[JogaBonitoRooney]

Sancho really isn't worth all the coverage he has been getting. He has flopped under three different United managers and never once looked like he could be one of the elite Premier League players. He was even given time off to rediscover his form away from the media spotlight and he did feck all with that too.

He's a very talented player playing in a league where his talents aren't going to excel. He's best when he can form passing combinations with a full back and striker. He's a very intelligent player and gets into great attacking positions by passing and moving into dangerous areas. That's just harder to do in the PL and especially at United where we don't use our wingers in such a way.

A lot of Sancho's issues in the PL stem from a lack of athleticism. In a Guardiola coached side you could maybe get the best from him, but other than that he'll struggle wherever he goes in England.

There are players in the pl smaller and less athletic than sancho. This assessment doesn't make sense.

 

[Woodenlung]

There are players in the pl smaller and less athletic than sancho. This assessment doesn't make sense.

They may be getting on, but he certainly isn't. Lack of athleticism is a valid criticism of Sancho and is something which will always be an issue for him if he tries to make a career in England.

 

[The Irish Connection]

That has more to do with our team setup than the Premier League. At United he was expected to beat the fullback in 1on1 or even 1vs2, this is because we are poor at moving the ball quickly and don't generate space for attackers. This is why only rapid players like Rashford or Garnacho shine on the wings.

I'm sure Sancho will struggle when put against a decent fullback in Bundesliga as well, it's just not his game. We always knew he can be effective when given some space, plenty of examples of Sancho doing things at United as well.


No, it's a difficult pass to make with a left foot.

It's interesting eth was reluctant to play Sancho on the right wing. I think it's easier to play for us on the right hand side, there's just more space to operate (for a few reasons- LW is usually double marked, Bruno tends to move there as well etc). I believe Eth didn't like the idea of right footed winger on the right. Although that is also a stretch because Bruno used to play RW regularly last season, so maybe it was just Ten Hag's preference to Antony above everything else.

No sorry, I disagree. He’s just an average winger who can do well in a less intense league. Yes, Dortmund are probably more suited to him but he often had off the ball runners around him with us only to misplace passes.
And obviously his attitude is shite.

 

[Ekeke]

I think its funny that we wanted him for years due to how he was playing on the right for Dortmund, then we finally sign him and we exclusively use him on the left where Rashford was playing. Now he goes back to Dortmund and in his first game hes back on the right and setting up a goal.

Any of the coaching staff who have suggested that he should play on the left need to be fired immediately

 

[Zehner]

They may be getting on, but he certainly isn't. Lack of athleticism is a valid criticism of Sancho and is something which will always be an issue for him if he tries to make a career in England.

Athleticism should be a means to an end, not an end in itself.

I think its funny that we wanted him for years due to how he was playing on the right for Dortmund, then we finally sign him and we exclusively use him on the left where Rashford was playing. Now he goes back to Dortmund and in his first game hes back on the right and setting up a goal.

Any of the coaching staff who have suggested that he should play on the left need to be fired immediately

He used to play on the left for Dortmund at the time you signed him. He played both wings yesterday it seems.

 

[padzilla]

The modern game at elite level at least is far too focused on athleticism and work rate. The increased use of data has made football evolve that way.
Much better for coaches etc but not the fans as it's less about talent than before and more about work rate and application.

 

[Ekeke]

Right footer playing right wing. Simpler job and he immediately showed he can do it better than his low involvement play on the left for United

Pass the ball, make a run, cross the ball. What he should have been doing on our right wing since the moment we signed him

 

[Zehner]

Pass the ball, make a run, cross the ball. What he should have been doing on our right wing since the moment we signed him

That's pretty much the worst description of Sancho I've read. My goodness.

 

[Ekeke]

That's pretty much the worst description of Sancho I've read. My goodness.

Thats what he did for his assist

 

[HTG]

Kagawa
Mhkitaryan
Sancho

Bellingham was smashing it in the championship at sixteen years old, he's a generational player who we tried to sign from Birmingham. He's not a "bundesliga player". He just went there for minutes, absolutely pissed it for 24 months then left for the biggest club on earth, where he is indeed smashing it.

Lewandowski is a top striker but he did go to the biggest Club in the league and also, was never truly loved by Bayern fans.

For everyone that is good there are five that are bad.

Well then buy the good ones? City manage to do that just fine.

