Moyes So Far!

[Nights]

I love Gary, he's one of my all time favourites, but he isn't half getting on my nerves this season with some of the things he's coming off with. He keeps blabbering on about the fact that Moyes will outlast the players here as if it's some kind of threat, when in reality the way things are going I imagine that there are several players including Kagawa, Hernandez, RvP etc for whom getting away from this club and Moyes won't represent a bad thing. I imagine for the sake of their careers they are quite looking forward to it. "Keep trudging away" said Kagawa. Who wants trudge away in their job at 23-24? Not one of these players look like they're enjoying their football under him atm.

I think Gary's really backed himself into a corner with his comments about how United always support their managers. Even he should be able to see how abysmal a job Moyes is doing. Maybe he's just trying to defend his brother's job; I mean, if Moyes got sacked, I don't really see any top team taking Phil Neville on as a coach.

I'm intrigued as to how far Moyes could drag this club before Neville would admit its time or get rid. I imagine he'd be happy to let him do a fair bit of damage just so that we can say "We're Manchester United we give managers time". I just don't see the point in giving the wrong man time. The comparisons with giving Fergie time are also irksome. Fergie had a positive impact here in his first two seasons. And he came here with a good pedigree. He was already a winner, we weren't attempting to turn him into one. His task was completely different to Moyes'. It warranted time.

I agree the comparison's are ludicrous. Fergie was a proven winner. Moyes top CV credentials was reaching fourth ONCE. He averaged a finishing spot of 8th in his time at Everton. Even Pellegrini got Villareal to fourth multiple times, and even to second against the might of Barca/Madrid. He also got them to the UCL semis. Interesting fact is that his Villareal were the ones that knocked Moyes out of the UCL qualifying rounds the one and only time Moyes got into UCL contention. Simeone has Atleti right up there with the big two whilst operating on a shoestring budget. Klopp had Dortmund on an upward trajectory as soon as he arrived and topped a team that dwarfed his in terms of wages/spending. Those are the sort of accomplishments that gives people the trust to ride out the bad times because they've proven that they can win and be successful.

Moyes should have embraced living up to the high expectations this club has when in fact all he's done is lower our own expectations to meet his own lowly ones. It's to the point that playing shit on a stick football with 82 crosses constitutes to playing well, and when facing Newcastle at home we endeavour to "try to make it difficult for them". There is high praise for the team when we lose but "get to the byeline 8 or 9 times" and not to mention that it's a signal that we've played well when we "got near the edge of the box a few times" - yeah, not even inside the box, just near the edge.

It was really disappointing for me to see Moyes come at the beginning of the UCL and immediately make excuses for himself and simultaneously denigrate a squad of winners by saying we couldn't win the UCL because we needed 5-6 world class players like Bayern had. Fergie would have never said that, even in our dark days of the early 2000s.

 

[LonelyFire]

If you watch our games this season, its clear there is absolutely zero emphasis in off ball movement. Barca keep the ball so well because the player with the ball has a minimum of 3 options to take. In contrast, count how many times our centre half's go long because there is nothing happening in front of them.

As people have pointed out, its about moving as a unit. If player x offers himself to player y on the ball, then someone should move to said space player x vacated in expectation he is going to get the ball. Difficult? Not really. But it requires a hell of a lot of shadow work and a manager who believes in it.

Our manager prioritises physical fitness over all, and ultimately doesn't have the expertise to pull off what in referring too. For Man Utd, that's just a shame.

 

[Revan]

Gary had become the new Paddy ever since Moyes decided to sign Phil as coach. You cant blame him. Who would have thought that a former player with no coaching experience who was renowned for running in circles and recklessly tackle players in front of the box would end up as a coach in one of the biggest clubs in the world? If United didn't stepped in then I doubt that Barcelona would have appointed him as their own technical coach.

It is a bit of a shame cause he was a really great pundit last season. Now he is probably the worst one. If he was a Caf poster, I would have put him in ignore. I know the sentimentality reason (United better than others blah blah blah, my brother got a job he couldn't have even dreamt because of Moyes) but when you are pundit it is supposed to be not completely biased. Also, I don't get how he always defends Moyes but doesn't hesitate to crtiticize players with whom he played many years. It's baffling.

