[Rojofiam]

Well we kind of did because Urgate brings that.

Ugarte doesn't have the legs to cover.

 

[erikcred]

For all the doom mongering, we’re only 4 points behind City, albeit playing 1 more game.

We've definitely got the momentum to overtake them if they have a another couple of bad weeks.

Arsenal must be very worried now.

 

[VivaJesperBlomqvist]

Everton are going to get absolutely bummed to death over the Christmas period it's a must win against wolves midweek for them.

Sounds like a good time

 

[Scanny]

Cmon lets not act like hes not been the worst player from a bunch of bad form players in the last year and a half. We know his ceiling is world class, we want consistency at the top

I was specifically picking up on criticism of his game today.

 

[RedDevilRoshi]

That will do very nicely. Far from the finished product but moving forward in the right direction under Amorim

 

[VivaJesperBlomqvist]

I missed our best game in years havent i? I have half a mind to go home and watch it to enjoy this.

Watch from the first goal. Astonishing performance after a drab 20 mins.

 

[Scanny]

All he has to do is be consistent.

I was specifically commenting on criticism of his performance today.

 

[Hester_manc]

Prediction: Before New Year´s Eve Everton will be among bottom 3 in the PL.

​

 

[Exiled_Red]

I love Amad. I really do. He’s young and will improve. His decision making with the pass MUST improve. I don’t mean final third. He’s amazing there. I mean when he plays deeper.

As for Bruno, I think he’s too frivolous in possession phases. He's always going for the wonder pass in transition when sometimes you need the sensible pass. He too must improve. But at his age I don’t see that happening. I love Bruno in an AM role in a back 4 formation. Not a fan in a possession based back 5 formation.

I think you need players like Bruno, especially in a team so sparse in creative players, but you have to give them protection and cover so they dont hurt the team. And you can only have one in the 11 at a time. He just needs to get better and picking when to play the Hollywood pass and when to keep possession.

I agree that this formation doesn't suit him that well currently, but I think having Amad at RWB actually helps him a lot. They play well off each other. If Amad is going to stay in this wide role, we badly need to address the other flank because as it stands all our threat comes from the right. We clearly need to dip into the market to sort out the LWB position and possibly the left 10 position. I still think Garna needs to be a guy coming off the bench until he develops some consistency.

 

[Steve Bruce]

There is something to be said about learning from past mistakes.

And no one on this forum or in the fan base has any say in whether the same mistake is made again or not. It's up to the glazers and INEOS to not make the mistakes a second time

 

[Pavl3n]

Yeah... I thought it will be Rashford leading the line instead of Zirkzee and I was right I suppose.

 

[santeria13]

Mainoo and Licha out of Arsenal game. That’s a guaranteed loss.

Both of them were amongst our worse players today. Not saying that will continue but they aren't exactly in great form.

 

[Wing Attack Plan R]

ZZ is absolutely mint in the middle

He's top. ZZ Top top player.

 

[Wing Attack Plan R]

7.3 for Rashford, with 2 goals in this match. So I guess a hat trick would push his rating up to 8. 5 goals for a 10?

 

[Northumberland Red]

7.3 for Rashford, with 2 goals in this match. So I guess a hat trick would push his rating up to 8. 5 goals for a 10?

Best player on the pitch was Amad ( once again )
I’m delighted he’s doing well for you after the magnificent loan to Sunderland-wish him and you continued success
Was hoping he may “ flop” so we could get him back on loan-no chance now .
Great player and all the best to him and you ( under your new boss )

 

[NLunited]

Best player on the pitch was Amad ( once again )
I’m delighted he’s doing well for you after the magnificent loan to Sunderland-wish him and you continued success
Was hoping he may “ flop” so we could get him back on loan-no chance now .
Great player and all the best to him and you ( under your new boss )

Thanks. He has gotten better steadily since he came back from injury. Class player.

 

[lex talionis]

And no one on this forum or in the fan base has any say in whether the same mistake is made again or not. It's up to the glazers and INEOS to not make the mistakes a second time

Yes, it is literally true that nothing that we write on this forum will have any impact on how the team or any individual player performs. Every comment on his well Amad played, or how poorly someone else played, or any comment of any kind here in one sense is completely irrelevant to the players and management. Given this, should we therefore close down this forum? Or should we observe and comment, flawed as we all are, what we see and we believe will improve the performances of the squad, even in the knowledge that what we write here is no interest to everyone associated with the club?

The latter is why we are all here, to pitch in as best we can, even knowing that club management does not look to the caf for guidance on how the club should be run.

 

[Steve Bruce]

Yes, it is literally true that nothing that we write on this forum will have any impact on how the team or any individual player performs. Every comment on his well Amad played, or how poorly someone else played, or any comment of any kind here in one sense is completely irrelevant to the players and management. Given this, should we therefore close down this forum? Or should we observe and comment, flawed as we all are, what we see and we believe will improve the performances of the squad, even in the knowledge that what we write here is no interest to everyone associated with the club?

The latter is why we are all here, to pitch in as best we can, even knowing that club management does not look to the caf for guidance on how the club should be run.

