[UncleBob]

Having watched that video over and over again, there was little chance of Cavani going through against Alisson from a direct Rashford pass. Cavani wasn't quick enough.

fecking mental claim
If Rashford passes the ball just before Cavani is level with Fabinho there's no way Robertson is getting there in time before Cavani has the chance to shoot, there's also no way Fabinho will be able to recover as he'll be behind Cavani and he has to risk sliding in from behind and conceding a penalty + red card. The only actual risk is that the pass will be cut off by Fabinho.

 

[stw2022]

Are people claiming that we have a Rashford problem while arguing there is no Martial problem

It’s a both player problems but there exists less of a denial about Martial.

He’s got pace and he’s decent at finishing even though his decision making and composure often negates that.

Beyond that I’m not sure there’s much there. His work rate is questionable, his touch is poor, his awareness of his surroundings is awful, decision making is evidently bad. His passing range hasn’t ever been particularly notable

It doesn’t mean he’s a bad player but just because some people point out his limitations it doesn’t mean we all have to invent assets we know deep down he simply doesn’t have

 

[Silverman]

I thought Neville's description of Rooney on MNF last night shows what Rashford needs.
When you think back to Rooney in his prime, he was non stop running, kicking everything that moves, aggressive, demanded so much from his teammates. Fernandes has it.

I'm not talking about technical abilities here. Rashford may have his drawbacks but I think he could reach another level if he adopted this mentality.

 

[UncleBob]

Are people claiming that we have a Rashford problem while arguing there is no Martial problem

Doubt it. Pretty much all our forwards are major concerns at the moment. Rashfords good performances are miles between, Sheffield the last one ? Then the match against West Ham, Leipzig. Thank baby jesus he's scoring and contributing, but there's not much between his Liverpool performance and his Wolves performance apart from a deflection into the net, which imo is a concern.

The good news is that we're in a bloody excellent position, and that if our forwards click and find the levels they were at for the last half of last season then we actually have a great chance of winning.

Personally i've always been annoyed with Rashfords inability to see teammates in better positions, i think it's his major flaw and that he lacks the balance between knowing when to go for the unlikely and when to play someone in.

Like the situation below against Liverpool:

1: Ball is played up to Rashford, he has Fred making a run down the sideline who is completely free and Martial is completely free in the middle. Two obvious options.
2: Rashford turns with the ball, his only option now is to pass the ball to Martial as Fred is now behind his back
3: Instead of passing it, he tries to go past Thiago(?) and loses the ball

If Rashford passes the ball up to Martial, it's likely to be Martial and Fred on a 2 vs 1 with Robertson the only defender in front of them.

Personally, i honestly can't understand the logic behind such decision making. 2 brilliant passing options -> 1 brilliant passing option -> loses the ball when we can turn it into an excellent counter attack with 2 vs 1.

There's no sense behind it. Even IF he gets past Thiago you're not running faster than the ball can move when you pass it, so you're just inviting pressure from Fabinho and Trent. It's just as fecking stupid as it gets to throw away chances like that.

 

[GoldTrafford99]

You have hit the nail on the head.

He flatters to deceive. Everyone will get on his back and then every so often he bags a brace or a hat trick and the heat subsides but on a consistent basis I think he's been pretty abysmal.

He just doesn't havethe vision or football intelligence to know when to pass and when he should shoot. Small weaknesses make a BIG difference at this level especially if OGS is determined to play him every week. Rashford probably costs us more points then he gains for us.

Some times it's utterly fantastic to be a Manchester United fan...

Some times you read utter garbage like this and it's actually quite embarrassing to be a Manchester United fan....

It's certainly embarrassing and cringeworthy and mortifying to be associated with fans who think like this.

This kid is BY FAR the greatest ever striker to have ever graduated from our academy in 100 years... BY FAR!

 

[GoldTrafford99]

This is ludicrous.

