[villain]

At this stage I think everyone just sees what they want to see with Fred. His pass completion was 91.3%. That’s 10% better than the next most accurate midfielder, from either team. He also completed the joint highest number of passes of any player, for either team.

Passing aside. He made 33 pressures. The next best United player (Bruno) made 16. The best Wolves player (Neves) made 21.

People see the pass intercepted by Traore early on and the miscontrol that created another break, shortly after, then lose their minds “CAN’T PASS!!! WORST PLAYER EVER TO PLAY FOR THE CLUB!!”

No it's completely understandable that Fred has a high passing percentage, he's often the deepest midfielder and he makes lots of short, safe passes, or out to the full back.
That's different to saying he put on a good passing display though, he just doesn't have that in that locker, which is my point.
He's not the player to play through balls, one touch passing, break lines of press, switch out to the flanks, play balls over the top etc. in fact any time he does it, I'm genuinely surprised. That's just not good enough for a CM for our club in my opinion.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

No it's completely understandable that Fred has a high passing percentage, he's often the deepest midfielder and he makes lots of short, safe passes, or out to the full back.
That's different to saying he put on a good passing display though, he just doesn't have that in that locker, which is my point.
He's not the player to play through balls, one touch passing, break lines of press, switch out to the flanks, play balls over the top etc. in fact any time he does it, I'm genuinely surprised. That's just not good enough for a CM for our club in my opinion.

He passes through the lines plenty. Always has done. Yesterday both him and Pogba struggled with this but mainly down to a lack of options. They both still made plenty of forward/progressive passes.

And Free doesn’t always have a % this high. He was in the 70s vs Southampton. He didn’t pass the ball well in that game. He did pass the ball well yesterday.

 

[villain]

He passes through the lines plenty. Always has done. Yesterday both him and Pogba struggled with this but mainly down to a lack of options. They both still made plenty of forward/progressive passes.

And Free doesn’t always have a % this high. He was in the 70s vs Southampton. He didn’t pass the ball well in that game. He did pass the ball well yesterday.

Passing through the lines is one type of passing skill, he doesn't have the variety to be able to put on a good passing display in the middle of the park.
We're having to adapt our standards to accommodate him (and the others), and we now need to add better quality in that position, it's been coming for a few years now.

 

[Marwood]

At this stage I think everyone just sees what they want to see with Fred. His pass completion was 91.3%. That’s 10% better than the next most accurate midfielder, from either team. He also completed the joint highest number of passes of any player, for either team.

He didn’t pass the ball well against Southampton. There was nothing wrong with his passing against Wolves.

Passing aside. He made 33 pressures. The next best United player (Bruno) made 16. The best Wolves player (Neves) made 21.

People see the pass intercepted by Traore early on and the miscontrol that created another break, shortly after, then lose their minds “CAN’T PASS!!! WORST PLAYER EVER TO PLAY FOR THE CLUB!!”

Yeah that's an overreaction but when a player drops two clangers like that, which could have ended the game after 5 minutes, it understandable he gets a slating.

But you're right, his passing was much better than the previous game.

 

[Ekeke]

@MadMike

All those progressive passes you thought you saw

Bonus - Getting on the ball lots and doing nothing with it, despite being mostly accurate and making pressures and having those pressures then beaten by a dribble consistantly aren't impressive parts of a performance. These stats are only good when matched by other stats that help tell the real story. Fred had our 2nd least success from his pressures.

Also beaten 6 times by someone taking him on with a dribble, with 0% tackle success

 

[Pogue Mahone]

@MadMike

All those progressive passes you thought you saw

Bonus - Getting on the ball lots and doing nothing with it, despite being mostly accurate and making pressures and having those pressures then beaten by a dribble consistantly aren't impressive parts of a performance. These stats are only good when matched by other stats that help tell the real story. Fred had our 2nd least success from his pressures.

