[Pass and Move]

He'll rotate in but long term I can see him really making his claim as one of the 2 #10's. In Amorims system it really seems like those 2 need to be very press resistant and good in small spaces.

I agree, he would be great as one of the 10s in this system.

 

[Raven]

I think, without disputing that we were too open last season and that we had obvious issues in tighting up midfield in the majority if games, that your argumentation here is too simplistic to make use of.

After all, the truth is also that we played quite a lot of games under Ten Hag with more defensive control as well. Many of these were in the season Mainoo didn’t play. Some of them had tactics more similar to what we now saw under Van Nistelrooy, with more compressed team, fewer comitted forward in the high press, and a more conservative pivot.

Also, most of us have really only seen Mainoo play magnificent football under two managers, both much maligned, incidentally. If they have exposed him, they are also the ones who has allowed him to shine. To the degree were many think of him as one of the worlds most promising teenagers.

The argumant that Ten Hag was a lunatic and nothing from his reign can tell you about a players capabilities, simplify things as to be completely black and white, and obviously wrong too.

Mainoo is my favorite United player atm personally, yet I eon’t be surprised if he will have a few seasons in and out of the first eleven now. He has enormous potential, but it has to be eked out, and he has skills already top notch, but is inexperienced in how to make the most of them. His weaknesses will tend to leave a team exposed while he learns, defensive awareness and positioning are two of them for me, foresight and in gameplay and hunger for dictating things two other things to develop.

Garnacho is in a similar position, whereas Mainoo has better allround technique, overview and strength, Garnacho has a seemingly immense hunger and confidence to me will ensure that he will develop his game one way or another.

I agree that Mainoo shouldn't be playing as much as he has been this past year and that he has areas of his game that require improvement. My issue is with the insinuation that he was the problem with ETH's system when a blind man could see that ETH was the problem.

 

[Glorio]

Which has been much less of an issue when he's partnered with Ugarte. I like Ruud but I think it's more likely that this change in personnel has closed down those gaps in midfield than a radical overhaul of our tactical approach. A tactical approach he was involved in throughout the season.

In addition to the personnel, I suspect Ruud definitely had something to do with it. After our horrible first half against PAOK I think it was, Ruud made it a point to say he insisted that the players had to stay in their set positions as they kept vacating them which meant our shape was all over the place. Notice Bruno in particular (while not part of the 2 we're talking about), his upturn in goal scoring form has come from him not trying to do everyone's job all over the pitch but keeping his position.

Also - Ugarte and Casemiro are never far from each other, that feels tactical to me. I reckon Kobbie will flourish even if we may lose some solidity

 

[romufc]

I agree that Mainoo shouldn't be playing as much as he has been this past year and that he has areas of his game that require improvement. My issue is with the insinuation that he was the problem with ETH's system when a blind man could see that ETH was the problem.

The thing is sometimes, the system can make a player look so bad, which ETH's system did, sometimes you look at the player and think.. wow you have been crap. Only once you re-watch it you will know that its more a tactical thing, in game we are all emotional and get carried away.

ETH deployed a weird system high press, low block which left our midfield 2 exposed as we played a 4-2-4. What I did notice under Ten Hag is the urgency to defend or get back wasn't there.

I watched Liverpool V Brighton and I saw Diaz who was playing CF run back and make a tackle in the penalty area.

 

[DRJosh]

The hype train has long gone but let’s hope he thrives under the new manager

 

[dubplate warrior]

I wouldn't use last years midfield as as yardstick for this season. Ten Hag made out players actively look worse and exposed.

You can never be sure but from what I can see Amorim plays with two inverted 10s who are good at dribbling and press resistance. To me that seems a lot like Mainoo and Amad.

In the long run I wouldn't be surprised if Bruno is gradually phased out of the team.

 

[Grande]

I agree that Mainoo shouldn't be playing as much as he has been this past year and that he has areas of his game that require improvement. My issue is with the insinuation that he was the problem with ETH's system when a blind man could see that ETH was the problem.

No doubt Ten Hag bears the brunt of the responsibility. I would say it takes a very strange person or even a madman to say that Mainoo was The Problem, don’t know if anyone has? Rather, all our players have several resources and several issues, and Ten Hag’s issue was that he couldn’t set us up in a way that over time got the most out of the players strengths and covered up most of their weaknesses. So any problem Mainoo had, due to positional inexperience for instance, became Uniteds problem because Ten Hag couldn’t set the team up and get them to play right.

For me, it seemed clear at the times we were most dough-nutty that Casemiro saw dangers that he couldn’t reach to snuff out and sometimes even gave up on, whereas Mainoo often would move around but taking wrong decisions and positions, and didn’t snuff dangers that he could have reached, sometimes putting Casemiro, McTominay or Amrabat in dire straits that could make them look worse. This was of course compounded by injuries, but I’m quite certain that a 28 year old Mainoo with due development would have helped that midfield to get opened up a bit less often than the 19 y.o. version could. All this in the end came under Ten Hag’s responsibility, and even if he managed to make us a lot less open in midfield this season, helping Casemiro par excellance to look better/less bad, it came all the while not scoring enough, still being able to collapse for parts of games, and looking unable to get the players to believe in it to the point where they looked lethargic or desperate. All this was Ten Hag’s plate to deal with, and he couldn’t, so he’s gone.

What remains is for instance a midfield with a combination of experience, technique, grit, but also with holes in terms of speed, creativity, were you always have to sacrifice one strength if you want to cover up another weakness. Van Nistelrooys solution was to make the team more cautious, more focussed on staying close, taking less risks in midfield. At home, against so-so opposition, we have been more effective (honeymoon joy effect?) and have seen less of the collapse periods than we have earlier in the season, but it hasn’t really looked any better to me in terms of playing strength. There are issues in balancing the squad still, I think. Now it’s Amorim’s job. Mainoo has some beautiful tools that can come of use already, but I think he also have some weaknesses to his game still that makes it less than 100% certain he will be first choice as often as he was under Ten Hag.