Do some folk honestly think Rashford - on ground level - can see the exact same things they can see from an 80-foot high TV camera after they've rewound it and paused it a few times?

feck me.

 

[Tom Van Persie]

He's scored a few match winning goals lately and set up Pogba's against Burnley last week but you wouldn't think it reading this thread. You would think he's been totally useless for months which is isn't the case. He was crap the other day but stop with the overreactions.

 

[UncleBob]

This is ludicrous.

Do some folk honestly think Rashford - on ground level - can see the exact same things they can see from an 80-foot high TV camera after they've rewound it and paused it a few times?

feck me.

It's ludicrous to expect Rashford, in the second picture, to pass the ball to a completely free teammate to make it a 2 vs 1 situation instead of trying to go past Thiago ? Why ?

 

[Andycoleno9]

Having watched that video over and over again, there was little chance of Cavani going through against Alisson from a direct Rashford pass. Cavani wasn't quick enough.

I disagree. Cavani would not be caught there. If the ball is good, Cavani can hit it in first touch. Even if the ball is not that good, Cavani would still have a time to control it with first touch and shoot with second.
He is in a run and defenders are standing still and waiting on Rashford. And he is quicker than Fabinho and Henderson anyway.

 

[Mcking]

The only actual risk is that the pass will be cut off by Fabinho.

Exactly, that is it. It was too late to make a pass there. A pass that would put Cavani through would have been cut off, and a pass that wouldn't have been cut off would have sent him wide.

It was two against one initially with Cavani, Rashford and Fabinho. The threat was obviously that of the ball in behind Fabinho to put Cavani through, but for Rashford to make that pass, Cavani needed to be at least close to Fabinho's level considering that he isn't very quick.

Fabinho on the other hand just needed to match Cavani for stride and stay ahead of him for as long as possible to give himself a headstart against the through ball, while waiting for Robertson to provide cover - which he was doing with complete ease.

The moment Robertson arrived and Cavani was yet to get on the offside line, a potential pass to him was dead. Cavani recognized that too, aborting his initial run through the middle and making the reverse one instead, strictly to drag the defenders with him and open space on the inside.

Rashford didn't cover himself in glory after coming infield, but I don't like seeing people use him not putting Cavani through as proof of his "selfishness". I have seen him in similar situations many times, and he usually produces a good pass. It was unfortunate that Cavani wasn't quick enough to get level early enough. The pass just wasn't on, good defending all round.

 

[Robbie Boy]

Martial isn't producing. Rashford is.

So, let me get this straight: It's ok to shit on players who you deem to be not performing? Because if I recall correctly, you were one of the posters getting very tetchy with people criticising Ole when we were looking poor. People need to stop with this favouritism lark and having different standards for who can and can't be critisised.

Your post was also factually incorrect as Martial has been getting absolute pelters on here for years now, so I've no idea why you would bring him up in here and make an untrue statement. It seems like you took the opportunity to have a dig. I'm a huge Rashford fan and some of the criticism in here is ridiculously hyperbolic and OTT. I am worried about his form though. Yeah his numbers are decent but his all-round game has looked relatively poor for large parts of the season. It's especially worrying as last season, he seemed to have become the complete player and ironed out a-lot of his deficiencies. Most are simply pointing that out so I have no idea why you are coming across so outraged. You can ignore the hyperbolic nonsense you know and focus on the posts worth a debate.

Also, can this melodramatic rubbish about 'worst fans in the world' die a death. It's absolutely ridiculous and is Sammsky type posting. I imagine you don't want to venture down that particular path.

 

[UncleBob]

Exactly, that is it. It was too late to make a pass there. A pass that would put Cavani through would have been cut off, and a pass that wouldn't have been cut off would have sent him wide.

It was two against one initially with Cavani, Rashford and Fabinho. The threat was obviously that of the ball in behind Fabinho to put Cavani through, but for Rashford to make that pass, Cavani needed to be at least close to Fabinho's level considering that he isn't very quick.

