I think Oivier Giroud immediately disqualifies any group of players from being called world class.
José Mourinho | 2018/19 Performances
- Thread starter MyOnlySolskjaer
- Start date
- Status
I think Oivier Giroud immediately disqualifies any group of players from being called world class.
not in the case of Man City
it probably meant they won by 4 rather than 3
it also doesn't take into account our ridiculous tactical approach of scoring a goal then inviting on pressure. take Leicester last week
I think a lot of it comes down to the fact that your defenders aren't really as good as some think. That's intolerable for a guy like Mourinho, so he sets you up even deeper to compensate.
Doesn't help his cause for a new centreback that the first two he bought aren't shining success stories, mind.
Be interesting to see how many of their late winners were expected goals.
That's actually not true, if we really want to make a comparison it was closer to the way Simeone sets his team up. Defend deep, defensively control the middle, push the opposition wide, the attackers press high and then retreat when the others are positioned, counter attack.
To be fair there is a lot of sense to this.
Brighton are in the Premiership for a reason. If they are given chances they will take them. If we played on the front foot and controlled the game they might not get those chances.
We do have to consider, Fred is new to the side so needs time to work with the unit and a lot of the players are not the sharpest after a busy summer and no pre season.
It might take a while to get going this year.
I was talking about centre-back options. Smalling and Jones and Rojo are not top defenders for us and never will be. Toby won't have scored the goals we need but he at least can provide defensive solidity Jose thrives on.
The only thing that Jose's team did differently in the past was not press high. Everything else is the same as you described. I don't think France pressed that much to be honest.
The difference is in the details in the great scheme of things you are simply talking about counter attacking set ups, Mourinho did nothing special. Now the way France played is how Deschamps has always played and it's closer to Simeone, he doesn't care about wingers but still care about width that is provided by the fullbacks, the middle of the field is crowded and the opponent pushed on a wing in an attempt to trap him and then try to shift play quickly either by using the target man or a runner. And the attackers pressed, they were the only one doing it.
Completely agree with what you said here. A lot of my friends who don't support United were constantly asking the same thing. "How the feck are you second, with playing football like a relegation candidate?"
In short efficiency. I think we were the team that had one of the best chance to goal conversion rates in the league last season and I had a lot of games where I thought that we were more than a bit fortunate to win those matches but you couldn't really complain to much as a United fan because, well we were second which all things considered isn't too shabby but our football really was a stinking mess for the majority of last season as well.
Nobody understands it. There was another picture somewhere with Pogba on the ball in the midfield. One player was right next to him and 5 Brighton players are standing infront. Nobody on the RW. All I'm hearing is the 'defence, the defence!'. It's nothing to do with the defence or the players. We can't attack and it's been the case for as long as I can remember. That's why we keep losing to small teams. They don't respect us going forward so they'll come at us. We didn't have any sustained pressure in the game. 3 shots in 90 minutes. Against Brighton. A team with no pace on the break. How is Glen Murray stretching our defence? If we had them pinned back in their half they weren't going to worry us at all because they had no pace. I looked to Brighton and saw a well drilled team. The tactic was get the ball 2 on 1 out wide and stretch our fullbacks. What was our plan? We used to throw the kitchen sink at teams. Not anymore.
Bailly and Lindelof will get stick but we've seen the same with Smalling and Jones as well last season. Theyve should be relaxing on the half way line and snuffing out counters from there. Too many times we don't play on the front foot, can't string two passes together, don't move the ball quickly and then moan about individual errors. Of course you will get caught out. It's a consequence of our approach. IF they are still making mistakes after we make this change in approach then by all means get rid and the manager should be backed in that but no Maguire or Alderweireld would've changed anything today.
We saw the team we wanted. Everyone wanted Bailly and Lindelof and they played. Everyone wanted Fred, Periera, Pogba midfield. We got that as well. It just doesn't matter who we put out now because we play the same every time. I have seen no improvement from last season. We had Smalling, Matic , Lingard and Sanchez and still lost games like this.
Last edited:
It's the wrong question to ask anyway and implies a misunderstanding of what xG is. Random example from last season: United beat Arsenal 2-1. xG was 1.55 - 0.65 in United's favour so a United win was a fair reflection of the game and you might call it "deserved". But the xPts is never exactly 3 (which is what you get for a win), in this case it was 2.16 points for United and 0.58 points for Arsenal. This means every time a team wins they have exceeded their expectation and every time a team loses they have fallen short of their expectation. The thing is United have outperformed their xG to an absurd degree that is not sustainable. The amount of high quality chances they allowed the opposition is way above any other top team.
