Mctominay shouldn't start games in midfield for a top10 team

Isn't there a thread for McTominay where one could discuss it instead of starting a new thread more about our best field player this season?
 
Adisa said:
Hes not good enough to start for our rivals. So the blatant truth is that he shouldn't start for us either. That said, he plays becuase the club has failed in team building but at least, he gives everything. I cant say that for a lot of our players
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He wouldn’t even feature as a squad option, that’s the damning truth. Given how slowly we turn over players he’ll still be playing significant minutes for seasons to come.
 
Man city are bettering us with de bruyne and grealish in midfield who both not natural midfielders with Rodri holding and yet it was absurd to suggest giving van der beek a run in our midfield because supposedly he is a number who should only play as a number 10 and we would be better off with the fantastic 2 man midfield of fred.and mctominay.

If pep was forced our squad upon him he would probably have us play 433 with matic holding with beek and either lingard or sancho making up the midfield 3.

I am fed up of our submissive mentality that we have had post van gaal with how we have constantly set up with a cautious midfield and yet has barely done us any great favour defensively over that time
 
Abraxas said:
In your mind it is. Maybe the club and manager took the view that resources spent on an average player has a knock on effect for a summer budget when a full-time manager is in place. Maybe they also realise that transfers don't come with guanratees and don't necessarily immediately hit the ground running so the 6 months between January and the summer isn't worth compromising on quality.

There are a lot of potential reasons why not much was done in January that are pretty logical and if it results in getting the right midfielders in the summer I would say the club acted prudently.

Ole probably ballsed it up by not prioritising it, but it's water under the bridge now and you're preaching to the converted on McTominay so I don't know what the grand point is. We know it's a problem but we also know the uncertainty around the club and how January works.
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Yeah, because this club has showed during every transfer period in last how many years how transfers should be done, and we should keep believing that strategy because it's proving to be excellent. Right.
 
Yeah, you're a missing a 0 from the title.
 
amolbhatia50k said:
Agreed. A CM who can't pass isn't a proper CM. He's an option you use to disrupt games or add physicality to the midfield battle. But he shouldn't be starting for top 4 hopefuls.
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I agree. He is a valuable squad player for certain situations and he is a fighter. But his passing isnt good enough and he cant be a defensive midfielder as he cant read the game or see runners. Just reminds me of my old p.e teacher always saying not to ball watch, he does it so often.....but Fred is worse
 
None of our homegrown players would be kept at a top club. None are even close to the standard required.
 
Abraxas said:
There are a lot of potential reasons why not much was done in January that are pretty logical and if it results in getting the right midfielders in the summer I would say the club acted prudently.
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I am sure there are actually way more -logical- reasons to not bring somebody in in January. I mean, I understand where you are coming from, we should certainly avoid exchanging dross for other dross. But if we look at the midfield, thats the current situation:
- Fred
- McTominay
- Pogba
- Matic
- DVB

The first two are evaluated as way too bad for the first team, Pogba is going to leave, Matic can't really be seen as an option anymore considering he can't really play longer than 45minutes (if even that). DVB is out on loan and hasn't been given a chance here (for whatever reasons).

Thats 5 options minus 1 in Pogba, minus 1 in Matic. The options for next season are therefor Fred, McTom, DVB. Bringing in an average option would be a net-positive at this point. Only to add numbers because we are pretty thin for next year. Obviously, we shouldn't stop there, we still have to bring in more reinforcements for midfield, but what are the odds for bringing in more than (if even) two players for midfield? The acquisition could have also used this season to bed in while the season is more or less pointless at this point anyway.

No one talked about shelling out 50 million for McGinn or something, but 5 million Kamara would have been a good acquisition. I am sure there would have been more available options of this calibre. Not doing anything was a mistake. Nothing in our past shows that "the money saved in January" is added for the summer budget. And no manager in the world, not even the best ones, will be able to do anything of note with a midfield of Fred, McTom and DVB.

To me, it was an obvious mistake - again, I could understand your points as being logical under different circumstances.
 
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Abraxas said:
There are a lot of potential reasons why not much was done in January that are pretty logical and if it results in getting the right midfielders in the summer I would say the club acted prudently.
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There is no logical reason with a DoF in place. We are repeating the same mistakes over again. In the Summer we’ll have a new manager, on a limited time table & will complete our customary snails pace 2/3 transfers then wonder why things don’t actually change.

There are 2 windows per year to complete transfers but 365 days to work on them, how the hell our ‘football people’ can look at this squad & wrote off 1 of the 2 opportunities this year to make changes is malpractice.
 
