I feel the same way, he never sherks away from a challenge and totally must have a bit of wee man syndrome about him because they can be 6ft 4 built like a god and Fred don’t care. He’s having some.
17
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 36
- Goals
- 4
- Assists
- 5
- Yellow cards
- 8
- Status
Look at Crystal Palace, same old midfielders + Conor Gallagher and they are playing out from the back and dominating possession. They had 63% possession against Villa at the weekend and Vieira has managed to completely change it all with only a pre-season.
That is coaching.
If football was all about pressing, the team with the fastest and fittest players would win all the games. I’m afraid it’s not simple as that. You do need to have the ability to play football. People need to move on from Fred. He just hasn’t the quality to be a Utd player.
Yes, but he is good enough to start for Brazil ?
Lets just wait to see what Rangnick can do before moving on from players.
I am sure lots of Chelsea fans said that about Rudiger under Lampard, now he is one of the best defenders in the PL.
I like Fred , he gives everything and runs a lot but he has his limitations with his passing , presence of mind and also consistency. Some games his challenges work and some game they won’t and in those he looks silly. You don’t know when you will get a good game.
If he played next decent DM who can win balls (like Kante) , Fred would be amazing.
Just me, or did he seem to play a lot more advanced in the last 2 games?
Seemed to be closing down the opposition defence a lot
Seemed to be closing down the opposition defence a lot
We still do need an upgrade at some point - He can't be a long term starter. Our fans always get caught up in his better displays which still never amount to much more than scrappy tackles. For some reason he always gets more praise than McTominay for similar things.
I'm excited to see what he can do under Ralf but there's just no fixing his technical limitations. His head goes when he gets anywhere close to the final third and if we're to punish teams consistently in transition then we'll need more composure than Fred brings.
I'm excited to see what he can do under Ralf but there's just no fixing his technical limitations. His head goes when he gets anywhere close to the final third and if we're to punish teams consistently in transition then we'll need more composure than Fred brings.
Hopefully you're right, mate.
I am a big critic of his, his braindead passing and poor shots at times drive me nuts but I believe there is a player there in the right set-up. His partners have been very poor which don't make it easy at all. Partner him with Rice / Haidara in a 4222 with 2 hard working attacking midfielders (Bruno/Sancho) in front of him and he might really shine. Though I think he's probably best on the left side in a 433.
He's fine with his passing, his pass completion stats show that. A central midfielder is supposed to take risky passes and will get the occasional one wrong. Every player does it and its swept up by the team. Put that player in a defensive position next to your centre backs though and those occasional passes become dangerous.
Curious skill set altogether...has not got the strength, confidence or touch to play out from the back securely, not strong enough in the challenge to be solely a destroyer...has a fuking amazing engine, is nippy over short distances and has a decent instinct/reading of danger...but his passing is also not good enough to demand a role further forward.
An 8 is closest to where hecan be utilised most effectively but I don’t see him as being a world class 8. Best we have by a long shot though so...he will do for now while we fix the bigGer issues first.
An 8 is closest to where hecan be utilised most effectively but I don’t see him as being a world class 8. Best we have by a long shot though so...he will do for now while we fix the bigGer issues first.
Agree and It's funny cause some things that get said enough, they somehow become a truism. Some players you can focus on what they can't do and ignore what they can. Also Fred is not a DM, never came here as one so it's not strange to me he's not one. The other is people talk about improving his shooting like the similar midfielders for the top teams are banging the goals in. Fred is not without his failings but it's becoming increasingly clear that he became the scapegoat for a lot of Utd's amongst the media and some of the fan base.
I know people don't tend to rate him but I genuinely think he is one of the players that if we decided to sell; would probably get quite alot of interest and attention - and not like some rubbish clubs either.
Good player that we have not really aimed to get the best out of by playing his best way- like a lot of our players.
Good player that we have not really aimed to get the best out of by playing his best way- like a lot of our players.
He has had a terrible time this season. But I also feel that there is a player inside him. Play him further forward but with a proper press by his other teams mates and he will become much better. He is non stop running and he Does fight for his team mates. If anyone fouls a United player, Fred is the first one to be up there while Maguire is not interested in that at all.
Yes he is playing further up for sure, not in a pivot. A defensive no 8, imo his natural position. He can press to his hearts content and not worry so much about the space left behind.
Nah he's was proper shocking early on this season. I wouldn't call it scapegoating. There was just no absolving his performances despite the poor team he was in. Couldn't pass at all. He was ok last season and doing a lot better recently.
I’m not sure why Carrick said people don’t see his attitude. His attitude is probably top of the entire team - he’s been questioned over his ability.
great player and absolutely need him in our squad.
great player and absolutely need him in our squad.
An apt discription, I think he and the team suffers a lot because we don't have the right partner for him. He'd be perfect partnered with a Carrick, Alonso or any player of that ilk who sits in front of the defense whilst Fred plays as the harrier. Has bags of energy to run any midfield into the ground but you will always need that anchor to secure the base and launch play from deep which we don't have.
Always context for me. When people say playing 'McFred' would cost Ole his job like everyone else were pulling up trees speak volumes in itself. The scapegoat goes much further than that too. When he plays well is very different on here, than when he doesn't. If you read some of the comments on here, all Utd's failing were due to Fred including Keanos comments....