 

[Kaos]

As much as I love Gary Neville he's really doing my head in with his nauseous pro-Moyes agenda.

Even if we were sitting 20th and about 15 points from safety he'd convince us he's the right man, needs to be given time, Rome wasn't built in a day etc.

 

[NoLogo]

I don't think the players have understood at all what he is wanting from them. Maybe his tactics are over complicated? There's no connection between the midfield and defence or midfield and forward line. Without us being in the room or on the training ground, we don't know if they are just confused or are being deliberately defiant. Someone said he only discusses actual tactics just before a game, can that be right and is that normal for other clubs as well? If it is then it seems crazy or that the manager is over analysing the opposition or cannot decide his own tactics and is leaving it far too late.

That's it. He is such a tactical genius that his players just can't follow his genius level tactics.

 

[mic.m]

Isn't that exactly what he's done with all that "little horse" nonsense?

How is portraying Chelsea as an underdog in the title race not questioning the quality of his squad?

come on. It's about context.This was in response to questions about whether they or City were title favourites. Chelsea are top of the league. Even Mancini kept insisting United were title favourites even when they beat us with a few games left.

On the other hand a new manager inherits a title winning squad. Said squad underperforms. New manager questions the quality of the squad and says they were lucky because the competition was poor.

 

[Getsme]

If you watch our games this season, its clear there is absolutely zero emphasis in off ball movement. Barca keep the ball so well because the player with the ball has a minimum of 3 options to take. In contrast, count how many times our centre half's go long because there is nothing happening in front of them.

As people have pointed out, its about moving as a unit. If player x offers himself to player y on the ball, then someone should move to said space player x vacated in expectation he is going to get the ball. Difficult? Not really. But it requires a hell of a lot of shadow work and a manager who believes in it.

Our manager prioritises physical fitness over all, and ultimately doesn't have the expertise to pull off what in referring too. For Man Utd, that's just a shame.

I agree,

I don’t think anyone expects us to play like Barcelona this season, but the way Barcelona, Munich, Real/Atletico Madrid play football is the future, in a way its bringing football back to grass roots, pass and move, keep possession, exploit the oppositions weakness and play to your teams strengths not the oppositions.

Unfortunately our football is as far away from that as you can get, play to the by-line, cross, repeat. We have some very technically gifted players in our squad, we don’t play to their strengths and it’s made us look like a week team, which is far from the truth.

 

[devilish]

It is a bit of a shame cause he was a really great pundit last season. Now he is probably the worst one. If he was a Caf poster, I would have put him in ignore. I know the sentimentality reason (United better than others blah blah blah, my brother got a job he couldn't have even dreamt because of Moyes) but when you are pundit it is supposed to be not completely biased. Also, I don't get how he always defends Moyes but doesn't hesitate to crtiticize players with whom he played many years. It's baffling.

Family comes first. If a world class manager comes along then I seriously doubt that he would keep an inexperienced coach with limited football knowledge as Phil is.

 

[Revan]

I don't think the players have understood at all what he is wanting from them. Maybe his tactics are over complicated?

Yep. He has 217 variations of how to cross and 148 ways how to hoof the ball from CB to Valencia. Players cannot remember all of them and choose the adequate cross/hoof and for that we are losing.

 

[nimic]

As with all the factors being discussed in this godforsaken season, we don't know what would have happened if Moyes hadn't brought his own team with him.

Phelan's previously been blamed for some fairly uninspiring football over the past couple of seasons, then came out with this weird comment where he tried to claim he was more responsible than Fergie for our recent success (something like that anyway, can't remember the exact quote) Meanwhile, Rene's since proven himself to have quite the ego too, as well as fairly disastrous spell as a manager. We've no idea how either of them would have dealt with life after Fergie.

Would they have got 100% behind the new manager? Or undermined him? There's a good reason that most managers bring their own backroom staff with them.