NZT-One said:
I am sure there are actually way more -logical- reasons to bring somebody in in January. I mean, I understand where you are coming from, we should certainly avoid exchanging dross for other dross. But if we look at the midfield, thats the current situation:
- Fred
- McTominay
- Pogba
- Matic
- DVB

The first two are evaluated as way too bad for the first team, Pogba is going to leave, Matic can't really be seen as an option anymore considering he can't really play longer than 45minutes (if even that). DVB is out on loan and hasn't been given a chance here (for whatever reasons).

Thats 5 options minus 1 in Pogba, minus 1 in Matic. The options for next season are therefor Fred, McTom, DVB. Bringing in an average option would be a net-positive at this point. Only to add numbers because we are pretty thin for next year. Obviously, we shouldn't stop there, we still have to bring in more reinforcements for midfield, but what are the odds for bringing in more than (if even) two players for midfield? The acquisition could have also used this season to bed in while the season is more or less pointless at this point anyway.

No one talked about shelling out 50 million for McGinn or something, but 5 million Kamara would have been a good acquisition. I am sure there would have been more available options of this calibre. Not doing anything was a mistake. Nothing in our past shows that "the money saved in January" is added for the summer budget. And no manager in the world, not even the best ones, will be able to do anything of note with a midfield of Fred, McTom and DVB.

To me, it was an obvious mistake - again, I could understand your points as being logical under different circumstances.
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I don't agree that bringing in an average player is a net positive, I think that premise is wrong. I agree that if you feel that way then January is as good a time as any to do business but I don't think it is the correct way to look at using our funds which may well be limited because signing or no signing the CL is a struggle. We have a squad full of averageness. It's not a body that we're missing, even though I would completely agree that we lack a real specialist defensive midfielder.

There's absolutely no guanratee this Kamara guy is a quarter as good as people on here make out. The way random French players and McFred are analysed is completely different and the standards applied to them is completely different. The chances are even if such a player was a good long term bet there wouldn't be that much practical benefit to realise right now for a player of that profile. It wouldn't be any more useful than approaching it in the summer and getting a preseason behind such a player rather than entering a jumbled mess and expecting him to make a big difference.

I personally think only a player with real gravitas, real personality and quality could enter in January and make a Bruno like impact. But this is a conundrum because such players aren't routinely moving in January. Its possible, I'm not saying it isn't but the odds might not have been in our favour and it's a very concrete thing - either the names RR and Murtough etc want are there or we compromise and potentially just add to the mess.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
There is no logical reason with a DoF in place. We are repeating the same mistakes over again. In the Summer we’ll have a new manager, on a limited time table & will complete our customary snails pace 2/3 transfers then wonder why things don’t actually change.

There are 2 windows per year to complete transfers but 365 days to work on them, how the hell our ‘football people’ can look at this squad & wrote off 1 of the 2 opportunities this year to make changes is malpractice.
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Yeah good points about the limited number of opportunities and a DOF (even without an actual DOF as Ralf is with us for that as well). We can't wait for a new manager to decide how we are going to play. FFS even if we are thinking that how are we seeming not knowing who is going to come in? We must have talked to them and if we consider them as capable of taking over, we should have talked with them about main priorities in terms of recruitments.

The main reason to go a DOF-construct is that it is supposed to provide continuity without the need to stick to one particular manager. To use that as an explanation against bringing in a player in January is lunacy in my eyes. We need to bring in somebody just for numbers sake at this point - just to not get even worse next year. We haven't even started to think about improving midfield at this point.
 
Midfield is where the game is won and lost. Ours is so poor, we are destined to lose control of the midfield and ultimately the match against quality opposition.

Fred, Matic, McTominay, Pogba, take your pick. None of them are good enough. We need an entirely new midfield capable of doing the basic skills required of a midfielder. That is screening your defence and linking defence and attack. They are the two most fundamental things a midfield should do. None of our midfielders are capable of doing both of those things in any sort of competent way.
 
I can't stand him.

Him and Fred are unfairly grouped together. Fred isn't great, but he is a much better footballer than McTominay.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
There is no logical reason with a DoF in place. We are repeating the same mistakes over again. In the Summer we’ll have a new manager, on a limited time table & will complete our customary snails pace 2/3 transfers then wonder why things don’t actually change.

