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2019-20 Performances

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5.9 Season Average Rating
Appearances
49
Goals
17
Assists
4
Yellow cards
0
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AFC NimbleThumb said:
This./

Tony is showing more determination since the break but Greenwood looks hungry. Those drifting performances won’t be tolerated if a Sancho is an option.
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I think having Greenwood and Rashford in the team actually helps Martial though. He can't drift out into wide areas because those two are already occupying the spaces there. Longer term Greenwood would probably play through the middle but he's fine out wide because he can use either foot and likes to turn and run. Plus the physicality is less of an issue.

If Sancho played Greenwood would have to be in the middle and atm I think you lose a lot of his effectiveness as a result.

The current front three works and suits all three players so I wouldn't be in any hurry to start tampering. We've only had it for two games.
 
Adamsk7 said:
I agree but an argument FOR getting Sancho is we have potentially four world class talents that can all play in any of the front three positions. One of them will HAVE to miss out every week and that is only going to be good long term because everyone will want to keep their place. We can’t say “oh we don’t want Rashford or Martial benched” because that’s exactly what we do want if they aren’t performing.

so excited for our current front three and the potential of Sancho to make an unbelievable front four.
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Not to mention we could also easily play 4-4-2 with both Greenwood and Martial as strikers with Sancho and Rashford out wide in some games. With that kind of firepower, and the whole team working their socks off, it doesn't really matter. The attitude is right, so it's simple now in that more quality will get us there.
 
This kid is such a talent. At 18 he already understands how to play as a seasoned inside forward. Do you see how he receives the ball on the half turn? Its vital for us when trying to bypass the oppositions midfield when they sit deep. Also has the technique to find his man like he did for the third goal.

United should always prioritize technical players when building a first team. We are literally seeing the results by doing this.

he also had a 92% passing accuracy with 38 passes.
 
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Revan said:
Honestly, as good as Sancho is, I am not sure is it worth to spend 120m to put Greenwood on the bench. Rashford is better than Sancho, as is Martial (IMO), so it is gonna be Sancho vs Greenwood (with Greenwood deputising for all positions).

Regardless what happens, he is fantastic. Our biggest talent coming from our academy I can ever remember. His finishing, in particular, is absolutely insane, there aren't many better finishersin football. He has a lot of areas to improve, and is a bit of a selfish player, but there aren't many (if any) better 18 years old players right there.
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Lingard, James and Mata have over 100 appearances between them this season. There's plenty of game time to be had for Greenwood even with Sancho in. We need quality and depth if we ever want to challenge for the title and it was painfully obvious against Norwich that we don't have that at the moment.
 
noodlehair said:
I think having Greenwood and Rashford in the team actually helps Martial though. He can't drift out into wide areas because those two are already occupying the spaces there. Longer term Greenwood would probably play through the middle but he's fine out wide because he can use either foot and likes to turn and run. Plus the physicality is less of an issue.

If Sancho played Greenwood would have to be in the middle and atm I think you lose a lot of his effectiveness as a result.

The current front three works and suits all three players so I wouldn't be in any hurry to start tampering. We've only had it for two games.
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I feel we’re in a fortunate position where all 3 current & Sancho [potentially] can operate across the frontline but of the 4 I think Martial is probably the least flexible [he’s never touched RW] so when it’s not working for him there are less options for him.

As you say though it’s firing atm so don’t want to tamper but I really hold Mason in high regard so don’t think it’ll just simply be Sancho in - Mason our for long.

I’m just really happy to see Mason being given his chance.
 
mu4c_20le said:
Remember when some people slammed Ole and called him delusional for selling Lukaku and not replacing him so he could bring an 18 year old through :D
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Did they? Must be a small number of folks. Thought everyone knew that Greenwood was the real deal.
 
My MOTM and probably my favourite player to watch in the team, he's so silky and his football brain is well tuned at such a young age, the way he took his goal was class, he gave the keeper no chance with the way he snapped off the shot with minimal backlift, he pretty much followed through into the shot from the step-over, and the weight on the cross for Bruno's second was perfection.
 