Obviously, Moyes' reign has been such a catastrophe that it's tempting to think that every decision he made was a bad one. He's clearly made some poor decisions but t's quite possible that this was not one of them.

Yes, time has if anything made me even more confused about the whole thing. Moyes has done so poorly that you'd like to blame part of that on the lacking backroom staff, but at the same time some of the previous staff have said or done some very strange things.

Overall I'm still negative about the whole deal, but it's a valid question if they would have been able to work with Moyes in the first place.

 

[kouroux]

Isn't that exactly what he's done with all that "little horse" nonsense?

How is portraying Chelsea as an underdog in the title race not questioning the quality of his squad?

I think it's a fairly obvious tactic (whether it's efficient or not is another debate) of trying the ease the pressure off his players. He knows he has a good except for the striker role and he's among the true favorites to win the title.

 

[B20]

I agree. But is this a hindsight thing?

Looking at cv's no way any of those 3 get the job before Moyes.

We didn't hire Rodgers for his CV.

Need to look at the kind of football they set their teams out to play and ask how well it scales.

 

[B20]

Didn't know where else to ask this:

Could someone please explain to me what the so often used term "percentage football" refers to?

If I understood correctly, it refers to crossing and hoping for the best?

Percentage football is when you stop asking "what is the right option to unlock the defence in this situation" and fall back on the received lore that since X percent of crosses result in a big chance, simply making sure to get that number of crosses into the box should produce a big chance from which we could score.

 

[mic.m]

As much as I love Gary Neville he's really doing my head in with his nauseous pro-Moyes agenda.

Even if we were sitting 20th and about 15 points from safety he'd convince us he's the right man, needs to be given time, Rome wasn't built in a day etc.

 

[B20]

Mr Man Utd pipes in:

This stood out as the most blinkered, ridiculously stupid statement:

Nice one. Gary. YAWN.

 

[kouroux]

Percentage football is when you stop asking "what is the right option to unlock the defence in this situation" and fall back on the received lore that since X percent of crosses result in a big chance, simply making sure to get that number of crosses into the box should produce a big chance from which we could score.

Yeah and percentage football would be "good" if most crosses attempted end up in dangerous sections of the penalty box but with our wingers, we see a lot of crosses, not a long dangerous ones and sometimes some ridiculously overhit ones.

 

[LR7]

I think Gary's really backed himself into a corner with his comments about how United always support their managers. Even he should be able to see how abysmal a job Moyes is doing. Maybe he's just trying to defend his brother's job; I mean, if Moyes got sacked, I don't really see any top team taking Phil Neville on as a coach.



I agree the comparison's are ludicrous. Fergie was a proven winner. Moyes top CV credentials was reaching fourth ONCE. He averaged a finishing spot of 8th in his time at Everton. Even Pellegrini got Villareal to fourth multiple times, and even to second against the might of Barca/Madrid. He also got them to the UCL semis. Interesting fact is that his Villareal were the ones that knocked Moyes out of the UCL qualifying rounds the one and only time Moyes got into UCL contention. Simeone has Atleti right up there with the big two whilst operating on a shoestring budget. Klopp had Dortmund on an upward trajectory as soon as he arrived and topped a team that dwarfed his in terms of wages/spending. Those are the sort of accomplishments that gives people the trust to ride out the bad times because they've proven that they can win and be successful.



It was really disappointing for me to see Moyes come at the beginning of the UCL and immediately make excuses for himself and simultaneously denigrate a squad of winners by saying we couldn't win the UCL because we needed 5-6 world class players like Bayern had. Fergie would have never said that, even in our dark days of the early 2000s.

Good points, especially your last one. Must have been completely demoralising for the players to hear Moyes say we needed 5-6 world class players to win the CL. Players have egos and they need to be built up, whilst Moyes just seemed to be getting his excuses in early. Even if he thought that, what was the benefit of saying it in public? So early on in his time here. Having David Moyes as a manager is probably more of a hinderance in the CL than the players we do or don't have.