There are 2 windows per year to complete transfers but 365 days to work on them, how the hell our ‘football people’ can look at this squad & wrote off 1 of the 2 opportunities this year to make changes is malpractice.
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I would guess there are any number of reasons for this "malpractice." Such as spending 100 million in the summer after Covid hit finances which potentially might have been a pretty set budget for the entire season. Ole may have spent what was available, and perhaps inefficiently. That would be nothing to do with writing anything off, it's acknowledgment that we spend within our financial parameters, which we know the potential of which is somewhat constrained by the owners.
 
Abraxas said:
I don't agree that bringing in an average player is a net positive, I think that premise is wrong. I agree that if you feel that way then January is as good a time as any to do business but I don't think it is the correct way to look at using our funds which may well be limited because signing or no signing the CL is a struggle. We have a squad full of averageness. It's not a body that we're missing, even though I would completely agree that we lack a real specialist defensive midfielder.

There's absolutely no guanratee this Kamara guy is a quarter as good as people on here make out. The way random French players and McFred are analysed is completely different and the standards applied to them is completely different. The chances are even if such a player was a good long term bet there wouldn't be that much practical benefit to realise right now for a player of that profile. It wouldn't be any more useful than approaching it in the summer and getting a preseason behind such a player rather than entering a jumbled mess and expecting him to make a big difference.

I personally think only a player with real gravitas, real personality and quality could enter in January and make a Bruno like impact. But this is a conundrum because such players aren't routinely moving in January. Its possible, I'm not saying it isn't but the odds might not have been in our favour and it's a very concrete thing - either the names RR and Murtough etc want are there or we compromise and potentially just add to the mess.
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Again, I understand your point in a way but I think, that it is built on a non-reality premise. Look at Matic, he is not available often and if he is, he is a) slow and b) suprisingly useful in his position. Bringing in Kamara in January would have given us the chance to use him instead of Matic. Kamara especially is also (from what I read) somewhat of a CB. With Jones and Bailly currently our 4th option, this is just an additional benefit. Such a player could have also helped to bring us CL football, which probably has just as much influence of our summer budget as our January transfer kitty.

I think, we are in a place, that we should stop with the image that only a real good player could help us out. It isn't. No one player will sort our mess out. Therefor we can't just sit and wait and put all our hopes on one individual. That is just not very sensible.

edit: Plus we don't know how a player will turn out anyway. We could bring in Rice and he could fail because of the pressure. We could bring in Kamara and he turns out to be Kante Mk II. There is always an element of gambling in there. And if we have the budget to bring in players like Cavani and Ronaldo than it shouldn't be too much of a huzzle to take punt in a position where we are in dire need. Players can be sold if they don't work out.
 
Been 9 years since Sir Alex left and our midfield consisted of players like McTominay, Fred, Fellaini, Matic a practically retired Schweinsteiger and so on. Only a club led by sheer incompetence would ignore the most crucial area of the pitch for a decade.

Oh wait....
 
Ole and Carrick started with the nonsense, of trying to convert him to a DM. He will never be a DM. He is an average box to box player, that turns up once in every 8 games or so. How he is starting for us most games is a mystery. We know he isn't good enough, try Hannibal or Garner (recall). Lets see who may be.
 
Awful as a DM. He has no sense of defensive positioning. Play him higher up the pitch as a box to box player, or don’t play him at all (I know which option many of the caf would choose - personally I rate the lad but you may as well stick Pogba at DM).
 
First time today from Keane I’ve heard someone in the media criticise what he’s actually doing on the pitch, or in the case of the 4th goal what he isn’t doing.
 
Stadjer said:
I read that he is third choice centre back for Scotland. That isnt true right? Any Scots here?
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He's started for Scotland on a few occasions as a CB, and done well there. Usually as a back three.
Bits it only been due to circumstances/injuries as to the reason he's played there.

He's an extremely effective midfielder who can play football, be aggressive in the tackle and score goals. He isn't a CDM, which is what this team is missing. He would be amazing in Liverpool's set up instead of Henderson. Yet our fanbase will not realize his positives until he has been sold, rather like Fellaini, Blind, Herrera, et Al.
 
He's just another mediocre player from our academy, like Cleverley, but because our midfield is completely lacking any quality whatsoever he's got a free pass for ages.
 
Champ said:
He's started for Scotland on a few occasions as a CB, and done well there. Usually as a back three.
Bits it only been due to circumstances/injuries as to the reason he's played there.