Fabinho on the other hand just needed to match Cavani for stride and stay ahead of him for as long as possible to give himself a headstart against the through ball, while waiting for Robertson to provide cover - which he was doing with complete ease.

The moment Robertson arrived and Cavani was yet to get on the offside line, a potential pass to him was dead. Cavani recognized that too, aborting his initial run through the middle and making the reverse one instead, strictly to drag the defenders with him and open space on the inside.

Rashford didn't cover himself in glory after coming infield, but I don't like seeing people use him not putting Cavani through as proof of his "selfishness". I have seen him in similar situations many times, and he usually produces a good pass. It was unfortunate that Cavani wasn't quick enough to get level early enough. The pass just wasn't on, good defending all round.

You not liking it isn't really a criteria.

And it's fecking bizarre that you refuse to see the situation for what it is.

Mental.

 

[Kaos]

This Rashford vs Martial strawman argument as to who’s been worse is an odd one. The fact is both have been an issue for us lately. But there’s already a separate thread for that.

As for Rashford, I do think he needs to be dropped or rested for a game of two.

 

[Robbie Boy]

I have no doubt that few of these "fans" are the ones with player worshipping accounts on twitter, who are more worried about "banter" and shit posting about other players.

Aye, all this favoritism towards certain players and becoming outraged when they receive fair criticism is ridiculous. Even more-so because the posters with their favourites, have no issue slating the players they don't idolise, yet they act like they set the standards for how a 'true fan' should post. It's very ironic.

 

[Silverman]

Im a big Rashford fan but I can also criticise his poor performances recently. The two aren't mutually exclusive.

 

[Swiss_Red89]

He's scored a few match winning goals lately and set up Pogba's against Burnley last week but you wouldn't think it reading this thread. You would think he's been totally useless for months which is isn't the case. He was crap the other day but stop with the overreactions.

True.

Of course, he had his up and downs this season and still has his faults, but all in all he's producing since the beginning of last season and is a huge reason why we are in a title race actually. He is still on Top of the CL scoring list with three other players. He is also a very likable person and is a red through and through.

Yet there are many fans who just wait for mistakes or a bad game and use every chance to slat him off. I really don't understand it.

The only critisim i understand at the moment, is that he really has become a bit of a "Diva" on the field. Doesn't run much when we don't have the ball and avoids header duels. But then again we don't know if it's for example a tactical advice from Ole to keep him fresh for the offensive part of his game. If Ole and the coaching staff weren't happy with his defensive efforts, they would tell him i'm sure oft that.

Other than that, when we have the ball he is constantly looking for runs behind de lines, which puts pressure on the defensive line of the opposition and creates space for others. He is the only one doing it constantly and i think it's one of the reasons why he has become undroppable for Ole.

 

[Nou_Camp99]

And Martial’s been heavily criticised all season, it’s weird to pretend that isn’t the case. Almost every post I see from you in this thread it seems like you’re begging for Martial to be abused, just because people are criticising Rashford too, it’s proper fanboyish behaviour.

Not at all. There are parts of Rashford game that need refining for sure but he's far more important to us than Martial is.

He's produced for us this season and a big reason we are top. Him n Bruno have carried the team.

Martial, Pogba, Greenwood and the other attacking players haven't done enough for me although Pogba has started to play better of late for sure.

 

[spiriticon]

It's frustrating that when he is running full pelt he has no awareness of anything around him. Maybe he's so fast he has motion blur

He has to stop and look to get his pitch radar back, which loses him the vital few seconds to make a truly incisive pass or shot. This separates him from the very best.

He's a very skillful footballer when he's not sprinting.

 

[HowieC]

Martial isn't producing. Rashford is.

Martial is contributing heavily to play, defensive and offensive. Yes he hasn’t been scoring recently but lets not forget his historical lethality.

Rashy on the other hand has been lucky with quite a few goals this season, and our team allows him to barely defend, run off the shoulder without contributing much to play.