 

[pascell]

He used to play on the left for Dortmund at the time you signed him. He played both wings yesterday it seems.

He played one season mostly on the right with Hakimi.

 

[Reapersoul20]

He actually kissed the badge on a loan deal ? What an absolute tosser

He looks leaner in the video. Hopefully he keeps it up long enough to get some kind of fee for him

 

[stefan92]

He actually kissed the badge on a loan deal ? What an absolute tosser

He also talked about coming home, happy to play together with old friends etc. Clearly this is more than the typical "half year to get some playing time" for him.

 

[HTG]

They may be getting on, but he certainly isn't. Lack of athleticism is a valid criticism of Sancho and is something which will always be an issue for him if he tries to make a career in England.

I don't think he lacks athleticism. I think he lacks in other departments, mostly mentally. The guy simply doesn't have the mental tools (maybe yet, I doubt it'll change, though) to work out at a topclub or a club with the ambition to be one. Dortmund manage to make guys like him or Dembele look good, because their whole business model is reliant on selling these players. So they bend over backwards in order to avoid any scandals or public criticism about their disciplinary issues. Which is why they had a guy hired to wake Sancho in the morning. They are basically enabling their lack of professionalism. Which works out for them, or used to.
Once he or Dembele arrived at a topclub where this shit only flies when you have Messi or Ronaldinho kind of talent, they falter. They are used to having everything, and I mean absolutely everything, going in their interests. They are the biggest fish in a small pond and won't have it any other way.
At United, Barca, Bayern, Real and so on, you only work out if you are professional enough to fight for your spot in every single practice and match. Something Sancho hasn't done once in his life, because his talent was always big enough for him to get a place despite his lack of professionalism. He just never once had to be a professional athlete before. So of course he doesn't know how to be one. And as long as clubs want him and pay him obscene money, as long as his false friends tell him how great he is, he won't understand that he needs to change. Because everything is working out.
But now that talent alone isn't enough anymore, he lacks the mental tools to change his approach. Which is why it made sense (from his flawed perspective) to rejoin a club where he could once again play by virtue of his talent alone.

It is quite similar to gifted children in school. They often tend to be very good early on, but become increasingly worse in the academic world, because they have never learned to learn.

 

[Gabriel Djemba-Bebe]

He also talked about coming home, happy to play together with old friends etc. Clearly this is more than the typical "half year to get some playing time" for him.

It's all good vibes until they can only afford to offer him half of his current salary.

 

[GlasgowCeltic]

I do wonder how he feels about his England career being virtually dead, the Euros are this year, Southgate took a lot of shit for not fancying him but it was just sort of a “fair enough” from him in terms of proving him wrong

 

[Hammondo]

Right footer playing right wing. Simpler job and he immediately showed he can do it better than his low involvement play on the left for United

Pass the ball, make a run, cross the ball. What he should have been doing on our right wing since the moment we signed him

More our fault than his.

 

[Zehner]

He played one season mostly on the right with Hakimi.

He mostly played as a right-sided 10 in a 3-4-2-1 and switched sides regularly. And that was in his first real season at Dortmund, the following two years he predominantly played on the left and reportedly that's also where he sees himself. I mean, it's only logical, isn't it? How many inverted wingers are there who play on the side of their strong foot?

 

[HTG]

I do wonder how he feels about his England career being virtually dead, the Euros are this year, Southgate took a lot of shit for not fancying him but it was just sort of a “fair enough” from him in terms of proving him wrong

It's their fault, not his.
I don't think his "critical" thinking extends much beyond that.

 

[Zehner]

I don't think he lacks athleticism. I think he lacks in other departments, mostly mentally. The guy simply doesn't have the mental tools (maybe yet, I doubt it'll change, though) to work out at a topclub or a club with the ambition to be one. Dortmund manage to make guys like him or Dembele look good, because their whole business model is reliant on selling these players. So they bend over backwards in order to avoid any scandals or public criticism about their disciplinary issues. Which is why they had a guy hired to wake Sancho in the morning. They are basically enabling their lack of professionalism. Which works out for them, or used to.
Once he or Dembele arrived at a topclub where this shit only flies when you have Messi or Ronaldinho kind of talent, they falter. They are used to having everything, and I mean absolutely everything, going in their interests. They are the biggest fish in a small pond and won't have it any other way.
At United, Barca, Bayern, Real and so on, you only work out if you are professional enough to fight for your spot in every single practice and match. Something Sancho hasn't done once in his life, because his talent was always big enough for him to get a place despite his lack of professionalism. He just never once had to be a professional athlete before. So of course he doesn't know how to be one. And as long as clubs want him and pay him obscene money, as long as his false friends tell him how great he is, he won't understand that he needs to change. Because everything is working out.
But now that talent alone isn't enough anymore, he lacks the mental tools to change his approach. Which is why it made sense (from his flawed perspective) to rejoin a club where he could once again play by virtue of his talent alone.