He's an extremely effective midfielder who can play football, be aggressive in the tackle and score goals. He isn't a CDM, which is what this team is missing. He would be amazing in Liverpool's set up instead of Henderson. Yet our fanbase will not realize his positives until he has been sold, rather like Fellaini, Blind, Herrera, et Al.
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Extremely effective midfielder, scott mctominay? I respect you are scottish but come on, the guy can't play football at the level required, division 2 at best
 
NZT-One said:
Again, I understand your point in a way but I think, that it is built on a non-reality premise. Look at Matic, he is not available often and if he is, he is a) slow and b) suprisingly useful in his position. Bringing in Kamara in January would have given us the chance to use him instead of Matic. Kamara especially is also (from what I read) somewhat of a CB. With Jones and Bailly currently our 4th option, this is just an additional benefit. Such a player could have also helped to bring us CL football, which probably has just as much influence of our summer budget as our January transfer kitty.

I think, we are in a place, that we should stop with the image that only a real good player could help us out. It isn't. No one player will sort our mess out. Therefor we can't just sit and wait and put all our hopes on one individual. That is just not very sensible.

edit: Plus we don't know how a player will turn out anyway. We could bring in Rice and he could fail because of the pressure. We could bring in Kamara and he turns out to be Kante Mk II. There is always an element of gambling in there. And if we have the budget to bring in players like Cavani and Ronaldo than it shouldn't be too much of a huzzle to take punt in a position where we are in dire need. Players can be sold if they don't work out.
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But is using Kamara or X player instead of Matic really striking at the problem? I thought that what we're saying is that we fundamentally lack quality, specifically that McTominay lacks quality. You're not even holding out that much hope for a player like Kamara making a huge difference within your own analysis so why then should it be so significant to do it now?

Which is only sensible because he's a young player and we're a diabolical mess. I just don't see that we are missing much value in that particular signing with an interim manager, a squad full of disgruntled and underperforming flops and a complete sea change to come. If we could have got hold of a proven signing for the midfield then I think that should be viewed differently because that potentially impacts us immediately. So yes I would say there is quite a difference between a bit of a punt and genuine quality.

I just think a lot of frustration is boiling over and we're not seeing January for what it is. A difficult time to get something really productive done. It's possible, it can and has been done but most clubs do limited business and that is for sensible reasons. I don't think it's worth getting too hot under the collar over when we know this is the case. If the summer is a disaster then yes I would be extremely annoyed and concerned.
 
jesperjaap said:
I agree. He is a valuable squad player for certain situations and he is a fighter. But his passing isnt good enough and he cant be a defensive midfielder as he cant read the game or see runners. Just reminds me of my old p.e teacher always saying not to ball watch, he does it so often.....but Fred is worse
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Valuable player? Seriously? Fighter? Let him do boxing then, he is a shit player. Fred isnt great either but you can at least see he upped his tempo and improved a bit under RR, mctominay is another Lingard, the only place he should playing at is the Gulag
 
The only two clubs in the league I could see him starting for is Norwich and Leeds.

He is actually shocking. I can see why the forward players are getting fed up to be honest with Shaw/AWB and Fred/Scott. There not even average. Your never going to win the league with 7 proper players on the pitch and them four lads. Not going to happen.
 
Abraxas said:
But is using Kamara or X player instead of Matic really striking at the problem? I thought that what we're saying is that we fundamentally lack quality, specifically that McTominay lacks quality. You're not even holding out that much hope for a player like Kamara making a huge difference within your own analysis so why then should it be so significant to do it now?
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Because a player who is half as competent defensively as Matic and as mobile as McTom would benefit us very much. Not only that, it would also support us to maybe push a little bit higher up the field so we can stay compact without having to play mostly in our own half. The current set of players aren't particularly bad players in my eyes. But the composition is very very bad. We have a guy with all the abilities to be a great DLP, but he lacks dynamism and defensive prowess. We have Fred who has dynamism in abundance but lacks defensive awareness as well. We have McTom who adds physicality but is close to a defensive liability as soon as the tempo around him gets higher. We have Matic who is great in defensive positioning but so slow these days, that players can ran rings around him. There is no single combination of two players who are even theoretically a functioning midfield. A Kamara type player would change that.

And just to be sure, at this point, I would even take an even bigger unknown player as long as stats are promising... As I said, we have a numbers problem right now in midfield. It could have been adressed in January. We also have a quality problem in midfield. I know we all would have liked that to be adressed in January but I agree with you, the quality problem is more difficult to solve.