 

[mic.m]

As much as I love Gary Neville he's really doing my head in with his nauseous pro-Moyes agenda.

Even if we were sitting 20th and about 15 points from safety he'd convince us he's the right man, needs to be given time, Rome wasn't built in a day etc.

He is never going to critcise a fellow British manager who has his brother as an assistant. I refuse to believe that both him and Keane really see nothing wrong with Moyes and put all the blame on the players. There is probably an unwritten code in the press and punditry world not to criticise any British managers. Only foreigners who are not Mourinho get called out.

 

[B20]

Yeah and percentage football would be "good" if most crosses attempted end up in dangerous sections of the penalty box but with our wingers, we see a lot of crosses, not a long dangerous ones and sometimes some ridiculously overhit ones.

We did similar under Kenny in his full season. I think it was informed by Commoli. I personally think it is a misleading stat.

If you teams attempting crosses because they get into situations where that is the best option, crossing obviously will look good in the stats. Basing a philosophy of crossing on such a stat fails to take into account to what degree "the best option in that given situation" played a part in upping those stats.

 

[Pexbo]

Percentage football is when you stop asking "what is the right option to unlock the defence in this situation" and fall back on the received lore that since X percent of crosses result in a big chance, simply making sure to get that number of crosses into the box should produce a big chance from which we could score.

Which is 200% what he believes in and why he put the Fulham game down to some sort of incredible luck on Fulhams behalf and not basic positioning and tactics by Rene.

 

[kouroux]

We did similar under Kenny in his full season. I think it was informed by Commoli. I personally think it is a misleading stat.

If you teams attempting crosses because they get into situations where that is the best option, crossing obviously will look good in the stats. Basing a philosophy of crossing on such a stat fails to take into account to what degree "the best option in that given situation" played a part in upping those stats.

We are football fans who debate the sport for hours on the internet and at worst we can become some keyboard warriors but how come we can see an error so obvious and not see it corrected ? Cross it all day if you're wingers are extremely accurate at it and you have a Drogba type striker in the box with support from midfielders. We have none of these things (the crossers, the striker and the midfielders)

 

[B20]

Which is 200% what he believes in and why he put the Fulham game down to some sort of incredible luck on Fulhams behalf and not basic positioning and tactics by Rene.

Quote from Commoli:

It was all part of a plan that should have led to a team to victory should they “win more than 40 headers, or cross the ball more than 30 times or make more than 12 regains in the final third”​

Rodgers was on about similar stuff a year ago with possession stats but he seems to have moved on from that.

 

[RedRover]

10 years at everton, it's all his players he either bought or brought up

You have the answer

Granted they're 2nd class players, but do you think it'll be much more than what they've shown? Probably a more lethal striker and a more solid defender, but other than that, the blueprint is there for us to see

You don't need 200M for him to show what his team can do. Just flip a page in Everton's playbook.

He's targetting top players - Fabreges last year, Kroos, Gundogan - even Bale last season - players who are footballers, so I suspect with more options and the players he thinks he needs he'll try to find a way to play. It wont neccessarily be how he played at Everton because he has different players.

He was succesful at Everton, did well in the transfer market. That carries no guarantees but they were a decent side.

Loads of Everton fans are waxing lyrical about Martinez and the style of play they have. All well and good and fair enough. It remains to be seen whether once the honeymoon period has worn off they end up any higher than they did under Moyes.

At the end of the day the better players you have, the better football you usually play. People have jumped on this "Moyes plays anti football" bandwagon of late because the players arent performing well. Earlier in the season we played some decent stuff when they have confidence.

You can criticse managers styles of play and everybody will have an opinion as to what they'd like to see. You might then want to pick a manager because his sides are attractive to watch. I'd suggest that a manager who wants Juan Mata in his squad, is desperate to keep Wayne Rooney and is targetting ball playing midfielders intends, at some stage, to try and play a decent brand of football.

This squad didn't play magnificent free flowing football under Fergie, and Mourinho is one of the most negative managers out there - and he seems to suddenly be a lot of people's ideal choice.

