If Murtough leaves United tomorrow, would any top club in europe be interested? No one would because he's a clown with no experience in the role. Probably a yes man. We can sack managers all we want, but we don't have football people around the club. We have a banker and Murough. I promise you the next manager they'll get after ETH will have a completely different playing style and will want half the squad gone. Rinse and repeat.
Manchester United name John Murtough as Football Director and Darren Fletcher as Technical Director
- Thread starter Tom Van Persie
- Start date
Jobs for the boys
Fixed.
I'll give a way to make Murtough job easier. Anytime ETH, scouts bring a name as a potential signing he should ask himself will Madrid, City, Bayern do this deal if the answer is yes go ahead.
For example will Madrid pay 70m and huge wages/ 4years contract for Casemiro at this stage in his career?
Will Bayern purchase Antony for 100m with the level he showed at Ajax?
Will City sign Weghorst even on a six month loan deal?
Do this clubs keep underperformers like Maguire around or do they find a way to get a deal done?
If he doesn't know how to run things he can at least learn from other clubs.
For example will Madrid pay 70m and huge wages/ 4years contract for Casemiro at this stage in his career?
Will Bayern purchase Antony for 100m with the level he showed at Ajax?
Will City sign Weghorst even on a six month loan deal?
Do this clubs keep underperformers like Maguire around or do they find a way to get a deal done?
If he doesn't know how to run things he can at least learn from other clubs.
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Maybe he has taken it one step further. He doesn't just think what will they do, he rings them up and asks their advice. "Of course we would John, sounds like a great deal" they say.
When we brought in ralf. He gave advice on who to hire and fire and has proven to be right. Why did we not listen.
does United no longer have a larger catalogue of scouts to try find players. Ten Haag seems to only sign players he knows.
does United no longer have a larger catalogue of scouts to try find players. Ten Haag seems to only sign players he knows.
The problem with us is that after a decade of unprecedented catastrophic failure of the football structure we then promote the same personnel within to revamp the system and refused to get someone in with proper track record.
This is the recipe for disaster to repeat itself again. We know what's going to happen next. ETH will be sacked and we will appoint a new manager again. After 2 years and half a billion spent, we will still play negative football. Rinse and repeat.
This is because we don't have long term football strategy and style of play. The blueprint must come from DOF.
This is the recipe for disaster to repeat itself again. We know what's going to happen next. ETH will be sacked and we will appoint a new manager again. After 2 years and half a billion spent, we will still play negative football. Rinse and repeat.
This is because we don't have long term football strategy and style of play. The blueprint must come from DOF.
Same mistake as before. We give complete control to the manager.
Having the manager decide if Rangnick should stay is silly. Rangnick has a very clear track record of establishing a good footballing structure at clubs. Just before he left, he recommended Luis Diaz, Alvarez, Enzo, Gvardiol and Nkunku - just those names is enough to show. SAF is gone, but we keep giving complete authority to managers who will never be him.
All of this is a distraction anyway. There is no point blaming Murtough - he is only doing his job. If he is doing it poorly, then it's up to the people above him to hold him accountable or find a replacement. All of this energy spent looking at the signings, the DOF, the manager, the technical director, the backroom staff, the medical team, the training complex, the stadium... it's all futile. It's all on the Glazers' heads.
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I just googled this and apparently it's an actual thing.
That's why I can't care about ETH's alleged mistakes and I find it completely stupid when pundits complain about him. They're missing the point. Really its the people above him who need to be replaced. Until they do, any manager is a band aid.
Iirc, United had a massive scouting department. I've no idea what they're used for though. It's like the person who should be hearing from them and managing them just doesn't exist and all their scouting reports are going to a spam folder somewhere.
Glazers, Arnold and Murtough (only Ed is gone) are still here and we expect the club to be run properly like a top football club? They have more than a decade to do that and failed catastrophically. I don't expect anything different from them, tbh.
Jobs for the lads.
DOF by title only. Put in place to appease fans, definitely nowhere near as active or as functional as the 'best in class' DOFs across the continent.
We're the only top club who gives their manager such a big say in personnel in 2023.
DOF by title only. Put in place to appease fans, definitely nowhere near as active or as functional as the 'best in class' DOFs across the continent.