 

[InspiRED]

His work rate is completely lacking at the moment, but I think it's understandable as he's played so many games and like Bruno must be running on fumes by now. He might have even been told to conserve energy and not worry too much about pressing.

The decision making criticisms are entirely valid though and are highlighted by the Cavani pass option example we're discussing. Look at Cavani's reaction. He's played at an elite level for most of his career, he's not going to chuck his toys out of the pram for a pass that was never on in the first place. He's fuming because there was a pass (or two) on there that would likely have won that game.

Agree the 'true fan' thing that comes out every time a player or manager is criticised is getting so boring. If anything makes this forum embarrassing it's that.

 

[BFernandes]

If we had to sacrifice and get rid of one, I'd rather it be Martial.

Even when Rashford is having a stinker he can sometimes pull something out of the bag. Wolves goal and assist against Burnley come to mind.

When Martial has a stinker, I never get the feeling he's going to turn it around in that game.

And the fact at 25 years of age Martial still doesn't know what his best position is, which itself causes an issue.

 

[roonster09]

Martial is contributing heavily to play, defensive and offensive. Yes he hasn’t been scoring recently but lets not forget his historical lethality.

Rashy on the other hand has been lucky with quite a few goals this season, and our team allows him to barely defend, run off the shoulder without contributing much to play.

Can easily be proven wrong with stats.

Lucky with goals, new low

 

[Robbie Boy]

I actually can't believe that in 2021, this Rashford v Martial nonsense is actually a 'thing'.

 

[spiriticon]

Martial is contributing heavily to play, defensive and offensive. Yes he hasn’t been scoring recently but lets not forget his historical lethality.

Rashy on the other hand has been lucky with quite a few goals this season, and our team allows him to barely defend, run off the shoulder without contributing much to play.

That is really a stretch to say he is a 'contributing heavily'. He's part of the painting sure, but not the outstanding feature of it.

Rashford has had more occurences this season where he was the outstanding feature.

 

[HowieC]

Can easily be proven wrong with stats.

Lucky with goals, new low

Prove it then. The reason why rashford gets all this flak every match throughout his career is because he is bad at so many basics of football for the top level.

His touch isn’t good, he is consistently a brainless selfish footballer, and is a poor passer, especially with short passes. Lately he’s even lazy.

His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

 

[roonster09]

Prove it then. The reason why rashford gets all this flak every match throughout his career is because he is bad at so many basics of football for the top level.

His touch isn’t good, he is consistently a brainless selfish footballer, and is a poor passer, especially with short passes. Lately he’s even lazy.

His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

No, he gets flak because of posters like you who are hell bent on worshipping one player which means you have to shit on other players to make your savior look much better than he is. Typical fan boys behavior.

Look who won more tackles, interceptions, plays more passes, more key passes and then tell me how Martial contributes heavily while Rashford doesn't.

Posting nonsense like "Rashford is just pace" shows how clueless you are. Somehow most of the players rate Rashford as the most skillful player in the training but then we have geniuses like you who think he lacks touch (must be the dumbest thing).

 

[roonster09]

I actually can't believe that in 2021, this Rashford v Martial nonsense is actually a 'thing'.

Exactly. We have 2 talented attackers, it's hilarious to see when one is having rough time, his fan boys wants to take the other one down too. I mean its common to have highs and lows in football, they are humans after all, they won't be at same level all the time unless they are Messi level.

 

[spiriticon]

Prove it then. The reason why rashford gets all this flak every match throughout his career is because he is bad at so many basics of football for the top level.

His touch isn’t good, he is consistently a brainless selfish footballer, and is a poor passer, especially with short passes. Lately he’s even lazy.

His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

This is a trainwreck of a post.

His touch isn’t good



and is a poor passer, especially with short passes.



His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

 

[MUFromLTU]

Prove it then. The reason why rashford gets all this flak every match throughout his career is because he is bad at so many basics of football for the top level.