 

[LR7]

Which is 200% what he believes in and why he put the Fulham game down to some sort of incredible luck on Fulhams behalf and not basic positioning and tactics by Rene.

You just haven't got a football brain or enough footballing intelligence to see the genius in what Moyes was trying to do Pex.

 

[B20]

We are football fans who debate the sport for hours on the internet and at worst we can become some keyboard warriors but how come we can see an error so obvious and not see it corrected ? Cross it all day if you're wingers are extremely accurate at it and you have a Drogba type striker in the box with support from midfielders. We have none of these things (the crossers, the striker and the midfielders)

I think stats are important, but for me the main problem with designing a philosophy based on them is that it is necessarily reactive and as such behind the curve.

 

[Kaos]

He is never going to critcise a fellow British manager who has his brother as an assistant. I refuse to believe that both him and Keane really see nothing wrong with Moyes and put all the blame on the players. There is probably an unwritten code in the press and punditry world not to criticise any British managers. Only foreigners who are not Mourinho get called out.

That's fine and all, but he seemed to go out of his way to criticise United last season, including his old manager's tactics just to prove his impartiality as a pundit. Yet with Moyes and his brother it's all blind bias.

 

[JaffyJoe]

We didn't hire Rodgers for his CV.

Need to look at the kind of football they set their teams out to play and ask how well it scales.

I wasn't talking about Liverpool.

What we look for in a manager and what you look for is different, we would want somebody with more of a proven record at the highest level which Rodgers doesn't have. Rodgers has done a great job but there's no way after what he did at Swansea he could have gotten a job at a top team.

 

[Nights]

He was succesful at Everton, did well in the transfer market. That carries no guarantees but they were a decent side

Successful is a relative term.

This squad didn't play magnificent free flowing football under Fergie, and Mourinho is one of the most negative managers out there - and he seems to suddenly be a lot of people's ideal choice.

Yea, but Fergie kept winning even without free flowing football, and he wasn't afraid to mix it up a bit when needed.

Mourinho might be a negative manager, but how has Moyes been any different this season? We've virtually set out to win every game 1-0. Even at Old Trafford, the lineups and tactics are defensive.

So if we had Mourinho, we'd be tight defensively, not be too adventurous and win lots of games 1-0.

Under Moyes, we leak goals, play not too adventurously and lose games 0-1.

I know which one I'd prefer.

 

[Anderson18]

He would've made such a huge difference.

 

[JaffyJoe]

If Moyes was winning or playing good football there would be some optimism.

He is doing neither. Red Rover makes some good points, I feel like he most likely doesn't rate the vast majority of players here and is working with what he has until next season. He has shown himself to be a poor man manager and you need it all at the highest level.

It is easier to do well/exceed expectations at a team that is not expected to be competing.

How do you exceed expectations at City, United or Chelsea? Winning is expected.

 

[LR7]

I also don't see why Moyes is the only manager who has taken over at a top club this season who needs an extraordinary amount of time. Yes following Fergie was always going to be difficult but being champions again in his first season should have been tough, but challenging for honours should have been the bear minimum required.
Why don't Guardiola, Pellegrini, Mourinho, Ancelotti, or Martino all need ridiculous amounts of time? They're all still challenging in several competitions whilst we have rapidly fallen by the wayside and have only dead rubbers left in February. Even Pochettino or Martinez haven't needed much time for their teams to start playing the way they want them to. We aren't even seeing anything to cling on to, to suggest that time will be worth it.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

I love Gary, he's one of my all time favourites, but he isn't half getting on my nerves this season with some of the things he's coming off with. He keeps blabbering on about the fact that Moyes will outlast the players here as if it's some kind of threat, when in reality the way things are going I imagine that there are several players including Kagawa, Hernandez, RvP etc for whom getting away from this club and Moyes won't represent a bad thing. I imagine for the sake of their careers they are quite looking forward to it. "Keep trudging away" said Kagawa. Who wants trudge away in their job at 23-24? Not one of these players look like they're enjoying their football under him atm.