We're the only top club who gives their manager such a big say in personnel in 2023.
Fecking disgrace. He should be kicked out of the club as soon as possible, hiring a donkey with Everton experience as director of football is an insult to the fans and the prestige of this great club. Buying Mount for 60m and rejecting 30m for Mctominay is one of the worse decisions in the history of football directors.
The reaction of the fan base towards Rangnick was appalling. The man knew what he was talking about and his assessment of this shambolic club was correct.
But because our squad is made up of petulant children who do as they please, and they treated him like a group of teens would treat a supply teacher, everyone just wrote him off as a shit coach who didn't have a clue what he was doing. Shameful really
The ones who haven't got a club what they're doing are those who are still employed by United
Like Rangnick said, open heart surgery.
They can go on Rangnick as much as they want, the reality is we are shit and nothing will change as long as we dont make the uncomfortable decisions. He said it what to do and really said it how it was, a mess, but we dismissed it and continued like before. Surprise
One of the reason why im not so convinced the man has no idea the depth he is actuallt at.
mate every week I understand more and more what rival supporters can’t stand us. I am convinced Jose mouton go would have won us a league by now with the right backing. He didn’t play the most attractive football but he got results.
in the first couple months of jaap stams career at United he was shocking he woulda got wrote off. Like evra, like vidic.
Fair fair fair too many of our fans play fifa and football manager and think it’s real life and never been in or around a football club in their lives
It's good to see this thread up here towards the top of the page. Finally people are seeing that this rot comes from the top. We have no clue how to recruit or organise this club and that comes from the top. No manager in the world and no player in the world can fix this because the club is rotten from the very top level.
Rejecting 30M for McT, not being able to sell Maguire, Bailly, VdB etc, overpaying on the loan fee for Amrabat just by being dicks, not getting a new CB the list goes on. This clown needs to be sacked asap.
To answer some of your questions:
Bayern wanted to sign McTomminay and signed the likes of Sabitzer.
And currently at Real, Hazard and previously Bale were stuck on insane contracts chilling on their bench and collecting a paycheck, like Maguire is doing right now and Sancho will most likely join him.
Not every team is ran perfectly. The problem isn't ETH. The problem is the lack of structure to support him and the player power that has infested our club. Absolutely no excuse for some of the rubbish we've been served or the basic fact that some of our stars aren't even arsed to track their runners and expose our midfield and defense.
We have a few problems and I am sure it’s true that we won’t get back to the very top and dominate again until the whole club is overhauled.
But. Do we really not have a better squad than Brighton? Our form and results since we won that cup have been pretty poor really. Do we really not have the resources to do better? Are the squad and manager overperforming or underperforming?
I’m happy to blame anyone you care to suggest. I just think we should be doing better. In time we will improve I’m sure but I wish we would immediately get our shit together enough to win more games than we lose.
I remember the hype surrounding murtough. He came with a bang with all those data analysts he hired. Quite frankly I wasn't impressed. First of all he lacked the cv to impress. Someone with little experience might shine at a club with a proper structure and with owners who want to succeed. United lack both. Secondly he was hired by Woodward ie a man with zero football knowledge who seem to only promoting mates and yes men. Finally murtough was here for a long time. I am sure that he had Woodward's ear throughput most of the time so either he shares part of Woodward's mistakes or he lack the persuading skills to positively nudge the club to the right direction
Time has passed since then. We are still unable to sell players, we still sign the manager's pets no matter what, we still go to gruesome preseason tours that destroy our team's fitness, nothing changed at Carrington since ronaldo left (first time round) and we still have multiple injury problems. At least we have some mean data analysts
Time has passed since then. We are still unable to sell players, we still sign the manager's pets no matter what, we still go to gruesome preseason tours that destroy our team's fitness, nothing changed at Carrington since ronaldo left (first time round) and we still have multiple injury problems. At least we have some mean data analysts
And that's a 90m blunder, imagine what 90m in the hands of a proper football man can do. Just doesn't deserve a sack, wish there was a way to sue him for professional misconduct.
