Jose Mourinho | 2017/18 Assessments | Poll Added

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Let me simplify things for you :

Jose took over when we finished 5th. He spent the 3rd most in the league after City and Chelsea. Hes won the Europa Cup, the Carling Cup and currently sits 2nd behind a side that has spent 150m EUR more than he has whilst still fighting for the FA Cup.


You don't do the above by being a reactive side all season. You don't do the above without improving the quality of the players you have. You don't do the above and have the "whole team struggling". It's a pile of dross to argue otherwise.

Well in that case we should have just kept LVG and kept giving him more money, we would have caught up eventually
 
Those arguying for Mourinho usually have no retort to this and would either take you on long tangents or resort to random expletives.

Yeah I gave up, I guess next season we'll just rank all the teams according to their spending and put that on the league table,no need bothering with the football.
 
Be nice if we could get a new poll to settle all this with just 2 choices.
Option 1) Full backing for Jose this summer, if it’s not working by December, then it’s time to assess other options.
Option 2) New manager at the end of this season.
 
I'm just confused. I don't get most Utd fans anymore, it's just incessant complaining. Jose has been our most successful manager since SAF left. In fact, he's arguably our most successful manager after only SAF and Sir Matt, and he's only been here 2 seasons. Yet on this board he can't manage players, doesn't know how to attack, doesn't give young players a chance, and plays boring football (averaging 2 goals a game is boring football?).

It's just so short sighted a view of football these days it's ludicrous. 2nd in the Prem, Semis of the FA Cup, knockout stages of the CL, reigning Europa League Champions, 2017 League cup winners, 2016 Community Shield Winners. That's the best it's been in 5 years. Hate on Jose all you want, but he's turned us around from where we were.
 
Trouble as well is he will say he does bring kids in. He has brought Scott in who is a kid, eternally grateful, someone who nobody really rated and does not have a personality who would go head to head with the manager. He wants robots, not players who have flair and a bit of edge to them. He even managed to irritate Ronaldo, one of the best players ever.
 
KDB was not world class when pep arrived christ he wasn't even world class last season, Silva has moments of magic but was not consistent, Aguero has had to change his work rate to get near pep's side as got dropped,

lets make this clear, when they both 1st arrived they finished on the same points, there 1st season they finished 9pts ahead of us, this season they are currently 16pts ahead of us, people need to realise we are getting further behind this city team, and quite frankly our football has been poor majority of the season AGAIN

Pep has changed what was needed, Jose has bought players because they were avaible even if he did not have a plan for them Pogba and Sanchez for example,

The evaluations of player quality seems different between you and I. Augero was the best striker in the league, Silva was always thought of as one of the best attacking midfielders in the league and KDB same. At the very least that trio would shit sideways on Rooney Depay Schweinstiger and Mata, which is what Mourinho inherited compared to Pep.

As for points tally looking at Pelegrini's last season is massively skewed. The team stopped playing since he announced he's leaving and it was an uncharacteristic fall (they were champions at the time and on great form up to his announcement that Pep will replace him). We still managed to finish below them, mind.

This season do you think Conte or Poch can do better if they were our manager? I doubt it given their quality of first XI is roughly the same as ours and they're behind us still.

Your example of Pogba is misguided. He had a plan to play Pogba the way we would want to see. It's a mixture of Pogba failing to build up consistency and a misfortune of long term midfield injuries that has stunted the plan Mourinho had.

As for Sanchez, best to discuss him last season. The plan is obviously for him to be our left winger and his consistency will come. Too early to write him off.
 
Facts are when both Pep and Jose came to take charge of their respective clubs, they found them on the same level points wise in the league. After 1 season jn charge Pep finished 9 points above Jose then the following season the gap widen to 16 points.

Do people seriously believe Jose has what it takes to overtake Pep? Throughout their whole carreer Pep has always had Jose numbers except the odd exceptions here and there.
 
Forget the money spent, or the style of play, the biggest difference between Pep and Mourinho in my eyes is that Pep will actually blame himself for his short-comings and wrong choices. He protects his players, at least publicly, instead of laying the blame at their feet like Mourinho always does.

