Manchester United vs Liverpool

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Thought we played pretty well in the second half, although was aided by Liverpool running out of steam - which seems to be a common problem for them.
Shaw was excellent, Young very good apart from a couple of defensive errors. Thought Blackett was very assured and he could play many more first team games than people think imo.
Most pleasing thing for me was Rooney. In previous preseasons he's looked short of fitness, but he's leaner than I've ever seen him and as a result he's being much more effective.
Couldn't have gone too much better tbh.
A central midfielder and a centre back and we won't be too far away this year.
 
let's get real here, Gerrard is a great player regardless of the fact he plays for our rivals. Yes he's not at the same level, and I'm glad as well that they'll likely rely too much on him, however to say he's past it or anything of the sort is nonsense. He was highly influental for them last season and I doubt we'll see such a huge drop in productivity as some of you are making it out to be. (penalties aside)

back to what matters though, simply put, we're a different team under Van Gaal.
Yes the team last year wasn't as good as SAF made them look the year before that, but they also aren't as shit as Moyes made them look. Completely uninspiring, boring football, pathetic "tactics" if you can call'em that. Press conferences that made you question his ability to think for himself, let alone manage a team of United's magnitude.
I think we were due a bad season given all the success we've enjoyed, and it was always likely to come after SAF's retirement, but the drop in quality was still something even the most pessimistic of people couldn't perceive given how we walked the league in SAF's last season.
 
Jones definitely touches the ball when sliding in but it's a reckless challenge and he does get the player too so it could have gone either way but a penalty's about right.
 
cold-zebra said:
The fact he clearly makes contact with the ball first?
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I've watched it about 5 times and am failing to see this "clearly" Even if he does, slightly grazing the ball in that reckless motion isn't winning the tackle. It's a foul all day, and we'd call it so against us in an instant.
 
Mockney said:
I've watched it about 5 times and am failing to see this "clearly" Even if he does, slightly grazing the ball in that reckless motion isn't winning the tackle. It's a foul all day, and we'd call it so against us in an instant.
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Yep. Blatant pen. What ref wouldn't give that? Fact is, Jones made a mistake going in like that against a faster player as good as Sterling.
 
People are mistaking 'touching the ball' for 'winning the ball'..They aren't the same thing. Jones is never winning that, Sterling is past him and still in possession if he doesn't take him out, its a foul.
 
This talk of not being comfortable with the high pressing of Liverpool is utter rubbish...give us the name of a team that's comfortable and not look shaky when pressed high, the most important part was how we recovered and getting going..
My poblem was some players looked good during the first half but in actual fact they were not playing their role right and it affected the whole team..in terms of movements and positioning causing all sorts of problem to our passage of play...
 
I wouldn't go as far as 'blatant penalty', but I can definitely see why it was given and it was probably the right call. Jones did make a mistake despite getting the ball rather clearly IMO. The tackle should have been more in the vain of 'blocking a cross' as Sterling was always knocking the ball forwards.

This kind of tackle gives the referee a decision to make and nine times out of 10 it is going to be a penalty. Now, if Sterling drags the ball back and beats Jones, then you have to say fair enough, he's done him for skill. However, buying that bit of time forcing Sterling to pull back would give another defender that split second to get back and maybe prevent the chance. Jones should definitely try to learn from this and make the tackle more ahead of the player where he anticipates the ball to go, rather than basically knowing he is going to take the player if he takes the ball.

These are the kind of tackles that should be out of his game by now really, what you expect from players in the 16-21 bracket. He's just out of there now, so he needs to stamp these out during this coming season for sure.
 
Delighted with the game yesterday. Not with the performance but with the sheer ability that made the come back and got the win.
There will be more than a few occasions in the season where things won't be working as usual and we'll need the sheer will to come back from behind the ability which got lost last season but last night players showed that they are more than capable of. Last season you could pretty much rule out a possibility of making a come back against the decent sides.
Rooney's finish was exquisite. Mata proved why he's a world class player and Shaw certainly is eager to prove his worth. Young has been a revelation and Blackett looks like yet another great prospect from the academy.

Can't wait for the season.
 
Not happy with the way we got mauled in the first 50 or so minutes, but I'm happy to see our winning ways again. Even when we played pretty poorly, we found a way to bounce back and win it, just like under Sir Alex
 
United22 said:
We were all over the place defensively and couldn't handle their high press. Not to mention Sterling seemed to look dangerous every single time he ran at us with the ball
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Consdering they managed about 4 chances in that "mauling" one of them a penalty and two long shots, I reckon we handled it fairly adequately.

They were the better team first half, but come on...
 
Mockney said:
People are mistaking 'touching the ball' for 'winning the ball'..They aren't the same thing. Jones is never winning that, Sterling is past him and still in possession if he doesn't take him out, its a foul.
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Sterling wasn't getting the ball again after Jones' toe poke. It was going out of play whether or not Sterling rode the challenge. Agree it was still a foul, on the basis of it being a reckless challenge. One of those "man and ball" challenges you can't get away with if you're coming in from behind.
 