Doing nothing with the ball = passing it more than anyone else and more accurately than anyone else. Yeah that makes sense…

 

[Ekeke]

Doing nothing with the ball = passing it more than anyone else and more accurately than anyone else. Yeah that makes sense…

Having the ball doesn't win you any points. And the more someone who can't find a forward pass or hurt the opposition is on the ball the better for them

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Having the ball doesn't win you any points. And the more someone who can't find a forward pass or hurt the opposition is on the ball the better for them

If only we had other players in the team who could use all that possession to create.

 

[Sultan]

Fred and Pogba just don't work as a pairing. Pogba is not the best at dealing with a high press and Fred is too rushed in his style of play and lacks composure with his passing. I don't think there are many players better than Fred without the ball and very likely the reason the coaches keep the faith.

 

[Sultan]

If only we had other players in the team who could use all that possession to create.

That was a major issue yesterday with all our front players decided to have an off day with Sancho and James anonymous. Cavani coming on made a change with their defence having to deal with a different problem.

It really becomes more of an issue for the team when Bruno has an off day more than any other player. The last few games of last season were telling how important Bruno has become in this set-up.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

That was a major issue yesterday with all our front players decided to have an off day with Sancho and James anonymous. Cavani coming on made a change with their defence having to deal with a different problem.

It really becomes more of an issue for the team when Bruno has an off day more than any other player. The last few games of last season were telling how important Bruno has become in this set-up.

“Anonymous” is being kind to Sancho and James. Both our wide players were as poor as you’re ever likely to see. Neither of our fullbacks played well either. So trying to blame central midfield for all our woes is far too simplistic.

I thought Bruno had a fairly standard performance. A mixed bag but always looking to make something happen.

 

[Andersons Dietician]

Again a typical kind of Fred performance. Not going to hold him getting manhandled by Traore against him, that’s like putting a mouse vs a Lion in a fight to the death. Bissaka and Pogba couldn’t handle Traore strength or speed either. Always a contest you would expect him to lose.

Had moments where I was like jeez Fred come on but then other where it’s like thank god for Fred. He was covering both sides of the pitch at one point, ran past both Pogba and Maguire to try and get a tackle in and did just enough to prevent a shot. Few occasions where his scrappy nature did good for us.

Usual sort of issue though which got better in the 2nd half once Pogba turned up. But the lack of options we give our midfielders is a joke that really needs rectified. We just hang our midfielders and CB’s out to dry.

 

[spiriticon]

He got better and better through the game yesterday but those first 15 minutes were just...jesus christ.

 

[roonster09]

At this stage I think everyone just sees what they want to see with Fred. His pass completion was 91.3%. That’s 10% better than the next most accurate midfielder, from either team. He also completed the joint highest number of passes of any player, for either team.

He didn’t pass the ball well against Southampton. There was nothing wrong with his passing against Wolves.

Passing aside. He made 33 pressures. The next best United player (Bruno) made 16. The best Wolves player (Neves) made 21.

People see the pass intercepted by Traore early on and the miscontrol that created another break, shortly after, then lose their minds “CAN’T PASS!!! WORST PLAYER EVER TO PLAY FOR THE CLUB!!”

To an extent that's true but he was very poor defensively. He tried 6 tackles and failed to win even a single one. One of that lead to Trincao's chance which was saved by AWB.

 

[Kostov]

He was appalling, absolutely horrendous and we were lucky to not concede couple of times thanks to his amateurish performance.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

To an extent that's true but he was very poor defensively. He tried 6 tackles and failed to win even a single one. One of that lead to Trincao's chance which was saved by AWB.

fbref have him down for one tackle. No United player made more than one. Total tackles for the team was 8 (vs 16 for Wolves)

 

[roonster09]

fbref have him down for one tackle. No United player made more than one. Total tackles for the team was 8 (vs 16 for Wolves)

There are couple of stats in that, one is when he tries to tackle a dribbler. Judging him for not stopping Adama would be harsh, was very disappointing to see how easily he was beaten by Trincao and he played at walking pace.

As per Fbref, he tried to tackle dribbler 6 times and failed all 6 times. Anyways 1 or 0 won't make much difference.