 

[Valencia Shin Crosses]

No doubt Ten Hag bears the brunt of the responsibility. I would say it takes a very strange person or even a madman to say that Mainoo was The Problem, don’t know if anyone has? Rather, all our players have several resources and several issues, and Ten Hag’s issue was that he couldn’t set us up in a way that over time got the most out of the players strengths and covered up most of their weaknesses. So any problem Mainoo had, due to positional inexperience for instance, became Uniteds problem because Ten Hag couldn’t set the team up and get them to play right.

For me, it seemed clear at the times we were most dough-nutty that Casemiro saw dangers that he couldn’t reach to snuff out and sometimes even gave up on, whereas Mainoo often would move around but taking wrong decisions and positions, and didn’t snuff dangers that he could have reached, sometimes putting Casemiro, McTominay or Amrabat in dire straits that could make them look worse. This was of course compounded by injuries, but I’m quite certain that a 28 year old Mainoo with due development would have helped that midfield to get opened up a bit less often than the 19 y.o. version could. All this in the end came under Ten Hag’s responsibility, and even if he managed to make us a lot less open in midfield this season, helping Casemiro par excellance to look better/less bad, it came all the while not scoring enough, still being able to collapse for parts of games, and looking unable to get the players to believe in it to the point where they looked lethargic or desperate. All this was Ten Hag’s plate to deal with, and he couldn’t, so he’s gone.

What remains is for instance a midfield with a combination of experience, technique, grit, but also with holes in terms of speed, creativity, were you always have to sacrifice one strength if you want to cover up another weakness. Van Nistelrooys solution was to make the team more cautious, more focussed on staying close, taking less risks in midfield. At home, against so-so opposition, we have been more effective (honeymoon joy effect?) and have seen less of the collapse periods than we have earlier in the season, but it hasn’t really looked any better to me in terms of playing strength. There are issues in balancing the squad still, I think. Now it’s Amorim’s job. Mainoo has some beautiful tools that can come of use already, but I think he also have some weaknesses to his game still that makes it less than 100% certain he will be first choice as often as he was under Ten Hag.

I also just think no midfielder in the world would have looked great in the style we played last season. A high pressing 4-2-4 where your fullbacks aren't closing the spaces high up the pitch and the midfield 2 is asked to man mark is basically impossible to consistently succeed with even if you had prime Kante in the middle.

Like I said before, if Mainoo can improve his passing range and up the creativity/penetration when distributing the ball, it won't matter how he develops physically because he'll be an elite asset even if he's always on the slower side. I'd rather him focus on that than do more cardio sessions so that he can press for 95 minutes and cover endless ground twice a week if it's a choice between the two. Of course if he gets taller/quicker/stronger AND improves his passing then you have a World XI candidate but expecting all of those to happen for any young player is just wishful thinking I think.

 

[Crimson King]

I agree, he would be great as one of the 10s in this system.

It feels like we automatically want to do this with any midfielder that has lots of ability and won't simply end up as a useful midfield yard eater. Look at Bellingham; did great at Dortmund in a deeper, more diverse, midfield role, but now he's #10, or even plays up front from time to time!

Mainoo has the ability to positively affect possession and build up in every 3rd of the pitch, so long term we should look to develop him as a pure CM/#8, whatever Football Manager influenced moniker you prefer. He might well play further up the pitch while he's still young and we have more suitable players to play deeper, but long term we should be grooming him to be more than that. I want him to be the next Modric, if possible, not another Morgan Rogers.

Not every young midfielder needs to be turned into a #10.

 

[Pass and Move]

It feels like we automatically want to do this with any midfielder that has lots of ability and won't simply end up as a useful midfield yard eater. Look at Bellingham; did great at Dortmund in a deeper, more diverse, midfield role, but now he's #10, or even plays up front from time to time!

Mainoo has the ability to positively affect possession and build up in every 3rd of the pitch, so long term we should look to develop him as a pure CM/#8, whatever Football Manager influenced moniker you prefer. He might well play further up the pitch while he's still young and we have more suitable players to play deeper, but long term we should be grooming him to be more than that. I want him to be the next Modric, if possible, not another Morgan Rogers.

Not every young midfielder needs to be turned into a #10.

In this system he’s not really playing as a traditional 10 though, he’s more like a very advanced 8. Most of these formations are meaningless on paper, you could easily describe Amorim’s set-up as a box midfield with a lone striker ahead and then nobody would ‘complain’ he’s a number 10

Also, the reason you might want such a technical player deeper than that in an 8/6 role is so that he can receive the ball under pressure and play progressive passes from deep, however Amorim’s system often relies on that pass from defence going past the deepest midfielders to those ‘10s’ which is where Mainoo’s skills would be ideal.

 

[Raven]

It feels like we automatically want to do this with any midfielder that has lots of ability and won't simply end up as a useful midfield yard eater. Look at Bellingham; did great at Dortmund in a deeper, more diverse, midfield role, but now he's #10, or even plays up front from time to time!

Mainoo has the ability to positively affect possession and build up in every 3rd of the pitch, so long term we should look to develop him as a pure CM/#8, whatever Football Manager influenced moniker you prefer. He might well play further up the pitch while he's still young and we have more suitable players to play deeper, but long term we should be grooming him to be more than that. I want him to be the next Modric, if possible, not another Morgan Rogers.

Not every young midfielder needs to be turned into a #10.

Couldn't agree with this more.