Less troubled about who manages us, as I don't think the squad is anywhere near fighting for the title, and I think this season Champions League is unrealistic unless the other clubs around us have horrible seasons.
City, Arsenal & Liverpool are way ahead of us, and there can be made arguments for 2–4 others as well. I'd like to see us get a coach in who is good at helping young players develop, because that is what we need. If Ten Haag is trusted by the players to do that then I am happy to have him stay, if he is not then he obviously has to go.
Onana is offensively average from what I've seen. Absolutely nothing spectacular when we are attacked, but he's fine when we have the ball. An upgrade here, either through coaching or a transfer, is needed if we want to challenge.
Our backline is finally starting to look decent on paper, but it still has some weaknesses: Martinez can be targeted for his height, de Ligt & Maguire can be targeted for their pace, and Yoro requires time to develop. But the center is on paper good enough once everything else is in order.
Our wide defenders are in a better spot than they have been for a long time, but we are still in trouble when Shaw is out injured, which is something we can rely on happening a lot. Shaw+Malacia being injury prone & Amass still being too young to stake a claim makes it a troublesome to keep quality up through a season. To be short, we require a new, reliable left-back still. We can make due with our current options, but that isn't going to be enough.
Our midfield needs a lot of work, we're low on player numbers with experience in the midfield:
Mainoo looks a fantastic prospect, and I'm happy to have him go through the growing pains while we let the rest of the group mature.
Ugarte hopefully comes good, because Casemiro is done, and we require an alternative to Ugarte that has more experience than Collyer but is less done at the top level than Casemiro. An injury to either of Mainoo or Ugarte means we're largely fecked.
Mount, similar to Shaw, isn't someone we can rely upon staying healthy given his record so far with us. He has plenty of ankle injuries, but more worrying is that he missed 27 games due to injuries last season. It is entirely possible that he turns it around, but I wouldn't rely on him as a core player in an 11.
I personally think Rashford is done being a first-11 quality player, but I think he would be fine as a player coming off from the bench for a team challenging for the league title. Unfortunately, he is currently our senior attacker alongside Bruno and is supposed to be a key player. Instead, we are relying on Garnacho, who is simply too young for the role he has as an attacking carrier in the team. In a squad that is already close to its peak. But we're a squad that is 3–5 years away from our peak. In those 3–5 years, Bruno just won't do, regardless of if you think he is good enough now or not. The squad is built to be good to challenge when Bruno no longer is, so having him sign a new long-term contract is a bad idea in my opinion.
We're building something in a good direction, I feel, but we have to commit to it and be patient with our players' development.
Dalot (25) - De Ligt (25) - Yoro (18) -
Ugarte (23) - Mainoo (19)
Diallo (22) - Zirkzee (23)- Garnacho (20)
Højlund (21)
Also: Mazraoui (26), Collyer (20), Mount (25), Antony (24), Rashford (26)
Based on this, we still need a window of addressing the left-back+midfield options and a window addressing the attacking options, and that is if those changes work out. We also have to figure out a way to get saves from our GK or have another window looking for a GK and people to fill in squad roles that the current lot that don't live up to their talent should be doing. I would expect this season to just be for development, next season to be a fight for top 4, the season after to be about establishing ourselves as a top 4 team that is too good to fall out, and then we can talk about challenging. It doesn't matter if we spent 200 millions one summer and 200 another summer if they are failures. Failures need to be moved on from. People blaming the manager for playing 4-2-4 leaving a lackluster midfield with Casemiro exposed is absolutely fair criticism, people who expect us to be in the CL or challenging because of how much we have spent I feel are deluded into thinking money automatically gives success. We paid a lot of Sancho, he turned to sour shit. Accept it and move on knowing that we need to do better in the future, don't call him an 85 million euros player and expect the manager to get that sort of performance out of him, when we know he isn't anymore.
If we look 3–5 years into the future, Liverpool will possibly have to have replaced Alisson (31), Van Dijk (33), Trent Alexander Arnold (free transfer to real being rumored), Robertson (30) & Salah (32). That is a lot of their core performing players in need of replacing. It is entirely possibly they manage to deal with that situation, but there is also a chance that our developing group will overtake Liverpool by then.
Chelsea & Arsenal are in a better spot age-wise than Liverpool, and City will either not be in the league system or have plenty of money to reinvest to fix their aging core, and they will still have a few great players from the current squad.
As for manager names, I really don't know. I don't follow other leagues anymore, although I might get into the Bundesliga as it is on my subscription for the PL. But the profile is someone good at developing youth players, and protecting them from overbearing criticism.
apologies mate