He should move to Dortmund if he wants to fulfill his potential.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
I feel we’re in a fortunate position where all 3 current & Sancho [potentially] can operate across the frontline but of the 4 I think Martial is probably the least flexible [he’s never touched RW] so when it’s not working for him there are less options for him.

As you say though it’s firing atm so don’t want to tamper but I really hold Mason in high regard so don’t think it’ll just simply be Sancho in - Mason our for long.

I’m just really happy to see Mason being given his chance.
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Greenwood is just too good not to be playing which is why I have a bit of apprehension with us spending huge money on Sancho. Rashford imo is also too good not to play. I'm not sure Martial is but he is the only one of the three currently you can play through the middle and get the best out of. He's also only played as a striker this season really so 19 goals isn't a bad return, particularly as he was injured for a few months and generally doesn't take the penalties.

Sancho obviously wouldn't play through the middle so I'm not sure where you fit him in. I think he's somewhat overated anyway. He's a very good young player but people forget how young he is and I don't think you automatically drop one of our front three for him. Doing well for Dortmund isn't the same as doing well for United. Greenwood is making playing for United look easy at 18, that really isn't something to risk curtailing. Look at the ball to Fernandes. He made it look simple. Most players would have fecked that up 90% of the time. With him you just expected him to either score or pick someone out.
 
Woody is eating Thermidor tonight washed down with a vintage year whilst putting his chequebook away.
 
Adam-Utd said:
Honestly on this form its Rashford on the bench :wenger:
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Which is why we need to have at least 4 quality attackers. There will always be loss of form and injury etc. It’s imperative that we sign Sancho if we want to compete on all fronts.
 
Brightonian said:
I am worried about how quickly people are forgetting just how unstoppable Rashford was right before he got injured. And that was in a still very dysfunctional team, he was doing a lot of both the creating and the scoring himself.

Of course he is still rusty. He's played four games after a lay-off of five and a half months. But it's not even as if he's playing badly. His playmaking has been excellent, as evidenced by the assists against Sheffield and a whole host of key passes since the return of football. It's actually been nice to have the opportunity to appreciate just how good a passer of the ball he is, callback to the days when he was tiny and not especially fast and was a crafty playmaker.

It's just his forward play that needs to get back into gear, and it will.
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Yep, I agree. Rashford was having a wonderful season, there were some whispers (probably a bit of an exaggeration) comparing it to Ronaldo's breakthrough season, and was destined to score 30+ goals playing from the wings. When he got injured, the first thought was that our season was finished (luckily, Martial stepped up and then Bruno came). Rashford is a fantastic young player, I don't like people forgetting how well he was playing before his injury.
 
noodlehair said:
Greenwood is just too good not to be playing which is why I have a bit of apprehension with us spending huge money on Sancho. Rashford imo is also too good not to play. I'm not sure Martial is but he is the only one of the three currently you can play through the middle and get the best out of. He's also only played as a striker this season really so 19 goals isn't a bad return, particularly as he was injured for a few months and generally doesn't take the penalties.

Sancho obviously wouldn't play through the middle so I'm not sure where you fit him in. I think he's somewhat overated anyway. He's a very good young player but people forget how young he is and I don't think you automatically drop one of our front three for him. Doing well for Dortmund isn't the same as doing well for United. Greenwood is making playing for United look easy at 18, that really isn't something to risk curtailing. Look at the ball to Fernandes. He made it look simple. Most players would have fecked that up 90% of the time. With him you just expected him to either score or pick someone out.
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Very valid points.

My main concern is the drop off after our current front 3 is huge [Igahlo in the 9 aside but he’s a short term fix]. I think you can rotate 4 into 3 enough to justify the outlay on Sancho given the level of quality the 4 would provide.

Under SAF [I hate resorting to this on here] we’d usual have a at least 1 forward player that could consider themselves ’unlucky’ to be out in most games & I’m very wary that after the first 11 we then relying again on Dan James to run in straight lines for 90 minutes.

I think Sancho puts in a similar cross on his right to the Greenwood one btw which is like you say a difficult pass & the reason I think we need to bring in that quality.
 