Also can't blame him alone, he was playing alongside Pogba and he had lot of ground to cover. More often than not Fred was the only player who had to cover lot of space infront of defense, it's near impossible job.

 

[Godfather]

“Anonymous” is being kind to Sancho and James. Both our wide players were as poor as you’re ever likely to see. Neither of our fullbacks played well either. So trying to blame central midfield for all our woes is far too simplistic.

I thought Bruno had a fairly standard performance. A mixed bag but always looking to make something happen.

Couldn't agree more. As for Fred: He made couple of grave errors in the opening minutes which will cloude everyone's judgement on the rest of his game, which - in the second half - was fine.

Also I don't agree that him and Pogba can't work, but we need a third player in CM to give both of them enough options and cover. For me Bruno was too far up the pitch yesterday. I love him for us his runs in behind and Pogba and him seem to have a good understanding. But especially in the first half when Wolves ran and pressed their lungs out we needed Bruno a bit deeper for some extra protection.

 

[acnumber9]

At this stage I think everyone just sees what they want to see with Fred. His pass completion was 91.3%. That’s 10% better than the next most accurate midfielder, from either team. He also completed the joint highest number of passes of any player, for either team.

You can definitely see what you want to with stats as well. I mean, Varane wasn’t far behind him and Wan Bissaka’s was better. There’s certain types of pass that are high completion and some that aren’t. Completing a lot of easy passes doesn’t prove somebody is a really good passer. The other midfielders were blatantly playing more difficult passes. That’s easy to see from just watching the game.

 

[Cooksen]

Fred is not a DM's arsehole, he is the Box to Box man in a midfield 3.

A good player but he is way out of position

 

[OrcaFat]

Fred can (and does) do a decent job as a defensive-minded no.8, provided we don’t expect creativity or positional discipline from him. I like him, his attitude is great. With the right players around him, his weaknesses are not going to bring the team to its knees.

His stats are pretty good.

But all of this ignores his lack of composure under pressure and lack of game intelligence. Stats don’t show the ragged quality of his passing when the squeeze is on. Stats don’t tell you when he’s running in the wrong direction. Stats don’t do a good job of identifying sloppy play in critical phases of play.

He mostly does okay and brings a lot to the team but that lack of genuine quality does cause us some problems. All in all, he is still one of our best options in CM and I’d still pick him out of what we’ve got but I wish we had some better options.

 

[Foxbatt]

His bad control in the first few minutes was terrible. That's why he was so bad. I thought tactically we were poor and that's what led to him having such a bad game.
As another OP we know that Wolves is going to counter attack us with pace of Traore. Tactically we should have been aware of it and pulled Bruno a bit back. Or even James. That would stop Fred having to do everything in midfield all by himself.

 

[Chicharo]

Keano explained everything regarding his performances. If you play there, you need to contribute attacking wise - either send long balls towards your forwards, be a threat to opponents' GK, contribute to goals in any way possible (his shooting is terrible, can score only if he is 5-6 yards from the goal) if not that, be strong in the defense and protect your teammates who play behind you. He can't do it on regular basis.
We've waited first year, ok needs time to adapt we said, second year, had some good games but far away to say he was what we need. This is his third season here, how long are we gonna wait?
Simply not good enough, which with Donnie's current situation and McT's injury prevents Pogba from doing what he does best.

 

[golden_blunder]

Keano explained everything regarding his performances. If you play there, you need to contribute attacking wise - either send long balls towards your forwards, be a threat to opponents' GK, contribute to goals in any way possible (his shooting is terrible, can score only if he is 5-6 yards from the goal) if not that, be strong in the defense and protect your teammates who play behind you. He can't do it on regular basis.
We've waited first year, ok needs time to adapt we said, second year, had some good games but far away to say he was what we need. This is his third season here, how long are we gonna wait?
Simply not good enough, which with Donnie's current situation and McT's injury prevents Pogba from doing what he does best.