I've said it before, but who on here actually believes that a coach who never blames himself resonates well with his players? Jose Mourinho is the Donald Trump of coaches, never blames himself for anything, it's always somebody else's fault, especially his players who he's in charge of getting the best out of and fails spectacularly at it.
 
Was being sarcastic, Jose fans thrown that around a lot
Sorry. I was just thinking about the hospitality side of United and what it if some firms who want to entertain clients from here and abroad just decide to switch to City because it will get them business. They may prefer better hospitality and their clients watching entertaining football. United are going to have to keep their eye on the ball on that side.
 
What will be the excuse when we are still witnessing shit on a stick football next season?

You are the most depressing poster on here. How do you even know what will happen next season? As @JPRouve states, more time could possibly help Mourinho in his bid to improve our football. I mean he's improved our results at the expense of our football, maybe next season he'll find the right balance?
 
I'm just confused. I don't get most Utd fans anymore, it's just incessant complaining. Jose has been our most successful manager since SAF left. In fact, he's arguably our most successful manager after only SAF and Sir Matt, and he's only been here 2 seasons. Yet on this board he can't manage players, doesn't know how to attack, doesn't give young players a chance, and plays boring football (averaging 2 goals a game is boring football?).

It's just so short sighted a view of football these days it's ludicrous. 2nd in the Prem, Semis of the FA Cup, knockout stages of the CL, reigning Europa League Champions, 2017 League cup winners, 2016 Community Shield Winners. That's the best it's been in 5 years. Hate on Jose all you want, but he's turned us around from where we were.

Seems like most posters like the soap opera more than they like the sport these days. Only thing I can think.
 
That is the price he had to pay, he needed fullbacks and went out and got the ones he wanted. I wish we had gone out and spent money on those fullbacks.

We were too busy fixing other areas tbf. Oh and we can't afford to spunk 200m on a back 5 over two windows.
 
You are the most depressing poster on here. How do you even know what will happen next season? As @JPRouve states, more time could possibly help Mourinho in his bid to improve our football. I mean he's improved our results at the expense of our football, maybe next season he'll find the right balance?

To be honest, I don't believe in that. Not because it's Mourinho or because I'm a pessimist but because in Football, managers are generally at their best around 40-55 years old, that's when they start winning consistently and still improve their skills. I have admired Mourinho and I have huge respect for Ancelotti but I'm pretty sure that they are both done and we already saw the best of both. I mention Ancelotti because in the past I have tried to convince people that he was the perfect candidate for United while I wasn't really sold on Mourinho, so my take isn't "anti-Mourinho", I just have a 2006-2007 Capello vibe with a handful of managers and they are among them.
 
I think he said he sees doing possibly seven years which is pretty long term. But it’s not the first time he has said that he wants to build something and it’s gone wrong, I just think it’s in his make up.
He does need better players next year which he will get a hefty transfer budget but I think the style won’t improve that much.
I was watching something of Utd in youtube from 2006. Try and imagine what that team would have looked like with these players....maybe they would have been a bit more organized, but I don't see these guys being any more exciting. IMO, Utd fans are spoiled from watching Ronaldo/Rooney/Tevez/RVP.
 
That is the price he had to pay, he needed fullbacks and went out and got the ones he wanted. I wish we had gone out and spent money on those fullbacks.
Oh yes, it's that simple, right? Yeah we could have signed 2 fullbacks but then still had Rooney up front and Carrick as DM. Do you think it would be better?
 
Facts are when both Pep and Jose came to take charge of their respective clubs, they found them on the same level points wise in the league. After 1 season jn charge Pep finished 9 points above Jose then the following season the gap widen to 16 points.

Do people seriously believe Jose has what it takes to overtake Pep? Throughout their whole carreer Pep has always had Jose numbers except the odd exceptions here and there.

Completely ignores the context of the two squads and the fact that City stopped playing under Pellegrini the year he left.