It is quite similar to gifted children in school. They often tend to be very good early on, but become increasingly worse in the academic world, because they have never learned to learn.

What about Leroy Sané, then? Had a habit of arriving late to training and even matches and was notorious for his 'no fecks given' training sessions until last season, now he's Bayern's second best player this season.

That aside, Rangnick recently said that he had zero issues with Sancho's professionalism when he coached United.

 

[Laurencio]

His footwork is so much slower than it was the last time. He might just be rusty, but he's really sluggish, his pass accuracy is much worse and his ball control is sloppy.

 

[stefan92]

I don't think he lacks athleticism. I think he lacks in other departments, mostly mentally. The guy simply doesn't have the mental tools (maybe yet, I doubt it'll change, though) to work out at a topclub or a club with the ambition to be one. Dortmund manage to make guys like him or Dembele look good, because their whole business model is reliant on selling these players. So they bend over backwards in order to avoid any scandals or public criticism about their disciplinary issues. Which is why they had a guy hired to wake Sancho in the morning. They are basically enabling their lack of professionalism. Which works out for them, or used to.
Once he or Dembele arrived at a topclub where this shit only flies when you have Messi or Ronaldinho kind of talent, they falter. They are used to having everything, and I mean absolutely everything, going in their interests. They are the biggest fish in a small pond and won't have it any other way.
At United, Barca, Bayern, Real and so on, you only work out if you are professional enough to fight for your spot in every single practice and match. Something Sancho hasn't done once in his life, because his talent was always big enough for him to get a place despite his lack of professionalism. He just never once had to be a professional athlete before. So of course he doesn't know how to be one. And as long as clubs want him and pay him obscene money, as long as his false friends tell him how great he is, he won't understand that he needs to change. Because everything is working out.
But now that talent alone isn't enough anymore, he lacks the mental tools to change his approach. Which is why it made sense (from his flawed perspective) to rejoin a club where he could once again play by virtue of his talent alone.

It is quite similar to gifted children in school. They often tend to be very good early on, but become increasingly worse in the academic world, because they have never learned to learn.

Watzke said yesterday that you shouldn't compare Dembele and Sancho in that regard

According to him Sancho only was occasionally late (which had to be dealt with) but did not have any disciplinary issues besides a "not very well working internal clock" as he called it. Dembele apparently was another case with actual disciplinary actions.

 

[Gabriel Djemba-Bebe]

He mostly played as a right-sided 10 in a 3-4-2-1 and switched sides regularly. And that was in his first real season at Dortmund, the following two years he predominantly played on the left and reportedly that's also where he sees himself. I mean, it's only logical, isn't it? How many inverted wingers are there who play on the side of their strong foot?

Garnacho springs to mind.

 

[HTG]

Watzke said yesterday that you shouldn't compare Dembele and Sancho in that regard

According to him Sancho only was occasionally late (which had to be dealt with) but did not have any disciplinary issues besides a "not very well working internal clock" as he called it. Dembele apparently was another case with actual disciplinary actions.

Well than everything is fine.
I actually agree that Dembele is an even worse case. But Sancho isn't that far of for me, as the time at United counts just as much for me. Though I understand why it doesn't to Watzke.

 

[Acrobat7]

Watzke said yesterday that you shouldn't compare Dembele and Sancho in that regard

According to him Sancho only was occasionally late (which had to be dealt with) but did not have any disciplinary issues besides a "not very well working internal clock" as he called it. Dembele apparently was another case with actual disciplinary actions.

Watzke is an idiot but even he is not stupid enough to shit on a player that is currently in his squad. Had they loaned Dembele and not Sancho he would probably speak highly of the former.

Edit: from the outside looking in, Dembele is way worse than Sancho.

 

[SER19]

I don't disagree on any of this. The only thing I see different is that by apologizing Sancho would have had to lie about trusting the manager which he clearly did not do.