I'm intrigued as to how far Moyes could drag this club before Neville would admit its time or get rid. I imagine he'd be happy to let him do a fair bit of damage just so that we can say "We're Manchester United we give managers time". I just don't see the point in giving the wrong man time. The comparisons with giving Fergie time are also irksome. Fergie had a positive impact here in his first two seasons. And he came here with a good pedigree. He was already a winner, we weren't attempting to turn him into one. His task was completely different to Moyes'. It warranted time.

Moyes should have embraced living up to the high expectations this club has when in fact all he's done is lower our own expectations to meet his own lowly ones. It's to the point that playing shit on a stick football with 82 crosses constitutes to playing well, and when facing Newcastle at home we endeavour to "try to make it difficult for them". There is high praise for the team when we lose but "get to the byeline 8 or 9 times" and not to mention that it's a signal that we've played well when we "got near the edge of the box a few times" - yeah, not even inside the box, just near the edge.

Neville his highly principled and because he's been so vocal about giving managers time it's like he can't go back on his words now. Principles only get you so far though.

Everything about this appointment stinks of principle, a British manager, cut from the same cloth as SAF. Hard working. Fastidious. Not likely to poke someone in the eye. Problem is he is too fastidious, does not have SAF's courage or personality. Does not have the playing philosophy of SAF. His press conferences are a bore, are his team talks like that? Sometimes principles can be a curse, if you aren't willing to regress from them now and again.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

I also don't see why Moyes is the only manager who has taken over at a top club this season who needs an extraordinary amount of time. Yes following Fergie was always going to be difficult but being champions again in his first season should have been tough, but challenging for honours should have been the bear minimum required.
Why don't Guardiola, Pellegrini, Mourinho, Ancelotti, or Martino all need ridiculous amounts of time? They're all still challenging in several competitions whilst we have rapidly fallen by the wayside and have only dead rubbers left in February. Even Pochettino or Martinez haven't needed much time for their teams to start playing the way they want them to. We aren't even seeing anything to cling on to, to suggest that time will be worth it.

When people criticize owners for firing managers too easily they talk about firing someone like Mancini with credentials and who's shown he has what it takes or someone who is showing a lot of potential. Not a completely calamitous manager who looks unfit for the level.

 

[Drummer]

It is a bit of a shame cause he was a really great pundit last season. Now he is probably the worst one. If he was a Caf poster, I would have put him in ignore. I know the sentimentality reason (United better than others blah blah blah, my brother got a job he couldn't have even dreamt because of Moyes) but when you are pundit it is supposed to be not completely biased. Also, I don't get how he always defends Moyes but doesn't hesitate to crtiticize players with whom he played many years. It's baffling.

You know whats baffling ? The recurring theme on the Caf where people who want Moyes out completely dismiss or insult anybody who has a conflicting view to this topic as if they know something that everybody else doesnt. .

Gary Neville is a superb commentator on the game and has a fantastic insight into how a club should be run, just because he disagrees with the Moyes out brigade does not automatically make him a bad pundit.

I have an alternative theory, Perhaps Neville just knows more then the fork wielding barstool managers calling for Moyes head ?

 

[Massive Spanner]

You know whats baffling ? The recurring theme on the Caf where people who want Moyes out completely dismiss or insult anybody who has a conflicting view to this topic as if they know something that everybody else doesnt. .

Gary Neville is a superb commentator on the game and has a fantastic insight into how a club should be run, just because he disagrees with the Moyes out brigade does not automatically make him a bad pundit.

I have an alternative theory, Perhaps Neville just knows more then the fork wielding barstool managers calling for Moyes head ?

Or perhaps his brother is Moyes' right hand man?

 

[Pogue Mahone]

I also don't see why Moyes is the only manager who has taken over at a top club this season who needs an extraordinary amount of time. Yes following Fergie was always going to be difficult but being champions again in his first season should have been tough, but challenging for honours should have been the bear minimum required.
Why don't Guardiola, Pellegrini, Mourinho, Ancelotti, or Martino all need ridiculous amounts of time? They're all still challenging in several competitions whilst we have rapidly fallen by the wayside and have only dead rubbers left in February. Even Pochettino or Martinez haven't needed much time for their teams to start playing the way they want them to. We aren't even seeing anything to cling on to, to suggest that time will be worth it.