Our best outfield players were Mata, Rashford and Martial. A good player and two young players with zero experience. Our only top player was de Gea.

City had just spent £150 million on Sterling, de Bruyne and Otamendi the season before Pep arrived. On top of that they already had players like Aguero and Silva in their squad. On top of that Pep had outspent Jose anyway.

They had a squad which included players who had proven they could challenge for the league. Our league winners are in defence, two of which are ex wingers and the other two are Jones and Smalling who had the fortune of playing alongside world class defenders. Oh, and Carrick who was on his last legs, and is now retiring.

Whilst we had to replace Rooney with a major and expensive signing in Lukaku, Pep could focus in other areas because Aguero was already there. He could then spend on his defence.

Jose beat Pep’s Barca to a La Liga title. He also knocked Pep out of the CL and won it with Inter.

Not taking anything away from Pep, he has done a good job. But lets not pretend that it was a level playing field just because City failed in Pellegrini’s last year. They had finished 2nd and 1st the two years prior. I dont need to tell you where we were finishing.
 
Some contradictory stats here from football 365 that sums up our season and explains the weird mood around the club right now:

* Manchester United rank sixth in the season statistics for shots, shots on target, passes, touches, possession and pass completion.



* Manchester United (7) take fewer shots per game from inside the penalty area than Crystal Palace (7.1) and five other clubs.

* …but United do score twice as many penalty area goals (1.2) per game than Crystal Palace (0.6) and more than both Tottenham (1.1) and Chelsea (1) from the top six.



* Manchester United (5.3) take fewer shots per game from outside the penalty area than Newcastle United (5.6) and five other clubs.

* …but no team scores more goals per game (0.4) from outside the penalty area.



* Of the top six, only Manchester City (16%) have a better shot conversion rate than Manchester United (14.2%). That puts them way ahead of Chelsea (10.58%), Arsenal (11.76%) and Tottenham (11.8%).



* Anthony Martial has the best conversion rate (20.93%) among Manchester United’s top five scorers, ahead of Romelu Lukaku (18.75%), Jesse Lingard (16.66%), Marcus Rashford (11.76%) and Paul Pogba (8.33%).

* …but Martial has started fewer than half of United’s Premier League games this season.



* Paul Pogba has taken 61.7% of his shots from outside the penalty area this season.



* Top scorer Lukaku takes fewer shots per 90 (2.7) than Rashford (3.1), Pogba (3) and Martial (2.8).



* Only four clubs – Huddersfield Town, West Ham, Swansea and Everton – have taken fewer shots from set-piece situations this season.

* …but no other club scores more set-piece goals per game than Manchester United (0.4).



* Thirteen other Premier League clubs attempt more headed shots than Manchester United (1.8) per game.

* …but only Chelsea (0.5) and Arsenal (0.4) score more headed goals per game than United (0.3).



* No Premier League team creates fewer chances from Opta-defined ‘long passes’ per game than Manchester United (1.1).



* Only four teams – Newcastle United, Huddersfield Town, Swansea and Arsenal – create fewer chances per game from crosses than United (2.0).



* No team creates fewer chances per game direct from corners than Manchester United (0.4).



* United have scored just one goal directly from a corner all season – in August when Marcus Rashford volleyed home Henrikh Mkhitaryan’s corner.



* Manchester United’s ‘key pass per 90’ leader is still Henrikh Mkhitaryan with 2.7. Next comes Juan Mata with 2.3.



* Only Burnley (23.8) and Bournemouth (22.8) attempt fewer tackles per game than Manchester United (24.2).

* …but only six clubs have committed more fouls this season.



* Manchester United allow more shots per game (11.8) than seven other Premier League teams, including Watford (11.1) and Huddersfield Town (11.4).

* …but only Manchester City have conceded fewer goals this season.

* … because David De Gea has the highest save percentage rate in the Premier League this season with 79.7%.



* Manchester United spend an average of 27% of their Premier League matches in their own third of the pitch – equal to the record of Huddersfield, Chelsea, Watford and Southampton. For comparison, Manchester City spend 22% of their matches in their own third.