Carrick on Fred
Really don't like the idea of him playing further forward, as he just doesn't have the skillset to pass/assist/score, but I guess it's a plan to keep him further away from our goal.
Really don't like the idea of him playing further forward, as he just doesn't have the skillset to pass/assist/score, but I guess it's a plan to keep him further away from our goal.
The fact that he tried to chip Mendy shows he has the right idea. The fact he messed up shows that he may not have been practicing it at all.
I still think that despite his poor form if everybody in our side put in 80-90% of what Fred does we wouldn't be in this predicament. You can talk about passing, or his individual mistakes or the way he's been shrugged off it but if people were working their arses off so he wasn't on his own with his pressing and getting around the pitch we'd be the ones getting to second balls, not the opposition. We'd get on the front foot against teams with worse ability than us instead of being played off the park.
I am pretty sure RR will see him as fundamental.
I am pretty sure RR will see him as fundamental.
I wouldn’t be surprised if he is first name on the team sheet. Agreed on the workrate. If the rest of our team put in the same effort we would be cruising.
This is exactly why he'll be the first name on the team sheet under RR.
edit: @Andersons Dietician
Dietician and psychicBeen saying it for almost 2 years now. Win the battle in front of you and then walk around the pitch like a superstar. Seems like our fellas didn’t get the memo
Nothing wrong with his attitude or energy, I just think he is incredibly limited as a player. He runs a lot. That is literally the only strength of his game. He isnt a player with particularly good positioning (indeed its more the opposite, which is why he thrives when given license to just roam around the pitch... running), he contributes very little in the final third, his passing is poor*, and he is prone to sloppiness and gifting away possession.
I think and hope Fred can improve a lot under Rangnick, but right now I think he is simply too limited to merit a place in a team that wants to play any sort of progressive football. For a backs-against-the-wall situation like we expected vs Chelsea (given the teams form), or as someone to bring on to break up play and defend a lead, absolutely - but thats it.
*I have posted in more detail about Freds passing before, but the TLDR is that 'pass completion' does not tell the full picture. Fred is regularly guilty of underhitting, overhitting or misdirecting passes which either kills attacking momentum or plays the recipient into trouble. Just because a pass reaches its target, does not make it a good one. Pass completion is far too binary a statistic to be a useful metric by itself. Stats can be deceiving, it should be obvious to a viewer that Fred is not a good passer of the ball.
I think and hope Fred can improve a lot under Rangnick, but right now I think he is simply too limited to merit a place in a team that wants to play any sort of progressive football. For a backs-against-the-wall situation like we expected vs Chelsea (given the teams form), or as someone to bring on to break up play and defend a lead, absolutely - but thats it.
*I have posted in more detail about Freds passing before, but the TLDR is that 'pass completion' does not tell the full picture. Fred is regularly guilty of underhitting, overhitting or misdirecting passes which either kills attacking momentum or plays the recipient into trouble. Just because a pass reaches its target, does not make it a good one. Pass completion is far too binary a statistic to be a useful metric by itself. Stats can be deceiving, it should be obvious to a viewer that Fred is not a good passer of the ball.
Fred is definitely inconsistent in that regard and has too many sloppy or poor passes to be considered a truly 'good' passer, but he's also not as bad as many make out. It's not like pass completion is the only stat where he's decent. He tends to come out on top in most passing related stats compared to other similar midfielders, and even all midfielders in general. Progressive passes (both in amount of passes and in actual distance), passes into final third, amount of long passes, passes that lead to a shot, expected assists, etc...they all paint a very different picture than the 'he does nothing but short sideways passing' claim that some people try to make out. Obviously his stats are much worse so far this season as he started the season in terrible form for the first month and has been fairly inconsistent since then, but in general over the last couple of seasons his passing has been quite a bit better than he's often given credit for. Hopefully he's starting to get back into form again.
The thing is that we watch him every match so he's under so much more of a microscope compared to some midfielders who people only watch a few times a season. I think people have an unrealistic expectation of what other midfielders are actually doing.
Man Utd 3:2 Arsenal
I think Fred may have been the best player on the pitch. He was horrendous in the opening 20 minutes, but after that made a lot of positive contributions to our attack. Two excellently times runs into Arsenals box which led to two goals. Also came flying out of nowhere to make an excellent block on Saka on our box.
Game of two halves again.
Mad first 20 but very good after that.
Penalty Won
Assist
Fundamental to winning that game.
Assist
Fundamental to winning that game.
To his credit he did very well for the first and third goals. Smart link up with Sancho and he positioned his body perfectly for the foul.
Had a shocking start to the game. I thought it was gonna be one of those nights that he has a complete mare, but he turned it around. Pretty good overall. Had a big influence on our goals.
Proper box to box midfielder
The block at the end against Saka was great too
The block at the end against Saka was great too
Our best player today.
We don't win that without Fred.
MOTM
Rangnick will love him
First 30 mins, he was the worst player on the pitch. The last hour, the best.
I think Ralf will love him to be honest. He was the best player on the pitch tonight.
Yes he has his brain farts but he’s head and shoulders our best midfielder
Yes he has his brain farts but he’s head and shoulders our best midfielder
- Status