And we’re back to talking about how everyone else restricts Pogba again

 

[RDCR07]

Keano explained everything regarding his performances. If you play there, you need to contribute attacking wise - either send long balls towards your forwards, be a threat to opponents' GK, contribute to goals in any way possible (his shooting is terrible, can score only if he is 5-6 yards from the goal) if not that, be strong in the defense and protect your teammates who play behind you. He can't do it on regular basis.
We've waited first year, ok needs time to adapt we said, second year, had some good games but far away to say he was what we need. This is his third season here, how long are we gonna wait?
Simply not good enough, which with Donnie's current situation and McT's injury prevents Pogba from doing what he does best.

This is his fourth season.

 

[Chicharo]

This is his fourth season.

Yeah you are right, even worse.

@
golden_blunder
Pogba is miles away from Fred.They are basically not even in the same league. The only answer whenever his name shows up is that he cannot help the defense. Yet, 5 asists so far. Are we to expect him to join David so we can have two goalkeepers?
And yet, people still think we would be better without Paul, that he is not happy in Manchester and what not. Never heard from him saying these bullocks after OGS became manager

 

[Cassidy]

Fred can (and does) do a decent job as a defensive-minded no.8, provided we don’t expect creativity or positional discipline from him. I like him, his attitude is great. With the right players around him, his weaknesses are not going to bring the team to its knees.

His stats are pretty good.

But all of this ignores his lack of composure under pressure and lack of game intelligence. Stats don’t show the ragged quality of his passing when the squeeze is on. Stats don’t tell you when he’s running in the wrong direction. Stats don’t do a good job of identifying sloppy play in critical phases of play.

He mostly does okay and brings a lot to the team but that lack of genuine quality does cause us some problems. All in all, he is still one of our best options in CM and I’d still pick him out of what we’ve got but I wish we had some better options.

Not very good for a defensive-minded player in our team, especially with the makeup of the rest of the midfield.

 

[laughtersassassin]

And we’re back to talking about how everyone else restricts Pogba again

Fred is a flaw regardless of who he is playing with.

The McFred partnership is insanely flawed for instance. Sure it defensively ok.

But on the ball it's flawed as feck.

It's not about Pogba at all.

We don't have a single partnership where the two players suit eachother.

Pogba and Matic did when Matic could play football still but that was always a stupidly short term transfer.

Fabinho was probably the man for us but our Midfield signings have simply been Terrible as even if the player we bought themselves was good we weren't buying players that suited eachother

 

[stevoc]

Keano explained everything regarding his performances. If you play there, you need to contribute attacking wise - either send long balls towards your forwards, be a threat to opponents' GK, contribute to goals in any way possible (his shooting is terrible, can score only if he is 5-6 yards from the goal) if not that, be strong in the defense and protect your teammates who play behind you. He can't do it on regular basis.
We've waited first year, ok needs time to adapt we said, second year, had some good games but far away to say he was what we need. This is his third season here, how long are we gonna wait?
Simply not good enough, which with Donnie's current situation and McT's injury prevents Pogba from doing what he does best.

This is his 4th season now.

 

[Mickson]

The amount of (unfairly) shit he gets here is unreal. He often plays by himself in midfield and we, as a team, have no tactical knowledge on how to play as a team in midfield. There's a reason he's first-choice for Brazil, Pep wanted him, and that he was ace for Shakhtar. Although he needs a little guidance sometimes, he's an incredibly useful player to have.

 

[flappyjay]

Keano explained everything regarding his performances. If you play there, you need to contribute attacking wise - either send long balls towards your forwards, be a threat to opponents' GK, contribute to goals in any way possible (his shooting is terrible, can score only if he is 5-6 yards from the goal) if not that, be strong in the defense and protect your teammates who play behind you. He can't do it on regular basis.
We've waited first year, ok needs time to adapt we said, second year, had some good games but far away to say he was what we need. This is his third season here, how long are we gonna wait?
Simply not good enough, which with Donnie's current situation and McT's injury prevents Pogba from doing what he does best.