Looked a pen when i saw it in real time, didn't change my mind seeing the replay either. You can argue the technicalities but i think Jones gives the ref the opportunity to give it, he didn't exactly help himself.

Think we might have gotten lucky with one later on Sterling, but i haven't seen it since the time of the incident. Remember thinking we'd gotten away with one though.
 
Mockney said:
Consdering they managed about 4 chances in that "mauling" one of them a penalty and two long shots, I reckon we handled it fairly adequately.

They were the better team first half, but come on...
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I think you are right 'mauled' is a bit of an exaggeration.

At the game it did look as though Liverpool scored against the run of play and then took complete control until we got a goal. Almost as though the confidence just sapped out of the team.

He was right with the pressing, that was the key difference between the two sides. But we had a couple of players in the first half who just had a bad day at the office. Evans and Flectcher were very very poor, DDG's distribution was a lot to be desired. Herrera now knows what it is like to play a premier team and will notice he will not have the time that he had in other games.

On the upside Blackett looks really good and I would be happy with us not getting cover at LB, also shaw and young did very well.

The atmosphere is absolutely shite in the US, people more interested in the mexican wave than supporting the team. It was only the brits signing.
 
Worries me De Gea never seems to get close to opposition pens :nervous:
 
An in form Rafael should be a huge asset in this formation (especially defensively dealing with players like Sterling). Januzaj will obviously add some quality and RVP's presence is an obvious plus. Still think we could do with one top defender and someone like Vidal is a must for me (especially with Carrick out). There will obviously be teething problems with the formation and we should expect patches of poor form within games.

Really think if we can add Vidal (or a different top midfielder) and a centre half we could possibly give the League a fair whack.
 
It was clear pen imo. Jones got a slight touch on it but it wasn't a clean tackle, rather clumsy, which gave the ref no choice. We'd all pissed off if we didn't get a pen in a situation like that.
 
Fair play to them.. they played well, particularly in the first half. The game was played at such pace aswell, both teams going for it.

Fletcher's passing was off big time last night, and in my opinion I think there is warning signs with the defenders at the back playing out.

Rooney took his goal really well.
 
barros said:
That's a 50-50 if Gerrard sent the ball to the side he jumped he would stop that ball.
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Don't get me wrong I don't expect him to save every penalty, or even most. Though it just seems like De Gea isn't the best at saving pens. Even the pens against Inter he didn't save one, just saying it has to be a bit of a worry.
 
United22 said:
Not happy with the way we got mauled in the first 50 or so minutes, but I'm happy to see our winning ways again. Even when we played pretty poorly, we found a way to bounce back and win it, just like under Sir Alex
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If that's as bad a 'mauling' we get all season then we'll be fine.

United caused pretty much 95% of their issues in the first half. Liverpool didn't muster an awful lot the entire game.

Was a strange game anyway. Too many mistakes all over the show.
 
fordemonk said:
Are you really judging kagawa on that 20 minutes in a game that had lost all flow? Agree nani should be gone. hernandez did as much as any other player today including rooney and mata
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No I'm not judging them in that game or thus tour even. I really like Kagawa & Hernandez and hope they stay but I think Utd will cash in on them as Van Gaal probably won't play them much. Both of them deserve to be playing first team football and would probably be happy to move in order to get it. I think we are going to buy a CM and CB(maybe 2 CBs or convert Carrick to a CB) and the squad will be thinned down in the forward positions.
 
LMControl said:
:lol: Classic RAWK'er......
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That's exactly what the RAWK thread is like right now. They don't care anymore and they were the better team. Go back a few pages when they were winning 1-0 and it meant the world to them and they couldn't stop running down our players.

Delighted.
 
Worrying that some people still can't see that it was a clear penalty, we should be hoping Jones learns not to be so rash instead of giving him a free pass and blaming the ref.

I'm not sure why Blackett is our most composed centre-back when in possession, Evans had a bit of a nightmare, while Smalling is more concerned with blocking the closing down striker than moving and making himself available to receive the ball. This caused a whole lot of aimless long diagonal balls in the 1st half which Sakho and Skrtel had no problems defending.

Credit to Young for his attitude and work rate, we'll need him to up his game defensively if he's going to play wing back permanently though.

Herrera was always going to take a while to get used to the pace of a game against a rival so the sloppy tackling can be excused I think.
 
Shark said:
That's exactly what the RAWK thread is like right now. They don't care anymore and they were the better team. Go back a few pages when they were winning 1-0 and it meant the world to them and they couldn't stop running down our players.

Delighted.
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From some of the posts on here last night we did a pretty good job of that ourselves. :rolleyes:
 
Red Digger said:
No I'm not judging them in that game or thus tour even. I really like Kagawa & Hernandez and hope they stay but I think Utd will cash in on them as Van Gaal probably won't play them much. Both of them deserve to be playing first team football and would probably be happy to move in order to get it. I think we are going to buy a CM and CB(maybe 2 CBs or convert Carrick to a CB) and the squad will be thinned down in the forward positions.
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Fair point but would still love to see both of them here next season. keep mata rvp and rooney on their toes. also the transfer fees being mentioned are an insult. no value in letting them go
 
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