so far it is not looking great
LVG and Mourinho are pretty far away from Fergie. I agree that the nostalgia of Fergie is a problem. We missed out on Klopp to Liverpool, who would have been the ideal replacement.
He reminds me a bit of a successful family member that wants you to do well, but not too well.
You have Gary Neville and an embarrassingly large portion of our fanbase sticking their nose up at the guy who’s been the best domestic manager in football over the last decade. All because he’s a “bad fit”. Yeah this whole mentality needs to be purged from the club.
Educate me mate, who's that?