His touch isn’t good, he is consistently a brainless selfish footballer, and is a poor passer, especially with short passes. Lately he’s even lazy.

His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

Damn son, I sometimes really think some people live on some other planet.

So many "fans" here, it's incredible. Top of the league, bashing our academy player after 1 bad game, when he is 2nd in the team according to xG created, only Bruno has done more key passes in past 18 months, 2nd in assists, 2nd in goals, 2nd in average match rating. I guess we don't have any above-average players in the club then.

 

[Poborsky's hair]

fecking mental claim
If Rashford passes the ball just before Cavani is level with Fabinho there's no way Robertson is getting there in time before Cavani has the chance to shoot, there's also no way Fabinho will be able to recover as he'll be behind Cavani and he has to risk sliding in from behind and conceding a penalty + red card. The only actual risk is that the pass will be cut off by Fabinho.

That´s what if that happen, it was a fraction of a second but Cavani even for me looked like he owuld perhaps get there but Robertson at the very least could recover and just make him go a bit wider to have a worse angle at Alisson while on his weaker foot. Also he could have been easily offside too. I don´t think it was a big issue Marcus not passing it to him, going alone open a lot of space for him but he could have release Pogba or do better by himself.

I think using all these smileys doesn´t make you any more right about that situation. After war, everyone is a general. If players had such hindsight. BTW I think Rashford was poor and I really dislike how he plays as of late because I truly think he can be a world class palyer if he puts everything together but you know if you seen how Salah hesitated on few occassions it´s clear that it does happen to more experienced players too

 

[Nou_Camp99]

Martial is contributing heavily to play, defensive and offensive. Yes he hasn’t been scoring recently but lets not forget his historical lethality.

Rashy on the other hand has been lucky with quite a few goals this season, and our team allows him to barely defend, run off the shoulder without contributing much to play.

Rashford has been better of the two by far even with his sloppy touches. Martial has been so poor this season. Barely scored and gone missing a lot too.

Bruno n Rashford are the main reasons we are top of the league.

 

[ROFLUTION]

In CL
Winning goal vs PSG
Hattrick vs Leipzig
Equaliser vs PSG in the home tie

In PL
Goal vs Brighton to make it 2-1
Vs Newcastle, scoring was 1-1. He won penalty which Bruno missed. Then in the last 10 mins, he made 2 assist6s and scored a goal to make it 4-1
Assisted winner in the injury time vs Southampton, to make it 3-2
Scored vs West Ham to make it 3-1
Scored equalising goal vs Sheffield United and also 3rd goal to make it 3-1.
Scored opening goal vs Leicester
Scored injury time winner vs Wolves
Set up winning goal vs Burnley.

That's lot of decisive moments in half a season.

The PL games you mention are not in the big games as I talked about. The big games is the point, as an attacker if he is to make it here of course has to deliver goals against Brighton, Newcastle, etc like you mention.

Yes, he did well against PSG, but my point is that he scores the tough goals sometimes (PSG springs to mind), but fails to score on the obvious chances in the very crucial matches, i.e the final match against Leipzig. Or in the big matches against City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs. Against Liverpool for instance, he ran on a promising counter, only for not even finishing but only to hold on to the ball and not finish. It feels like very often he shoots hard and direct at the keeper on big chances, instead of scoring on the big chances. (happened in the Leipzig loss too)

 

[roonster09]

The PL games you mention are not in the big games as I talked about. The big games is the point, as an attacker if he is to make it here of course has to deliver goals against Brighton, Newcastle, etc like you mention.