You answered your own question.

 

[Sixpence]

If Moyes was winning or playing good football there would be some optimism.

He is doing neither. Red Rover makes some good points, I feel like he most likely doesn't rate the vast majority of players here and is working with what he has until next season. He has shown himself to be a poor man manager and you need it all at the highest level.

It is easier to do well/exceed expectations at a team that is not expected to be competing.

How do you exceed expectations at City, United or Chelsea? Winning is expected.

There is honestly nothing that Moyes is doing that gives me hope. Even the slightest crumb of comfort to cling to. Nothing about him appeals to me. Like has been said a million times, if we could see a visible style of passing football that he was trying to improve us with we could accept these results a little bit better. We have actually been getting worse and worse as the season has gone on.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

That's it. He is such a tactical genius that his players just can't follow his genius level tactics.

Now I read that it does look a bit silly. Well maybe his tactics are too basic. That actually could be the case.

 

[Drummer]

If Moyes was winning or playing good football there would be some optimism.

He is doing neither. Red Rover makes some good points, I feel like he most likely doesn't rate the vast majority of players here and is working with what he has until next season. He has shown himself to be a poor man manager and you need it all at the highest level.

It is easier to do well/exceed expectations at a team that is not expected to be competing.

How do you exceed expectations at City, United or Chelsea? Winning is expected.

Ferguson has punched way about his weight with this squad. If you look at it purely in monetary terms, united have never been in the same league as City or Chelsea in terms of spending power for some time. Then you have Monaco, PSG, Barca, Madrid and Bayern, even a couple of Russian clubs could throw their weight around a bit (where has Eto been?).

The point is that United have actually over performed because of Fergies Genius. People keep talking about this championship winning team, but when was the last time we had a team on paper that we all thought (that's a better 11 then Chelsea or City)? In fact, when was the last time United consistently beat a top team in Europe or the league ?

Fergusons success was built around stability (everybody knows their role), his man management and his ability to squeeze every bit of quality out of the team. Moyes has come into a squad of players who on paper aren't above top 3 in the league. Crippled or declining senior players who gave it one last hurrah last season after the City league win debacle that could of served to give them no more motivation then they ever had in their lives.

Moyes hasn't just had to try and re-motivate players (like RVP who couldn't have the same hunger as he had last ) to try and find that hunger, but hes had to try and be successful doing things his way with SAF team that was never on paper on the level they were achieving.

Even in SAF time How many times have people complained about - Rio, inuries to defenders, Carrick, Cleverley, Anderson, our entire CM, Young, Valencia, wellbeck ?

Im not saying that Ferguson left Moyes with a shit team, but there were problems with that squad long before SAF left. the difference was the stability of having SAF running things. He knew everything inside out , what he could get out of players and who would play for him. Some idiots suggested that Moyes should of known who to get rid of when he came to united, but herin lies the major part of their argument> fans watch a match and think its as simple as - "Sure young is shit, therefore moyes should of known this before he joined" when in fact it is nowhere near as simple as that.

 

[LR7]

You answered your own question.

I also said making us champions in Moyes first season might have been difficult but challenging for honours shouldn't have. We are pretty much out of it all in February. The regression is so steep it's scary and I don't believe any of those managers would have seen this team fall as far as David Moyes has even following Fergie.
I started a thread about the challenges facing Moyes and Pep when they first got appointed. I won't even try to dig it up because it's quite embarrassing now given how things have gone. Pep taking on treble winners, where even if he won one trophy it'd pale in comparison to Heynckes achievements. A lot was being made of Barcelona's decline last season yet they're still going strong in three competitions this season despite losing two coaches steeped in their philosophy.

Moyes was at Everton for 11 years and he'd brought pretty much all of those players there, it was his team, playing his way but yet it didn't take Martinez ages to get them to adapt to his way of playing and they haven't seen any decline in results at all.