* Alexis Sanchez has been dispossessed (tackled by an opponent without attempting to dribble past them) more times in nine appearances (29) than Marcus Rashford (24), Juan Mata (19) and Jesse Lingard (14) all season.



* Alexis Sanchez has lost the ball with a poor touch more times in nine appearances (25) than Juan Mata (22) all season.



* Manchester United are second in the Premier League.
 
I was watching something of Utd in youtube from 2006. Try and imagine what that team would have looked like with these players....maybe they would have been a bit more organized, but I don't see these guys being any more exciting. IMO, Utd fans are spoiled from watching Ronaldo/Rooney/Tevez/RVP.

What is wrong with expecting that class of player at United. Think some fans have forgotten what this club is about regarding style. Jose promised to adhere to that. He has one more season to do it.
 
What will be the excuse when we are still witnessing shit on a stick football next season?

The problem is you are looking for an excuse when there isn't one. Anyone with common sense knows Mourinho doesn't play expansive football; he's hired to win trophies.

If we win the league or CL next season you will have the exact same 'problems' with him. It happened at Chelsea when they won the league, their second half of the season was grinding out wins with defensive football. It happened at Madrid, where Madrid fans complained just like us about how we did not play on the front foot enough, and there was no fluidity in the attack. Inter Milan wasn't a problem because Italians are a bit different as fans and are used to defensive football.

The only team that played entertaining football in almost every game was his first Chelsea side. His Porto side were very defensive as well.
 
What a tragic response :lol:

Keep telling yourself swapping Matic for Herrera has not improved us.

Nemanja Matic is very good footballer,but this notion that he has been head and shoulders above the rest of the midfield is ludicrous, there was a point in December were he was so bad it cost the team points. but at no point during this run was he in danger of losing his place. where as Ander Herrera ( Our player of the season, in a season were we pick up silverware) will be drop or pulled after average display.

if you don't think Matic has been just as guilt has the rest of the team when it comes to putting in bad performances. You and I have not been watch the same team this season.

jumping over 4 teams isn't significant? ok. we were 17 pts off Spurs last season, well off Chelsea and well off Liverpool and Arsenal. we have overtaken them all but you have seen no great improvement. Then what off those clubs behind us who have seem to have gone backwards? why so much praise and contentment of our rivals?

I have never praise our rivals, I honestly do not give a flying toss what any of those clubs do, my problem is with Jose and his treatment of our players and this narrative that he has done well given what he has to work with. we have a very good squad of player, we have extremely gifted attacking player, we did not lose to the Bitters because they spent more money, we lost the title because Pep was better able to utilize the players at his disposal.

P.S.
I do not think we have had poor season, I just find Jose's reasoning and excuses for why we don't win certain games very exasperating.
 
To be honest, I don't believe in that. Not because it's Mourinho or because I'm a pessimist but because in Football, managers are generally at their best around 40-55 years old, that's when they start winning consistently and still improve their skills. I have admired Mourinho and I have huge respect for Ancelotti but I'm pretty sure that they are both done and we already saw the best of both. I mention Ancelotti because in the past I have tried to convince people that he was the perfect candidate for United while I wasn't really sold on Mourinho, so my take isn't "anti-Mourinho", I just have a 2006-2007 Capello vibe with a handful of managers and they are among them.

Which is fine, at least you're not constantly flooding this place with depressing nonsense.

To be honest, I have lost a little faith in Jose, the Sevilla, Brighton and WBA games were beyond garbage, but not enough to completely dismiss the improvements he's made. And, I still have enough belief in him and the quality of our team to improve further next season and challenge for the league. Time will tell, although, if we produce a few more shit shows over the next few weeks, I may have to change my opinion.
 