Abraxas said:
Which is only sensible because he's a young player and we're a diabolical mess. I just don't see that we are missing much value in that particular signing with an interim manager, a squad full of disgruntled and underperforming flops and a complete sea change to come. If we could have got hold of a proven signing for the midfield then I think that should be viewed differently because that potentially impacts us immediately. So yes I would say there is quite a difference between a bit of a punt and genuine quality.
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Of course there is a difference there. And I am not a hard on Kamara fan, he seemed to be a good package, young, good stats, very good price. Obviously I would have taken an even better option as well. Maybe I can try to be more precise: Bringing in a quality player would have been great (2 Plus points), bringing in a promising player would have been a sensible/reasonable/necessary thing to do (0 plus points), not doing anything was bad (1 Minus point).
We just missed a beat here. Again, I'd be totally on your side, if we would talk about for example a CB or striker or anything. Because the squad would have provided somebody somehow. But for the DM, we don't have anybody. And I'd say, no potential manager will be able to create a working midfield with what we have, a January acquisition would therefor make sense in any case, even under a new manager who is then bringing in another option.

Abraxas said:
I just think a lot of frustration is boiling over and we're not seeing January for what it is. A difficult time to get something really productive done. It's possible, it can and has been done but most clubs do limited business and that is for sensible reasons. I don't think it's worth getting too hot under the collar over when we know this is the case. If the summer is a disaster then yes I would be extremely annoyed and concerned.
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Agreed. Even though I think, January shouldn't be seen as some sort of 2nd tier transfer opportunity. I agree, if I am Bayern Munich and I am looking for a Lewandowski replacement, I don't do it in January. It usually isn't the time for the best players to make big moves. But it absolutely is suitable to cover deficiencies in your squad that do not require the best players in a certain position. Lets face it, the United midfield is in a dire place. Hell, I'd tried to loan fecking Gueye from PSG or some guy from China or whatever. In the worst case scenario, it doesn't work out, so be it, but at least you tried your luck.
 
He doesn't start for any other team in this league, he's a shit fecking player and if this is best centre midfield our academy can produce now then fecking close it down.
 
Wouldn't make the bench for most of our rivals but he's an important part of the current set up which says it all for where we're at as a club currently really.

Will never fault the effort certain players put in but quite a few simply aren't cut out for being relied upon at big clubs. We've got too many of those in the squad unfortunately
 
He would be a good player at Watford
 
It's pretty stark when you just look at his quality relative to the other big clubs in the PL. City, Liverpool, and Chelsea all have at least 4-5 midfielders who are better than he is, which is outrageous - the decline from a player like Darren Fletcher to McTominay is massive and hugely damning of United's squad management.
 
I've always maintained the same opinion of him, he'd be great as a squad player in a well functioning side.. and occasionally come into big games in a midfield three as B2B next to a DM and a baller

I agree he shouldn't be our main starter though, he isn't suited to a possession game which is where we want to be (dominating most games).. but that isn't his fault
 
I've always said McFred is the biggest reason why our football has been so average. They are so limited - can't pass, can't create, can't offer anything in buildup play, and can't defend alone in DM role. The only use of them, is that they have legs and would run alot in midfield and would get stuck in at times, that's about it. Yes perhaps they are both naturally box to box players who would never fit into the lone DM role, but I'd prefer to have a box to box player who could actually pass, someone like Herrera instead of McFred.
 
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As even Scotland have realised, McTom is a championship level CB playing midfield at supposedly the top end of the Premier League, the switch to the back 4 makes more sense than continuing a flailing about midfield role. Nice bloke and all that , not what is needed frankly.
 
amolbhatia50k said:
Agreed. A CM who can't pass isn't a proper CM. He's an option you use to disrupt games or add physicality to the midfield battle. But he shouldn't be starting for top 4 hopefuls.
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This. Agreed with the OP. Harsh on Scott, but he’s a symptom of how far we’ve fallen as a club,. The plucky underdog these days. In there for his fight and attitude over his ability as a footballer (passing, controlling the match, positioning etc).

It’s not his fault entirely but criminal how the club has let the midfield position become a choice between McFred plus Matic (past it but grand in his prime) and Pogba (never had a DM or team bringing out the best of his ability/question his commitment).
 
The same can be said for Maguire AwB Shaw Matic Fred etc

The team is sh!t.

The club is run sh!t.

The leeches should be chased out but they wont be.

We are at least 4/5 years away from challenging and thats assuming we get in a really good manager, but when the end of season comes and we have no CL football next season will we get a top manager?
We certainly wont get the top players coming without CL football.
 
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