EtH did not try to gain his trust again but apparently double down on Sancho to just accept what EtH was doing and thinking.

Again, this is fine, but it is EtH's decision to just leave Sancho behind.

I think early on Ten Hag did try do downplay things. I just dont have any reason to believe that sancho couldnt have went to ten hag and had a reasonable conversation even with an agent or so on present, where he apologised for stepping far beyond whats reasonable on social media, but that he does have concerns about his role and feels singled out. We can clearly see so many poorly performing players that ten hag hasnt criticised in this way, and putting his words together with his actions it would seem that the others are meeting a basic standard he sets for them in training. No matter what way I assess this, trying to be fair, Sancho is the outlying factor.

 

[SER19]

Sancho didn't refuse to play though, ten hag refused to play him for standing up for himself.

He's not done well here, but that's equally a criticism of us as it is him.

If he goes well with Dortmund it doesn't reflect well on us, we have a history of not doing well with intricate link up type players like him.

Made a post above to stefan on this point. What he did is tantamount to refusing to play.

 

[Lyng]

It's all good vibes until they can only afford to offer him half of his current salary.

I am not sure it matters that much to him.
Maybe he just feels more at home in Dortmund.

 

[ItDoesntEvenMata]

When we take the premise for granted that he has to smile to play well and consider how much abuse he got after that Euro penalty miss I don't think he is even interested in playing for it at the moment.

I'd imagine getting racially abused as a 20 year old for missing a pen probably puts a sour taste in the mouth when thinking about the national team.

Weird that people are saying Dortmund are his level etc when Haaland and Bellingham both left Dortmund and kicked on fine. Same with Gundogan and various others.

 

[Hammondo]

Made a post above to stefan on this point. What he did is tantamount to refusing to play.

No it's not, there was nothing stopping Ten Hag from playing him, Sancho did not want to stop playing.

 

[Lyng]

I have only three posts per day and why should I defend the factual truth. We scraped over the finish line last year to earn promotion. Our manager´s tactics have always failed in the Bundesliga (he´s literally PPG, the worst in BL history), our summer transfers were awful and our DOF just left during the winter break. If you work with our miniscule budget the on-pitch product will simply reflect the horrible last 12 months we had in management/transfers. I am at peace with where we are, cause our story is so unbelievable that Hollywood would turn it down as an underdog story, cause it´s too unrealistic.

We had been playing in the 4th division four years until 2010/2011 always teetering on bankruptcy. Bayner actually saved us with a charity game. In 2012/2013 we were once again supposed to be relegated back to the 4th division, but our biggest local rivals went bankrupt (the irony), so we stayed up in the 3rd division. Then we immediately finished 3rd next season, which earned us a play-off for promotion. We lost the first game at home 1-3 to a huge favourite. Then went to their place as even bigger underdogs, won regulation 3-1, conceded the 3-2 in OT and then earned promotion on away goals in the 122nd minute. Next year from the 2nd Bundesliga we earned straight promotion to the Bundesliga. During all that time we were always in the bottom third of budgets in the respective leagues. Over the last decade we managed to squeeze out three years of Bundesliga and seven years of top half of the table 2nd Bundesliga, all while building a whole new stadium and training ground without any sugardaddy or any significant debt despite Corona.

So whatever sh*t some others might throw at my club cannot faze me.

Fantastic post. My cousin is a season ticket holder in Darmstadt and what you described its pretty much exactly what she told me.

 

[SER19]

No it's not, there was nothing stopping Ten Hag from playing him, Sancho did not want to stop playing.

There 100% was. You simply cannot violate the norms between players and their managers that way and expect to play without apologizing. For Ten Hag to keep playing him would be to completely upend any efforts he's made at instilling standards and discipline. What youre arguing is that a hugely underperforming player who both the manager and teammates have expressed concern about his professionalism and training, should just stay in the team. Its mind boggling. Every top manager in the world has these red lines and has stuck to them for far better players than Jadon bloody Sancho.

 

[stefan92]

There 100% was. You simply cannot violate the norms between players and their managers that way and expect to play without apologizing. For Ten Hag to keep playing him would be to completely upend any efforts he's made at instilling standards and discipline. What youre arguing is that a hugely underperforming player who both the manager and teammates have expressed concern about his professionalism and training, should just stay in the team. Its mind boggling. Every top manager in the world has these red lines and has stuck to them for far better players than Jadon bloody Sancho.