Oh yes, it's that simple, right? Yeah we could have signed 2 fullbacks but then still had Rooney up front and Carrick as DM. Do you think it would be better?
Of course it isn't that simple, but we have known Valencia is a problem for a couple of season, yet have done nothing, that Jose does not rate Shaw, no matter what he says, otherwise he would be playing. Hopefully the penny has now dropped and he will do something about it. He got rid of Rooney for which we should all be grateful, however he has signed Pogba and Sanchez, who under normal circumstances would be fantastic signings, if the manager actually played to their strengths or knew how to build a team round them. The summer will tell us a lot. If he is changing his colours and we go more attacking then fair play to him. If if is more of the same then unless we overhaul City or get mighty close he will find more fans turning on him.
 
Nemanja Matic is very good footballer,but this notion that he has been head and shoulders above the rest of the midfield is ludicrous, there was a point in December were he was so bad it cost the team points. but at no point during this run was he in danger of losing his place. where as Ander Herrera ( Our player of the season, in a season were we pick up silverware) will be drop or pulled after average display.

if you don't think Matic has been just as guilt has the rest of the team when it comes to putting in bad performances. You and I have not been watch the same team this season.

You’re going around in circles trying to justify yourself. Matic is an improvement on Herrera. End of.
 
What is wrong with expecting that class of player at United. Think some fans have forgotten what this club is about regarding style. Jose promised to adhere to that. He has one more season to do it.
Jose doesn't have a lab in the back room to build players out of clay, so far as I know. Ronaldo-type players come along every what? 40 years? Ditto with Rooney -- local lad, top scorer for Man Utd. Probably there are Tevez' to be had, I expect Suarez would look pretty good playing with a 26 year old Ronaldo & Rooney in front of him, no matter what Mourinho did.
Otherwise, you have to do what what Mourinho is doing, bring in quality players and work thru getting them to gel on the field. Takes time.
 
Just reading through this thread and I’m genuinely shocked that there are United fans who want Mourinho sacked.

You’re second in a league where the team at the top is having a freakishly strong season and you have a chance of winning your third trophy in two seasons.

I don’t understand what the people wanting Mourinho to go are hoping for. Is it just about playing attractive football like City/Liverpool do?
Of course you don't mind where United are, meanwhile your team is going to the CL final and have a good shot at overtaking us on the table despite the money spent. To make it all worse all our young players are reported to want to jump ship and the dull football hasn't delivered in games that mattered the most. It was supposed to be dull but effective
 
Just reading through this thread and I’m genuinely shocked that there are United fans who want Mourinho sacked.

You’re second in a league where the team at the top is having a freakishly strong season and you have a chance of winning your third trophy in two seasons.

I don’t understand what the people wanting Mourinho to go are hoping for. Is it just about playing attractive football like City/Liverpool do?


I think the recent loss at home to bottom of the table West Brom has sparked it all off again. It completely killed the fans momentum after the City game.
 
It’s a slightly bizarre position. If you’d told me at the start of the season that we would be relatively comfortably second and in the SF of the FA Cup I’d have been more than satisfied.

However, having watched how we actually play, I am concerned despite the league position. We’ve had some big wins against the big teams but they have been very backs to the wall - the Arsenal and City wins where they had 70%+ possession and 50 odd shots in total particularly. We’ve also looked slow and lacking creativity quite often in smaller matches, even where we’ve ultimately picked up 3 points. Our top players don’t seem to really gel and I’d struggle to name our best team. Realistically, of the likely top 4, we are by far the worst to watch.

I wouldn’t be in favour of sacking Mourinho but i think he needs to get it right this Summer. Sorting out the fullbacks and midfield are the priority. Hopefully, he can then start to play decent football - even if he’s always going to be relatively defensive, I don’t think even Jose wants to play in the current style ideally.
 
Facts are when both Pep and Jose came to take charge of their respective clubs, they found them on the same level points wise in the league. After 1 season jn charge Pep finished 9 points above Jose then the following season the gap widen to 16 points.

Do people seriously believe Jose has what it takes to overtake Pep? Throughout their whole carreer Pep has always had Jose numbers except the odd exceptions here and there.

Pep walked in a far more capable squad though in fairness, He already had the core of his team in place, Aguero, Silva, De Bruyne Fernandinho .. Jose came into a core of Smalling Fellaini and Rooney , he had far more rebuilding to do than Pep .. Worse case scenario after both their 24 months in Manchester is that they'll end up with 2 trophies each. Hopefully it will be 3-2 to Jose..