You are missing quite a massive factor.
France had the best team and best squad in the tournament by miles. They were well balanced and full of quality.
The counter attack was spearheaded by the most talented and expensive teenager ever. And even then there was a support strike force with Griezzman one of the other top talented strikers in world football.
Their midfield has some of the best in the world.
Part of the reason Pogba shined is because he had the freedom too, I.e. a talented team doing most of the work.
I think Pogba only shines when he is the cherry on a quality team. But I'm yet to see him grind it out as required when he has to be the best player on the pitch.
I'm not missing a thing, I'm talking about the tactical approach.
Well he persisted with Pereira instead of Fellaini or McT. Both Fellaini and McT would have been the old Mourinho double pivot to shield the defence. So Pereira is new, probably a Carrick suggestion. It theoritically gives us a playmaker from deep but when it does not go well, we look lightweight on the defensive side of the house.
I get the disillusionment with Mourinho. But who (that is realistically available) would be able to do a better job than Mourinho coming in mid-season?
I feel the best thing would be to maybe finalize the replacement but wait till season-end so that the new manager gets a full transfer window and pre-season for prep.
I feel the best thing would be to maybe finalize the replacement but wait till season-end so that the new manager gets a full transfer window and pre-season for prep.
He persisted is a slight exaggeration, Fellaini was in for the last 30 minutes and he is the manager, he makes the team. It's the first time that I see someone shift to the assistant coaches like that.
Also, neither Fellaini or McTominay are Jose's preferred choice as back up DM, that is Herrera.
Probably right with Coutinho / VvD although the financial accounts at Liverpool show that the VvD deal was basically secured in September. Long before Coutinho was actually sold. However I do suspect that the club knew it was coming and the hoo ha was about the price.
Fekir, you're just wrong. Liverpool pulled out because of concerns from the medical. I he may have actually had two medicals with the second a more in depth look at the problem. There may have been some financial issues which were forced by the fee paid for Alisson but either way the board has said nothing regarding the clubs financial position, especially in relation to Fekir. The club doesn't operate that way anymore. It's a pretty closed shop but the financial position should be quite strong after several seasons of quite prudent spending and last years Champions League run.
It's third season Jose, none of this should be that surprising. Baffling he was offered an extension last season, he doesn't do longevity.
Hands off!He is already 'in a good moment'
Well...until Palace beat you tonight....
Weird that plenty of other teams are able to set up a viable defence with decent centre halves (which IMO ours are), but for Jose’s defensive methods to work he needs worldies in each position along the back 4 despite playing his midfield right in front of them.
We’re not even that good at parking the bus. The only logical conclusion is it’s the way he setting them up rather than the individual components.
Tactically we all knew how Jose wants to play so I'm a bit confused why people complain after any game where we drop points. He's about as honest a manager as there is, despite being a horrible human and grumpy sod, about his system. If your gripe is with the tactics, you should be fully focused on Woodward, why appoint Jose in the first place?
Our failure and I suspect this is Woodward's fault given the Perisic/Willian stories from last/this season, is not addressing the RW (in particular) and LW issue that we have had for a long time. The Sanchez signing is an awful one so far and I wonder if that was a Woodward 'Galactico' signing ("let's get one up on Pep") or a player Mou really really wanted. I suspect the former. Mou has beaten Pep when backed properly at RM and we have been clearly improving year on year under him - the signings just haven't been right this summer and that was the chance to close the gap. Unless Sanchez suddenly rediscovers his form I can't see where some new impetus will come from, Rashford still seems too immature and wants to run it every single time, Martial hates Mou and Mata is a snail so shouldn't be out wide.
Our failure and I suspect this is Woodward's fault given the Perisic/Willian stories from last/this season, is not addressing the RW (in particular) and LW issue that we have had for a long time. The Sanchez signing is an awful one so far and I wonder if that was a Woodward 'Galactico' signing ("let's get one up on Pep") or a player Mou really really wanted. I suspect the former. Mou has beaten Pep when backed properly at RM and we have been clearly improving year on year under him - the signings just haven't been right this summer and that was the chance to close the gap. Unless Sanchez suddenly rediscovers his form I can't see where some new impetus will come from, Rashford still seems too immature and wants to run it every single time, Martial hates Mou and Mata is a snail so shouldn't be out wide.