People lapped it all up though, deluding themselves that things would change and people like Murtough had no accountability despite being here for years and the club telling us he had been helping with recruitment and rebuilding the recruitment team. They then lapped up the idea you can’t judge him because the recruitment department he helped build was so bad it needed to be rebuilt. They’ll lap up whatever the next excuses are when ETH gets the sack and the same people who have failed repeatedly get another chance.
If the club wanted a proper DOF they’d have got one, they went for Murtough because he has no power, no leverage and will do and say what he’s told or allowed to do. A proper DOF would be out the door within months because there’s no intention of running a football club.
The Glazers are parasites but these running the club on a daily basis are the main issue. Nowhere near the standard needed to run a top club properly.
They've had money, in fact we're the number one spenders in world football there's no excuse
They've had money, in fact we're the number one spenders in world football there's no excuse
The Glazers have put those people in charge knowing very well they lack the expertise to get the job done. Nobody expects club owners to be experts, but they need to get one thing right, hire the right people. A club like United should be hiring the best in class in all department. The Glazers were lucky to have Fergie and Gill, but since then they have failed to bring in any experts. Just bankers.
I was one of the few who was sceptical and I had a heated argument about it with possibly the nicest and most knowledgeable poster in here about it. My argument still stand. Murtough was a nobody who was hired and who was promoted by Woodward. It happened during a time when pressure was piling up on Woodward regarding him constantly involving himself on the football side . Now I had experiences working under control freaks and they don't relinquish power easily. If given the option then they will hire a doormat, with little knowledge about the role in question who will be too grateful and too ignorant to challenge the modus operandi. That's exactly what happened.
For the record I cannot see anything changing unless new owners (not SJR and his bike version of Arnold/Murtough) take over. The Glazers only care about money and wouldn't want competent football people to challenge them especially ones who don't rely on them for a job
Here's a breakdown of some of those staff making senior level decisions about the direction of the club.
Richard Arnold - CEO
An accountant with no experience working for a football club before being recruited by United. Internally promoted by his friend and previous CEO Ed Woodward, also an accountant with no prior sporting experience.
John Murtough - Director of Football
Experience in academy coaching and youth development at Everton before quickly joining United as Director of Development. Changed roles three times over ten years at the club before becoming DoF. Not a bad resume until you realise he's the most qualified member of the senior management.
Andy O'Boyle - Deputy DoF
Has spent the majority of his career as a strength and conditioning coach. Joined us as DDoF after working for the Premier League as Head of Elite performance - a project the organisation run to ensure young players have the appropriate physical development as they age.
Darren Fletcher - Technical Director
Assistant manager for eight months.
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Yes we have a new Director of Football Operations, in David Harrison, who has a lot of experience in the role from his time at Everton. But is that the standard that we should be looking to?
Richard Arnold - CEO
An accountant with no experience working for a football club before being recruited by United. Internally promoted by his friend and previous CEO Ed Woodward, also an accountant with no prior sporting experience.
John Murtough - Director of Football
Experience in academy coaching and youth development at Everton before quickly joining United as Director of Development. Changed roles three times over ten years at the club before becoming DoF. Not a bad resume until you realise he's the most qualified member of the senior management.
Andy O'Boyle - Deputy DoF
Has spent the majority of his career as a strength and conditioning coach. Joined us as DDoF after working for the Premier League as Head of Elite performance - a project the organisation run to ensure young players have the appropriate physical development as they age.
Darren Fletcher - Technical Director
Assistant manager for eight months.
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Yes we have a new Director of Football Operations, in David Harrison, who has a lot of experience in the role from his time at Everton. But is that the standard that we should be looking to?
Because it would mean very expensive changes to the club. Glazers are about as anti innovation as you can get because it cost a lot of money to actually bring in a competent DoF, build some kind of modern analytical database and retain the best scouts. Instead we probably pay Murtough and Fletcher what a couple to hundred grand a year in return for a cushty gig?
I had assumed when we brought Murtough in, given his background was heavily plugged into the England setup and developing players through from a younger level that we’d see a real focus on bringing in younger players. So far we’re just resetting to when LVG arrived, realised we basically had no scouting outside of well known players and picked guys he knew.
Do Arnold and Murtough have proof of the Glazers visits to Epstein island or something?