Granted, Pep has improved a lot more players individually and at the minute they look a far better coached team than us but there has been huge improvements from us this season.. We've beaten Chelsea Liverpool and City in the last 2 months.. Europe was disappointing but this team and Jose will learn from that, Pep went out in the last 16 to a massive underdog in his first season at City too..

Next season is big for United, we now have the core that we were lacking when Jose first came.. Bailly, Pogba, Matic, Sanchez, Lukaku.. If we can improve certain areas in the summer, and more importantly, get some sort of cohesiveness in the team, we'l be challenging for the big trophies next year.. This season could prove to be a big learning curve and step for this team.
 
You’re going around in circles trying to justify yourself. Matic is an improvement on Herrera. End of.

We are going to disagree on that no matter what either of us say. But my initial point wasn't to debate the merits of Matic vs Herrera, I was trying to point out that Jose doesn't choose to bring play or bring on based on performance, rather players he has annotated the right man for the job will stay on or get selected regardless of how poor they perform. just look at the West Brom game.
 
* Alexis Sanchez has been dispossessed (tackled by an opponent without attempting to dribble past them) more times in nine appearances (29) than Marcus Rashford (24), Juan Mata (19) and Jesse Lingard (14) all season.



* Alexis Sanchez has lost the ball with a poor touch more times in nine appearances (25) than Juan Mata (22) all season.
Are these really true? And we are wasting RAshford and Martial for this shite.
 
Of course you don't mind where United are, meanwhile your team is going to the CL final and have a good shot at overtaking us on the table despite the money spent. To make it all worse all our young players are reported to want to jump ship and the dull football hasn't delivered in games that mattered the most. It was supposed to be dull but effective
You’re ahead of us in the league and probably have a better chance of winning a trophy than we do.

If you win the FA Cup and finish second whilst we win nothing and finish third, are you really going to care that we play better football?
 
Touched upon it slightly in the Pogba thread, but one major thing that is annoying me about Jose is that he seems to be letting the players travel all across the world inbetween games. Surely that isn't good for squad harmony or for actually trying to improve tactics on the training ground. After every game you see the likes of Lukaku, Pogba, Lindelof (basically all those with Instagram) travelling to America etc. For example after leg 1 against Sevilla (a bad result), Lukaku was right onto a plane to the US to sign with Jay-Z's sports agency. Just seems like the players are running amok.
 
I think the recent loss at home to bottom of the table West Brom has sparked it all off again. It completely killed the fans momentum after the City game.

The same thing happened after the Sevilla game. We'd just beaten Chelsea and Liverpool, as well as coming back from 2 down against Palace, then put in one of the worst European performances in living memory. The Sevilla and Brom games seem to sink in much harder as it's the manner of the defeats, and they've been difficult to get over mentally as a fan.

We could conceivably finish 2nd with our highest points total in a long time and also win the FA Cup, but I can also see us finishing the season 4th and without a trophy.

I don't think I've ever felt so pessimistic about the club. Most of it is most likely a buildup from Moyes and LvG rather than Mourinho, but there's been too many failed signings, and now supposedly Martial/Pogba might leave, Madrid will probably come in for DDG again, and the football has been so disheartening at times.

We could keep all those players and/or have a great summer with our incoming transfers, but for some reason I would still feel very pessimistic about next season. Something just feels a bit broken about United at the moment.

It's a weird juxtaposition to be in considering what you may think if you just looked at the league table and the players/manager we have.
 
Some contradictory stats here from football 365 that sums up our season and explains the weird mood around the club right now:
Some of these are super weird. Best in goals from headers, yet utterly shit at creating something from corners and crosses? Apparently the corner takers and crossers must suck.
 
Some of these are super weird. Best in goals from headers, yet utterly shit at creating something from corners and crosses? Apparently the corner takers and crossers must suck.

They do, I think Daley Blind is the only one who is half decent at corners.
 
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