I don't care what Keane says not even kante can defend the midfield by themselves. It's a team sport Pogba and Bruno should be helping out a lot more off the ball. It's always forgotten that Fred himself is shoehorned as a dm. I am not a fan of Fred's, he is erratic and not good enough on the ball but he is also playing in an unbalanced midfield. What happened in midfield against wolves was disgusting to see.

 

[Mickson]

I don't care what Keane says not even kante can defend the midfield by themselves. It's a team sport Pogba and Bruno should be helping out a lot more off the ball. It's always forgotten that Fred himself is shoehorned as a dm. I am not a fan of Fred's, he is erratic and not good enough on the ball but he is also playing in an unbalanced midfield. What happened in midfield against wolves was disgusting to see.

Bingo. Greenwood, Bruno, Pogba, Sancho etc does feck all in defense, but let's blame Fred who is running for three players. Nobody would've impressed in Fred's role so far this season.

 

[Kaos]

The amount of (unfairly) shit he gets here is unreal. He often plays by himself in midfield and we, as a team, have no tactical knowledge on how to play as a team in midfield. There's a reason he's first-choice for Brazil, Pep wanted him, and that he was ace for Shakhtar. Although he needs a little guidance sometimes, he's an incredibly useful player to have.

I don't disagree with this, but its still no reason we should be shoehorning him into a position he's clearly uncomfortable and ill-equipped to play in. And thats on Ole tbh.

 

[Mickson]

I don't disagree with this, but its still no reason we should be shoehorning him into a position he's clearly uncomfortable and ill-equipped to play in. And thats on Ole tbh.

I realize we could do better than Fred, but I don't blame him much for his performances so far.

 

[Levenstein]

Fred will prove lot of people wrong this season. I think he will be very good in a 4-3-3 and when he will have more help from Bruno. He makes very straight forward and quick transitions from defence to attack.
Also presses high up the field and wins a lot of balls when opponents are not in a shape to defend. Imagine what changes players like Ronaldo, Bruno, Pogba, Greenwood and Sancho will create from there.

To think that he will be very poor teammate for Ronaldo is also wrong in my opinion. I believe Ronaldo brings more out of him.
He links up well with Pogba. He played awesome tournament with Neymar who trusted him a lot on the ball.

More faith people. He is our player and support him as long he is here. Ole will decide who plays and who not. Do you guys think he would put Fred on field for Manchester United, if he is rubbish?

 

[Litch]

Whether he's good enough or not, play with Pogs and Bruno in our system, be prepared to have to cover both their defensive duties (as well as your own) and if you aren't playing well, it's gonna be magnified when you make mistakes. Some players on this team have a free pass, they can score goals but don't have to help prevent them. It's amazing that with all that ability and creativity, it's still not amounted to winning anything even in the big games, yet the 'donkeys' that are carrying their water, consistently get the blame for spIlling it. Anyone noticed how less effective they are internationally when they have to carry some of the water too.....?

Oh, the irony.....the big games, Scott and Fred have arguably contributed to winning more than Bruno and Pogs.

 

[laughtersassassin]

Fred has been very erratic and in my opinion poor since roughly last January.

And despite peoples willingness to blame others he has been crap alongside McTominay as well in that time.

He basically had a couple of months where he was ok which for Fred is impressive but for most others it is not

 

[Levenstein]

Exactly. If he had more help, his qualities would come out more easily. He is just played out of position with little help. That is not his fault. He still carried us over half season like that.

 

[Shark]

He isn't a defensive midfielder. Not exactly his fault he's been asked to be Kante instead of us replacing Matic.

 

[Litch]

Fred has been very erratic and in my opinion poor since roughly last January.

And despite peoples willingness to blame others he has been crap alongside McTominay as well in that time.

He basically had a couple of months where he was ok which for Fred is impressive but for most others it is not

Help me out, if midfield is generally accepted where you win or lose games, how do you get to 2nd in the league, semi's and finals and unbeaten away if you are only good for a couple of months?