Revan said:
Yep, I agree. Rashford was having a wonderful season, there were some whispers (probably a bit of an exaggeration) comparing it to Ronaldo's breakthrough season, and was destined to score 30+ goals playing from the wings. When he got injured, the first thought was that our season was finished (luckily, Martial stepped up and then Bruno came). Rashford is a fantastic young player, I don't like people forgetting how well he was playing before his injury.
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Agreed.

The form Rashford was showing before his back injury was world cass. Elasticos, nutmegs, long range shots, left foot finishes, headers, electrifying pace... he was carrying our team, let's be honest.

Onto Greenwood, at 18 this guy is a phenomenon. His ambidexous nature and the maturity of his game is top level. For me since Messi, Rooney and Ronaldo only Mbappe, Sancho, Haaland and now Greenwood are the best teenagers i've seen this century (all for varying reasons).
 
Said it before that Greenwood at this current stage is much more effective on the wide rather than playing as a lone striker. It'll be too difficult for him at this moment to play against two PL centre back who can outmuscle him in tight spot. However, if he plays on the wide area, he can use the advantage of find space for himself to be in the free and right position to score without worry big centre back to stay tight on you. His ability to shoot with both of his feet are assets and effective if you let him play wide or two striker role. His hold up play also pretty good. A natural goal scorer, you can tell all he thinks when he's in the penalty box is to shoot.

I think he can still learn a lot playing on the right before he's ready to be a striker that we can relied on week in week out.
 
My god this kid is exciting to watch. What a phenomenal young player. Hopefully in a year or two he'll be playing the number 9 role as that would be his best position long term IMO.
 
With Greenwood putting on a show at RW, other positions should be a higher priority for transfer spending in the next transfer window, imo.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
Very valid points.

My main concern is the drop off after our current front 3 is huge [Igahlo in the 9 aside but he’s a short term fix]. I think you can rotate 4 into 3 enough to justify the outlay on Sancho given the level of quality the 4 would provide.

Under SAF [I hate resorting to this on here] we’d usual have a at least 1 forward player that could consider themselves ’unlucky’ to be out in most games & I’m very wary that after the first 11 we then relying again on Dan James to run in straight lines for 90 minutes.

I think Sancho puts in a similar cross on his right to the Greenwood one btw which is like you say a difficult pass & the reason I think we need to bring in that quality.
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Yeah I'm never exactly against bringing in a quality player so I wouldn't be disappointed if we did sign him, but we have also done this under SAF and hindered ourselves as a result in the past. We messed up a really good partnership in Rooney and Tevez to try and fit Berbatov in. We tried to shoe horn Veron into a midfield already packed with quality.

The Haaland signing would have made more sense to me. It seems a bit odd to pass up the opprtunity to sign him fairly cheaply and then spend twice the amount on Sancho. Especially as we then had to sign a striker on loan.

Whenever I've seen Sancho play I've been impressed with his technical ability but he does also mess things up a lot. It's a very different game for Dortmund. Every time they get the ball it's an immediate transition to attack which is how the Bundesliga is generally played, so it doesn't matter so much if you mess a few. In the PL the games are more of a slog and more about closing out space, so it's not only easier to mess things up but you also get less opportunities in 90 minutes not to. Someone like Rashford can get away with being wasteful to a degree because he has an explosiveness that someone like Sancho doesn't, but players like that are really rare.

I'm not saying it wouldn't suit Sancho but I don't think looking good for Dortmund proves you'd be a hit in the PL...and when you see pundits comparing Sancho to people like Neymar it's just laughable. I think there's every chance if we sign him that he ends up the one sitting on the bench more often. We'll see how the current three do between now and the end of the season though.

At the end of the day I'd prefer having too many quality players to fit into a team than not enough.
 
Backrow Singer said:
You see a lot of young players who have a lot of talent but don’t have that cutting edge or decision making in the final third. He seems to have it. No doubt he‘ll have some up’s and down’s but he’s turning into a fine player.
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that’s the mad thing. he already has end product in abundance and he seems like a level headed guy. He has world class potential and if he can stay grounded and injury free the sky is the limit. Saying that I wouldn’t let mason stop us from signing sancho at all. It’s just another quality English player that can play all across the front line and competition is always healthy in sport. There is no downside to having both. If he can keep this up he’s going to be one of the top players in the league. I don’t want to jinx him but for me he’s the most naturally talented United youth player to break through since Giggs. He’s already more complete than Marcus. Rashford is a super athlete and is obviously devastating on his day but Greenwood just has something special. It’s brilliant having them both in the same team! We used to always have to buy our forwards and now we have 2 gems come through. It’s just great to see.
 