Yes, he did well against PSG, but my point is that he scores the tough goals sometimes (PSG springs to mind), but fails to score on the obvious chances in the very crucial matches, i.e the final match against Leipzig. Or in the big matches against City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs. Against Liverpool for instance, he ran on a promising counter, only for not even finishing but only to hold on to the ball and not finish. It feels like very often he shoots hard and direct at the keeper on big chances, instead of scoring on the big chances. (happened in the Leipzig loss too)

There isn't a player who doesn't miss chances. Rashford has proven already that he is a big game player and his record in big games is very good too.

https://www.redcafe.net/threads/rashfords-record-against-the-top-6.444364/page-6

 

[croadyman]

Just frustrating that he made the wrong decision when you aren't going to get many of those against a top team, also needs to time his runs a bit better because has been caught offside a few too many times in recent games

 

[Stacks]

This is a trainwreck of a post.

His touch isn’t good



and is a poor passer, especially with short passes.



His athleticism lets him get chances, but ask yourself what he would be with average pace? A below average footballer.

no point man. He has previous. didn't Rashford play Bruno in with a great curling pass behind the defence against Liverpool? Didn't he provide the pass for Pogba's winner vs Burnley? With some players people focus on the mistakes

 

[Swiss_Red89]

no point man. He has previous. didn't Rashford play Bruno in with a great curling pass behind the defence against Liverpool? Didn't he provide the pass for Pogba's winner vs Burnley? With some players people focus on the mistakes

Definitely the case here. It has reached a point where some people slat him even after games he did score and single out the things he didn't do well.

Previous example the Burnley Game---> Some poster in here couldn't admit that it was a good assist (and not an easy one btw. You would know if you ever played football on competitive level) and good decision making in that situation. No, they focused on the situations where things didn't come off for him or he took the wrong decision and downplayed the assist as an easy pass.

 

[Stacks]

Definitely the case here. It has reached a point where some people slat him even after games he did score and single out the things he didn't do well.

Previous example the Burnley Game---> Some poster in here couldn't admit that it was a good assist (and not an easy one btw. You would know if you ever played football on competitive level) and good decision making in that situation. No, they focused on the situations where things didn't come off for him or he took the wrong decision and downplayed the assist as an easy pass.

Surely that's the definition of agenda. Maybe its the media fault. They kept hyping Rashford up and calling him world class so when he messes up it is magnified due to the hype. Or maybe its because United fans pick sides when it comes to players

 

[united_99]

All three (Rashford, Martial, Greenwood) are not performing well currently. Out of those three if I had to bet before every game who would contribute the most or do something useful I would still go for Rashford. We wouldn’t be where we are this season without his contributions despite his poor form.
Having said this Greenwood is still a teenager and got limited time so far this season (mostly justified). Rashford and Martial are the ones who need to step up. Rashford needs a short break actually and afterwards he needs to improve. Martial has had a few breaks already (and missed the three league games through suspension) so he can’t be that tired.
What goes in their favour a bit so far is that apart from the Spurs duo all other attacking players at City, Liverpool and Chelsea are struggling, too. Maybe the attacking players are the most affected by the intense schedule this season.

 

[Swiss_Red89]

Surely that's the definition of agenda. Maybe its the media fault. They kept hyping Rashford up and calling him world class so when he messes up it is magnified due to the hype. Or maybe its because United fans pick sides when it comes to players

Seems to be the case sometimes. I think it's human to favor some players over others. I for one obviously really like Rashford, but that doesn't mean i feel the need to go into the Martial or James thread and slat them after games for example. I really don't get it.

Rational critisim is fine, but what is going on in this thread is fare from rational at this point.

One poster even suggested that Rashford costs us more points than he wins us....I mean, really? How can you say that in the middle of a season where we are Top of the table and he contributed heavily for it.

 

[Stacks]

Seems to be the case sometimes. I think it's human to favor some players over others. I for one obviously really like Rashford, but that doesn't mean i feel the need to go into the Martial or James thread and slat them after bad performances for example. I really don't get it.

Rational critisim is fine, but what is going on in this thread is fare from rational at this point.

One poster even suggested that Rashford costs us more points than he wins us....I mean, really? How can you say that in the middle of a season where we are Top of the table and he contributed heavily for it.

because if someone else (no idea who) was in his place we would be MORE on top