And that's totally fine and probably was fair to do. But all of this means that EtH decided to enforce this read line by completely banning Sancho. He could have suspended him for two weeks as well for example.

 

[KeanoMagicHat]

I'd imagine getting racially abused as a 20 year old for missing a pen probably puts a sour taste in the mouth when thinking about the national team.

Weird that people are saying Dortmund are his level etc when Haaland and Bellingham both left Dortmund and kicked on fine. Same with Gundogan and various others.

It's also funny considering Dortmund are better than United. Won their CL group and we went out last. They're not ripping it up in Bundesliga this year but at least they're not 9th in the table like us.

 

[Hammondo]

There 100% was. You simply cannot violate the norms between players and their managers that way and expect to play without apologizing. For Ten Hag to keep playing him would be to completely upend any efforts he's made at instilling standards and discipline. What youre arguing is that a hugely underperforming player who both the manager and teammates have expressed concern about his professionalism and training, should just stay in the team. Its mind boggling. Every top manager in the world has these red lines and has stuck to them for far better players than Jadon bloody Sancho.

Well that's all well and good but Tan Hag was the one who lowered the standard by talking about him in the media in the first place. Sancho simply responded, this is the main reason why this almost never happens.

Also everyone has underperformed, and he's definitely not been the laziest one on the pitch, yet Ten Hag says and does nothing about it.

 

[stefan92]

I'd imagine getting racially abused as a 20 year old for missing a pen probably puts a sour taste in the mouth when thinking about the national team.

Weird that people are saying Dortmund are his level etc when Haaland and Bellingham both left Dortmund and kicked on fine. Same with Gundogan and various others.

Even weirder when you consider that all players you named (and some you didn't like Akanji) actually looked better once they left that nostalgic mess in dire search for the second coming of their beloved great manager. Sancho is the only one who looked worse once he moved.

 

[stefan92]

Well that's all well and good but Tan Hag was the one who lowered the standard by talking about him in the media in the first place. Sancho simply responded, this is the main reason why this almost never happens.

What's also curious is that all of this happened before at Dortmund without escalating. Their manager and DoF both publicly made similar statements about Sancho (multiple times!) and we even had the "I feel like a scapegoat" post from Sancho once. The reaction from the club was basically "feel whatever you want, perform better and than there won't be any problem". If you make a public statement and get a public reply that you don't like, you shouldn't be surprised.

Dortmund had no problem getting him in line while United had. Of course we can repeat all the points about how United is so much of a bigger club that couldn't accept these little issues etc, but in the end we have a club that was carried for four seasons by Sancho and then sold him for 85m, and another club that got almost nothing out of him and made themselves a laughing stock by the terms of this loans.

 

[Tyrion]

I am not sure it matters that much to him.
Maybe he just feels more at home in Dortmund.

I'm sure it'll matter when we offer to sell him and it falls through due to wage demands. Personally I don't want him to play for United again, a feeling me and him seem to share.

 

[Hammondo]

What's also curious is that all of this happened before at Dortmund without escalating. Their manager and DoF both publicly made similar statements about Sancho (multiple times!) and we even had the "I feel like a scapegoat" post from Sancho once. The reaction from the club was basically "feel whatever you want, perform better and than there won't be any problem". If you make a public statement and get a public reply that you don't like, you shouldn't be surprised.

Dortmund had no problem getting him in line while United had. Of course we can repeat all the points about how United is so much of a bigger club that couldn't accept these little issues etc, but in the end we have a club that was carried for four seasons by Sancho and then sold him for 85m, and another club that got almost nothing out of him and made themselves a laughing stock by the terms of this loans.

Yea you make some good points, I just do not understand how we are taking no responsibility at all in how this turned out, and just blame the player.

 

[He'sRaldo]

I’m the first to blame the club for messing up our talented players’ career trajectories over the years, but nah I’m not having that with Sancho in particular . It’s clear he’s never been serious, even the Dortmund unveiling video shows he’s just not a proper professional.

Fair enough you can behave like Eden Hazard all you want, but you’d better be beating 3 men to score or assist if you expect that level of accommodation for your piss poor attitude.

Ronaldo at least achieved something in the game before he ran to the media to complain. What has Sancho ever achieved other than showing the same patented “Dortmund potential” that the likes of Dembele, Kagawa, Mkhitaryan showed? I really hope the guy leaves the club permanently asap. We can’t be accommodating such characters in our current state.