I've one foot in the 'Jose out' camp I'm afriad.
While yesterday's performance can be partly attributed to.poor individual performances and a lack of transfer backing, there are some glaring long term issues that Jose has to take the blame for.
1. Mata at RW - The Mata threads provides a range of insight into why Mata is completely inappropriate as a RW and also how this is damaging the team. Jose keeps sticking with proven despite other options that although imperfect, are far better (Lingaard, Rashford, Sanchez and now possibly Perreira)
2. Tactics - We can potentially attribute the woeful defensive performance to an off day, but overall we still play with far to much caution and it's costing us. Barring some great De Gea saves last week, we could be down to 1 point and this broadly a continuation from last year where De Gea was the difference between 2nd and potentially 5th place. Also throw into the mix our abysmal and unstructured attacking play, then we have the outcome of a pragmatic team that is riding it's luck in getting so many points.
These tactics fall squarely at Jose's door and it is simply not good enough.
Finally there is now a 3rd major problem where it seems Jose is losing the dressing room through his man management. This may explain why so many players performed under par yesterday.
Individual players (Martial, Lideloff) and Woodward are of course issues, but I'm now finding major faults with the manager who is allowing the same issues to persist
While yesterday's performance can be partly attributed to.poor individual performances and a lack of transfer backing, there are some glaring long term issues that Jose has to take the blame for.
1. Mata at RW - The Mata threads provides a range of insight into why Mata is completely inappropriate as a RW and also how this is damaging the team. Jose keeps sticking with proven despite other options that although imperfect, are far better (Lingaard, Rashford, Sanchez and now possibly Perreira)
2. Tactics - We can potentially attribute the woeful defensive performance to an off day, but overall we still play with far to much caution and it's costing us. Barring some great De Gea saves last week, we could be down to 1 point and this broadly a continuation from last year where De Gea was the difference between 2nd and potentially 5th place. Also throw into the mix our abysmal and unstructured attacking play, then we have the outcome of a pragmatic team that is riding it's luck in getting so many points.
These tactics fall squarely at Jose's door and it is simply not good enough.
Finally there is now a 3rd major problem where it seems Jose is losing the dressing room through his man management. This may explain why so many players performed under par yesterday.
Individual players (Martial, Lideloff) and Woodward are of course issues, but I'm now finding major faults with the manager who is allowing the same issues to persist
Should have stuck with Moyes...
Lol
Lol
Difference is, Mourinho tactically hasn't evolved and opposition teams know how to play against him now. He doesn't have a plan B, as games like yesterday show. In fact it doesn't even look like he has a plan A anymore either judging by the way we play. His biggest strength in his other clubs was uniting his players and making them very disciplined (therefore hard to beat). This group of players play as if they are a bunch of strangers threw together and without any discipline at all. The total opposite. I was a huge fan of Jose pre-United, but I think he has to go now as the players are not responding to him.
Fekir deal failed because once the tests have shown he might experience knee issues in the future, they tried to lower the price bellow what has already been agreed.
Have to agree regarding Morinho's appointment. If the stories of a disagreement in the overall direction of the club exists between the manager and board are true it does make his appointment a bizarre one at best.
Not sure about Sanchez though. It has that Mourinho look to it, big money, player at his peak (allegedly) etc. Either way he seems to be clearly there for the pay packet, which is a shame.
To be fair I think Brighton were quite clever. United under Mourinho play deep and Brighton went right at you. Tactically i'm really surprised that you didn't play it long to Lukaku but you seemed to be stuck between playing deep and playing possession football. You ended up playing in the wrong areas basically.
The problem will occur if we start going downhill rapidly and staying firmly in mid-table. I think we should try and get ahead of that. Mourinho is not known to correct situations once he starts losing control. In fact, he's historically gone into full self destruct mode which is bad for us.
I personally don't think we can continue for the whole season like this. He can't inspire the players, so what's the point?
We need an interim whilst we sort ourselves out for the start of the next season imho.
That interim manager would just need to actually have some sort of plan and make us play cohesively. Brighton's manager did it with a far inferior team than ours, so I don't think we need anyone that great to do the job right now.
I just think, the longer this goes on, the worst the season will get.