It's like we looked at Moyes tenure for lessons and decided the reason for the failure is that we didn't get enough Everton staff.
Yep 100%
Infact if they hired a proper best in class team of directors to run the club 10 years ago after SAF and Gill I doubt many would even care about the dividends considering we’d be challenging on the field.
I said years ago when there was a story we’d met Rangnick we would never appoint someone like that as DOF and we’d just give it to someone already at the club. That was what happened because the owners don’t want someone putting football first, they don’t want to give someone controls and authority or to call them out in public or walk away when they don’t.
They spent about 2 years looking for a DOF, supposedly met a lot of the top people and I think all they probably learnt from that was we don’t want anyone like that. I’m with you Murtough is a nobody who even if he was a genius would be pointless. But he’s happy to take the job knowing what it is and who can blame him, he’s massively over promoted and overpaid in a role where you can fail and your employers don’t really care as long as you get on with it.
We should support our manager but this is ridiculous, ETH is signing players that is not suitable for EPL and higher management sanction all the transfers. Where is the check and balance? Ridiculous!
Comes in, gives a manager with no history of spending £400m to spend over two summers. Allows the signings of Mount and Antony. Can’t agree a deal to get Maguire or other shite out of the club. If Ten Hag gets sacked these guys should be right behind them. They’ve got no idea what they’re doing and they’ll use the excuse that they backed the manager when he gets sacked and it all goes to shit just to save themselves from being accountable.
Wheres Unitedsofa to counter all this?
Careful people seem to hate Ralf for some reason. The guy came in spoke the truth, he recommended players like Julian alvarez and Enzo before they were popular.
If he had have stayed on as DOF we would be in a much better place right now. Instead Ten haag got rid of him and signed a load of players he knew which are nowhere near the standard required.
Yep, we also seem to have a lot of people who are "learning on the job". But who are they learning from, except other folk who are also learning on the job?
Can this be turned into John Murtough sack watch @Tom Van Persie
A proper DOF would be someone like Rangnick who is willing to speak the truth about football and prioritize football above all.
But as we can see from Rangnick case, he was considered too outspoken and didn't toe the party line. It was no surprise that he was sacked and there were plenty of excuses for his sacking. The truth was the club want someone like Murtough who don't rock the boat. Murtough was happy that his mates gave him multi-million job doing basically yes man roles.
If the DOF was too outspoken the people above him at the higher management and the board level may lose their jobs. Even the owners will be affected. Hence, all those unqualified higher management team especially Arnold would like someone who knows when to keep his mouth shut to protect them.
I have no doubt that if we let Rangnick continue his advisor roles or get in a proper DOF we can't be any worse than now. We spent almost half a billion and playing negative football like LVG, Ole, Jose and Moyes time.
But as we can see from Rangnick case, he was considered too outspoken and didn't toe the party line. It was no surprise that he was sacked and there were plenty of excuses for his sacking. The truth was the club want someone like Murtough who don't rock the boat. Murtough was happy that his mates gave him multi-million job doing basically yes man roles.
If the DOF was too outspoken the people above him at the higher management and the board level may lose their jobs. Even the owners will be affected. Hence, all those unqualified higher management team especially Arnold would like someone who knows when to keep his mouth shut to protect them.
I have no doubt that if we let Rangnick continue his advisor roles or get in a proper DOF we can't be any worse than now. We spent almost half a billion and playing negative football like LVG, Ole, Jose and Moyes time.
So people here have finally woken up to the fact that John Murtough, Manchester United FIRST EVER DoF is someone without proper experience, proper expertise, and proper networks, took you people this long eh? I have lost my faith in him in early 2022, when we had chance to sign the likes of Enzo Fernandes, Alexis McAllister, Julian Alvarez for pittance YET this man thought it would be wiser to wait for the next manager arrival first. It was obvious from that time that this man has no clue of how Director of Football supposed to work, what the jobdesk of DoF is. The fact that he's turned into ETH's lackey when he was supposed to be his direct superior says it all. SAD thing is that most United supporters across the board (not only on caf) failed to see this problem, only after we hit the iceberg that people have finally realised the fooly of this man.