You're misinterpreting my post.

I'm not saying don't comment or have an opinion because it makes no difference to the club. If that was what I meant then as you said we might as well shut everything down.

I was replying to the 'learn from our past mistakes'

This makes no sense to you and me learning or not from past mistakes made at boardroom level because we're not in any place of influence. We need ineos and glazers to learn from these mistakes. We are just observers.

My whole point in this discussion is what is the point in bringing ETH up at every turn to either support or hate on him? He's in the rear view mirror, he is of no consequence to United going forward and I just see it as a pointless divisive point scoring that isn't constructive in any way.

I think if people would use their efforts in hating/supporting ETH towards backing the man that matters today Amorim it would make for a better forum rather than every thread being polluted with BS about ETH one way or another

 

[leeroyTX]

This was a fun game to watch. Thought, overall, we played well in all phases for most of the game. My only 2 criticisims were early on when we let them take too much control of the match and then Casemiro. He's cooked. He just is. There were looooong stretches of the game where I forgot he was even on the pitch. I saw Mainoo covering from side to side, either helping to get the ball out of the back or making movements that created other runs (one in particular was a momemnt where I saw him move out to the right which tied up the Everton mid and allowed Dalot to make a run that was played over the top to him and nearly created a good chance). Didn't see any of that out of Casemiro. He was just mostly non-existent. Longer term, it's going to need to be Ugarte and Mainoo in there.

Very happy to see Zirkzee and Rashford actually finish opportunites. But Amad was clearly the star. He, next to Onana, might be the most undropable player right now. I know Amorim is going to keep rotating, but I'd be cool if he went with nearly this same 11 on Wednesday (outside of Mainoo and Martinez since they're suspended).

 

[lex talionis]

You're misinterpreting my post.

I'm not saying don't comment or have an opinion because it makes no difference to the club. If that was what I meant then as you said we might as well shut everything down.

I was replying to the 'learn from our past mistakes'

This makes no sense to you and me learning or not from past mistakes made at boardroom level because we're not in any place of influence. We need ineos and glazers to learn from these mistakes. We are just observers.

My whole point in this discussion is what is the point in bringing ETH up at every turn to either support or hate on him? He's in the rear view mirror, he is of no consequence to United going forward and I just see it as a pointless divisive point scoring that isn't constructive in any way.

I think if people would use their efforts in hating/supporting ETH towards backing the man that matters today Amorim it would make for a better forum rather than every thread being polluted with BS about ETH one way or another

But surely there is great value in learning from past mistakes, even if it is true that no one who runs United consults RedCafe.

If what you're suggesting that all discussion of what went wrong under ETH is pointless then it's actually just as pointless to discuss what went right under ETH as well as what is going right and wrong under Amorim on a daily basis, since we are all only speaking to each other and none of what we discuss will ever reach the eyes of the people who are in a position to implement the great ideas we all come up with here.

And if your complaint is that the criticism of ETH here is excessive, all good. It should never be personal ("Pep Guardiola is my idol") nor abusive (can't recall any examples, but there have been many abusive posts posted here) but constructive criticism such as his poor communication skills, his stubborness, his easily defeated tactics, his poor player acquisition selection, his freezing out of productive players and continued reliance on poor performing players are all fair game for commentary, so it seems to me.

It's not like we're endlessly debating a bad decision from 10 years ago, such as the appointment of Moyes. ETH only left us a month ago and what he left behind was a club in crisis, a crisis largely of his making, that his successor now is tasked with cleaning up. It is not irrelevant to discuss the lessons Amorim must learn from the failure of his predecessor.

 

[Steve Bruce]

But surely there is great value in learning from past mistakes, even if it is true that no one who runs United consults RedCafe.

There is value from learning from mistakesI agree, but what mistakes do we as supporters of the club have to learn? In this instance ETH was highly thought of, he had Ajax playing fantastic football and was very successful. The fans supported him to begin with and then when it went wrong people turned against him. What is there to learn here?

If what you're suggesting that all discussion of what went wrong under ETH is pointless then it's actually just as pointless to discuss what went right under ETH as well as what is going right and wrong under Amorim on a daily basis, since we are all only speaking to each other and none of what we discuss will ever reach the eyes of the people who are in a position to implement the great ideas we all come up with here.

I have no issues with people discussing ETH whether it be good, bad or indifferent. But I do have an issue when every thread is infected by it and more often than not it is nothing constructive. There are loads of threads on this forum dedicated to ETH, why not keep it all in one or two threads, rather than make the same points in most other threads?

And if your complaint is that the criticism of ETH here is excessive, all good. It should never be personal ("Pep Guardiola is my idol") nor abusive (can't recall any examples, but there have been many abusive posts posted here) but constructive criticism such as his poor communication skills, his stubborness, his easily defeated tactics, his poor player acquisition selection, his freezing out of productive players and continued reliance on poor performing players are all fair game for commentary, so it seems to me.