Boga has been linked quite strongly and has really come on this season. Would he possibly be a better value signing than Sancho as he'd be more usable in rotation with Mason, Martial and Rashford? He'd be a good 80 million or so cheaper and United have had their fingers burnt before buying from Dortmund...
 
noodlehair said:
Yeah I'm never exactly against bringing in a quality player so I wouldn't be disappointed if we did sign him, but we have also done this under SAF and hindered ourselves as a result in the past. We messed up a really good partnership in Rooney and Tevez to try and fit Berbatov in. We tried to shoe horn Veron into a midfield already packed with quality.
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The problem in those examples is that Fergie wanted to put all of them into the same first XI but couldn't figure out how.

If Ole is clever about it, he'll rotate a starting frontline with three out of four from Rashford, Martial, Greenwood and Sancho. Each of them can start 75% of matches then come on as sub in the other 25%.

What makes this new attacking lineup so special is the fact that they're all capable of swapping positions and fitting in and out of different roles to accommodate each other. None of them is an orthodox winger, striker or midfielder. You couldn't say the same about Scholes, Veron, Berba or Tevez when they were asked to play unfamiliar positions.
 
Would much rather back Greenwood instead of spunking £100 million on Sancho. Rashford, Martial and Greenwood is the stuff of dreams if it works.
 
Dante said:
The problem in those examples is that Fergie wanted to put all of them into the same first XI but couldn't figure out how.

If Ole is clever about it, he'll rotate a starting frontline with three out of four from Rashford, Martial, Greenwood and Sancho. Each of them can start 75% of matches then come on as sub in the other 25%.

What makes this new attacking lineup so special is the fact that they're all capable of swapping positions and fitting in and out of different roles to accommodate each other. None of them is an orthodox winger, striker or midfielder. You couldn't say the same about Scholes, Veron, Berba or Tevez when they were asked to play unfamiliar positions.
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I feel like we would still need that strong box striker to do the rough stuff and unsettle defenders and giving too many players undefined roles could be messy but the potential is scary.
 
noodlehair said:
Greenwood is just too good not to be playing which is why I have a bit of apprehension with us spending huge money on Sancho. Rashford imo is also too good not to play. I'm not sure Martial is but he is the only one of the three currently you can play through the middle and get the best out of. He's also only played as a striker this season really so 19 goals isn't a bad return, particularly as he was injured for a few months and generally doesn't take the penalties.

Sancho obviously wouldn't play through the middle so I'm not sure where you fit him in. I think he's somewhat overated anyway. He's a very good young player but people forget how young he is and I don't think you automatically drop one of our front three for him. Doing well for Dortmund isn't the same as doing well for United. Greenwood is making playing for United look easy at 18, that really isn't something to risk curtailing. Look at the ball to Fernandes. He made it look simple. Most players would have fecked that up 90% of the time. With him you just expected him to either score or pick someone out.
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A very good young player is underrating him like he's only doing good for a young player. We're talking about a just turned 20 year old (Gomes and Foden generation) player with 20 goals and 20 assists. Not to mention he's averaging 2.5 dribbles per game.

Getting Sancho could mean you have secured 10 years of service from England's top 2-3 generational talents. The potential from having those 2 team could mean game over for other PL clubs for several years.
 
Shane88 said:
Would much rather back Greenwood instead of spunking £100 million on Sancho. Rashford, Martial and Greenwood is the stuff of dreams if it works.
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We don't necessarily need Sancho, but I feel we still need competition in those areas. I would spend that 100m on 2-3 players rather than Sancho at this point. 1 to compete with Mason and Rashford, one to back up Bruno and a centre back.
 
Genuinely enjoy watching him play. He has a lot more to him than the other youth prospects we’ve gotten excited over in recent years.
 
One positive from the tournament postponements is that Mason will surely play himself into the England squad for next year's Euros.
 
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