I don't think I've seen a team in the premier league who are worse than Utd in possession of the ball. Every time we have the ball, I just feel that we are either going to give it away, or will be pressurised into silly mistakes. Having said that, I can't think of a team in the premier league who are worse than Utd without the ball. It seems who ever we play, they seem to have so much time on the ball and knock it around like fun. There is never any press, we just sit back and get dominated. All this brings anxiety and negativity through the the team and the supporters.
We keep taking about Utd should sign this player or that player, but it will make no difference to our play. Every player we sign, becomes a zombie and looks terrible. But at other clubs or their national sides they look world class. The cancer has spread through the club now and everyone needs to take a little bit of blame, like everyone at the club takes a little bit of praise when things are going well. They way I look at it is, which one man you can take out the club that will make the biggest change to Utd.....you don't have to be a rocket scientist to work that out.
We keep taking about Utd should sign this player or that player, but it will make no difference to our play. Every player we sign, becomes a zombie and looks terrible. But at other clubs or their national sides they look world class. The cancer has spread through the club now and everyone needs to take a little bit of blame, like everyone at the club takes a little bit of praise when things are going well. They way I look at it is, which one man you can take out the club that will make the biggest change to Utd.....you don't have to be a rocket scientist to work that out.
Yes but LFC did not go back to Lyon at all. Just walked away.
Now maybe this freed up cash to allow Alisson to happen but the only suggestion that this is case is the time line. Alison happened after withdrawing from the Fekir deal. However, it can also be argued that the Alison deal took longer (World Cup) and maybe Klopp wanted a look at Karius first.
I'd be the first to admit that we (City) have got a much better squad than United (particularly when looking at depth of squad), however your players are hardly a bunch of Sunday League plodders. You have got the players to go out and scare the opposition, in fact you should be able to do that before the game even kicks off (as in the Fergie era when teams were beaten when the fixture list came out!). However, your manager, for whatever reason (and I don't think it's lack of tactical awareness as he's proved in the past that he knows what he's doing) seems scared to do this. I really don't understand why this is the case.
You'll get top 4 this season fairly easily, but playing football that your fans hate, particularly after many years of being spoiled by the football served up under Ferguson. But... you'd also get top 4 easily enough by playing more attractive football. Like I've said above, I don't know why your manager is not prepared to do this.
You'll get top 4 this season fairly easily, but playing football that your fans hate, particularly after many years of being spoiled by the football served up under Ferguson. But... you'd also get top 4 easily enough by playing more attractive football. Like I've said above, I don't know why your manager is not prepared to do this.
Last edited:
I didn't want to have to say this so early, but I'm Mourinho out right now. The players seem to not give a feck right now. While the manager can't be blamed for all of that, he is the one that is supposed to be the person to organize them well and get them ready to play. Would anyone say that is what we look like right now? We look like headless chickens on the pitch. Disgraceful.
The fact he still plays Mata at RW is laughable. Add in his childishness in pressers and I say get rid of him.
The fact he still plays Mata at RW is laughable. Add in his childishness in pressers and I say get rid of him.
Spurs next monday, then Burnley and Watford away, not kidding I think we will come away from these 3 games with 1 point max. It was clear as daylight yesterday the team didn't bother to put in a shift for the manager and we all know how that will end up. I'm telling you right now if we get rid of him now there is still time to save the season but if we give him the whole season a 6-8th place finish is the best we will do. We have now reached a point where it's not even up for debate wether he should stay or go, the only question is who do we bring in?
We can't afford the next appointment to be another failure, we need someone with the right approach to the game, someone who puts focus on attack.
It's been 5 years now and every single manager we appointed had tactics and personalities that never suited a club like this. Just let the fact sink in that it's going to be 6 fecking seasons now that we havn't even been close to challenging for the league. I'm afraid with the Glazers and Woodward in charge it will be another 10 years without challenging for anything. There are serious fundamental and structural problems at this club and it starts from the owners down.
We can't afford the next appointment to be another failure, we need someone with the right approach to the game, someone who puts focus on attack.
It's been 5 years now and every single manager we appointed had tactics and personalities that never suited a club like this. Just let the fact sink in that it's going to be 6 fecking seasons now that we havn't even been close to challenging for the league. I'm afraid with the Glazers and Woodward in charge it will be another 10 years without challenging for anything. There are serious fundamental and structural problems at this club and it starts from the owners down.
Hasn't he supposedly said the players will be better when they get some confidence. Why do they not have confidence Jose|? Could that be your fault perchance?
I think the most disappointing thing about this is that right now if we'd stuck with Moyesy we'd be entering the final year of his six year plan.
- Status