I don't get offended by people calling him a 'Pep Guardiola is my idol' I think it's disrespectful and inaccurate but I come to expect such things in todays society where respect doesn't exist much, but it doesn't annoy me, it is what it is. As I have already said, I have no issues with constructive criticism and the points you have made as examples are perfectly valid. However do you think that we need the same points being made in every match day thread for example? What does it do in respect to moving the conversation forward? To me it's about as relevant as talking about Ole, Jose or LVG. I think it's time to draw a line in the sand and move on. I don't think it makes much sense to continously make the same points over and over again especially when the majority of the fans have got what they wanted, he's gone.

It's not like we're endlessly debating a bad decision from 10 years ago, such as the appointment of Moyes. ETH only left us a month ago and what he left behind was a club in crisis, a crisis largely of his making, that his successor now is tasked with cleaning up. It is not irrelevant to discuss the lessons Amorim must learn from the failure of his predecessor.

I think he left the club in a far better situation than what he inherited, don't forget he took over the club when they had it's lowest ever points total the previous season, we had a lot of over paid aging players, players left out of contract eg Pogba. He left with the squad much younger, he got rid of a lot of dead wood albeit not all of it, he did bring in some good players albeit he didn't get the best out of them and Antony was a complete disaster. He also broke the duck of no trophies in 6 years. I'm not arguing he's a big success far from it and ultimately he failed in what we wanted him to achieve and wasn't the right fit for United. It was certainly the right time for him to go and I'm happy with the early signs of what Amorim is about, but I don't think United are at crisis point, the season is far from over for us and if our players adapt to Amorims way of playing quickly we could still have a relatively good season.

 

[lex talionis]

@Steve Bruce

I dispute the claim that "every thread" contains harsh criticism of ETH. Some threads yes, but not even most threads and certainly not every thread.

If we were still discussing what went right and wrong under Ole on several threads, or even one thread, it would be a stale and pointless discussion. But ETH was sacked only a month ago and the new manager is working every day, possibly as I'm typing this post right now, to unwind the damage his predecessor had inflicted on the club.

What's crazy about what I had written that you accurately quoted is that I am 100% sure that I had typed "Pep Guardiola is my idol" instead of the words "Pep Guardiola is my idol", which doesn't even make sense as an example of personal criticism of ETH. What I meant to type, which I actually hope to have typed this time, is that personal criticism of ETH (such as "Pep Guardiola is my idol") is out of order here. But by contrast, criticism of his performance as manager -- player acquisition, tactics and so on -- is perfectly in order.

What we saw against Everton was a managerial masterclass that we saw only once under ETH -- the FA Cup win over City -- that although was slightly flattered by the scoreline, there is no doubt whatsoever that the manager got the tactics and personnel right and got the in-game substitutions right. We shall see whether we can pull this off consistently, but whether he can or cannot it is perfectly reasonable to compare the performances of the two managers in the short run because they are working with the same exact squad of players. Until that changes with new players in and out, it is not out of order to observe here how the manager overcomes (or does not and we shall see) from his predecessor.

 

[Steve Bruce]

@Steve Bruce

I dispute the claim that "every thread" contains harsh criticism of ETH. Some threads yes, but not even most threads and certainly not every thread.

If we were still discussing what went right and wrong under Ole on several threads, or even one thread, it would be a stale and pointless discussion. But ETH was sacked only a month ago and the new manager is working every day, possibly as I'm typing this post right now, to unwind the damage his predecessor had inflicted on the club.

What's crazy about what I had written that you accurately quoted is that I am 100% sure that I had typed "Pep Guardiola is my idol" instead of the words "Pep Guardiola is my idol", which doesn't even make sense as an example of personal criticism of ETH. What I meant to type, which I actually hope to have typed this time, is that personal criticism of ETH (such as "Pep Guardiola is my idol") is out of order here. But by contrast, criticism of his performance as manager -- player acquisition, tactics and so on -- is perfectly in order.

What we saw against Everton was a managerial masterclass that we saw only once under ETH -- the FA Cup win over City -- that although was slightly flattered by the scoreline, there is no doubt whatsoever that the manager got the tactics and personnel right and got the in-game substitutions right. We shall see whether we can pull this off consistently, but whether he can or cannot it is perfectly reasonable to compare the performances of the two managers in the short run because they are working with the same exact squad of players. Until that changes with new players in and out, it is not out of order to observe here how the manager overcomes (or does not and we shall see) from his predecessor.

We're going around in circles. We'll have to agree to disagree.

I think we just have 2 very different outlooks which is perfectly fine. No hard feelings mate

 

[lex talionis]

We're going around in circles. We'll have to agree to disagree.

I think we just have 2 very different outlooks which is perfectly fine. No hard feelings mate

Agreed. My view is that, even on a club forum such as RedCafe, it actually is important for club supporters to take stock of the lessons of the past even if it is literally -- in the literal sense of the word literally -- true that what we write here has no impact whatsoever on how the club is actually run on a day to day basis. Supporter interaction, the exchange of opinions however boneheaded each of us is once in a while, is a vital part of the experience of being a club supporter. And once in a while a football club does listen to its supporters.