Some of the Ole comments and threads on here have been nothing short of a disgrace. One of the reasons why I struggle to read the match day threads
Ole Gunnar Solskjær | 2021/22 Discussion
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Liverpool, Chelsea and City recent results show just how good some of Ole's results have been. All this bullshit narrative about Ole being a PE teacher because he can't break down ultra defensive low block teams, and yet Pep and Klopp have exactly the same issues.
The thing I have really liked about Ole is that he has rotated his squad expertly without dropping too many points. I mean no one expected James to start and he has started and taken some load from the wide players. However, there are two things that I want this team to improve and I am hoping Ole can get that coached in
1) Attacking set piece - We need to score more from corners and setpieces into the box. We hardly score from these avenues and this is one of the main ways of breaking down low block teams. I just hope the team focuses on this. Improve set pieces conversion percentage should be a priority. In the last two years, I can't think of more than 3-5 goals from corners, which is shocking. I may be wrong.
2) Rashford/Martial/Pogba need to hold the ball less. Too many times they stop the play, try a fancy stepover to make space and pass. Occasionally its fine, but it absolutely kills the tempo. This needs to be coached.
Mentality of the team has improved leaps and bounds, there is a desire to win which is great to see, whether that has been influenced by Ole or has been infected by Bruno's arrival, I don't know but Ole deserves some of the plaudits as well.
1) Attacking set piece - We need to score more from corners and setpieces into the box. We hardly score from these avenues and this is one of the main ways of breaking down low block teams. I just hope the team focuses on this. Improve set pieces conversion percentage should be a priority. In the last two years, I can't think of more than 3-5 goals from corners, which is shocking. I may be wrong.
2) Rashford/Martial/Pogba need to hold the ball less. Too many times they stop the play, try a fancy stepover to make space and pass. Occasionally its fine, but it absolutely kills the tempo. This needs to be coached.
Mentality of the team has improved leaps and bounds, there is a desire to win which is great to see, whether that has been influenced by Ole or has been infected by Bruno's arrival, I don't know but Ole deserves some of the plaudits as well.
I think he's doing very well at this stage and the direction he's taking the club into is very positive and exciting.
I'm actually at the stage now where I'd be scared to lose him.
I'm actually at the stage now where I'd be scared to lose him.
You're forgetting the 'he failed ar Cardiff narrative as well
You don't see the same nonsense aimed at them despite having better squads. Armchair supporters who've never give a shit about patterns of play, tactical acumen, the low block and philosophies before it became something to level at Solskjaer. I also find it highly suspicious that this place seems to be a lot more positive when Liverpool and City drop points as opposed to United actually winning games.
This, imagine hitting reset on this now and having to spend the next two years just trying to get back to this point?
Agreed. There's no patience from some "fans" for a United legend who has created a team that plays great football and gets great results when we click. Have people forgotten how much better this is than when van Gaal or Mourinho were at the helm? Both experienced managers with stellar CVs who were sh1t at United. There are no sure things at United - players like Sanchez and managers like Mourinho both flopped. Let's back the United legend with the sh1t managerial CV when we are seeing year on year improvements. That's what he should be judged upon - the performance of his United team. My impression is that the naysayers negativity is less to do with his performance at United, and more to do with his CV. To hell with them. I'm loving watching United at the mo, and give Ole a lot of credit for that.
That's interesting that you feel that way, it says a lot about the sense of stability he has brought to the club and the team, which I think is probably his biggest achievement. I'm personally not there yet; I still feel that he will eventually hit a ceiling and will need a more sophisticated coach to be able to win the league. But he could prove me wrong if we keep up our current form. Whatever way you slice it, three points off the league leaders with a game in hand is an excellent achievement, and I'm more optimistic about this team than any side post-SAF.
The only thing I'm upset about is his decision to play Pogba over VDB, but 1) the results will vindicate him and 2) everyone will have a gripe with elements of selection regardless of who the manager is.
It has to be said that he's turned round the form, sustained it and steadied the ship very well. He's surprised me and I'm hoping he can do even more by sustaining this title charge.
It has to be said that he's turned round the form, sustained it and steadied the ship very well. He's surprised me and I'm hoping he can do even more by sustaining this title charge.
He was a great player who always seemed to come off the subs bench and score a goal with relative ease wasnt he?
I say this because he must have built a fantastic ability to read the game from the subs bench that has led to some of his management skills that we have seen today (alongside being a player of SAF etc). I always felt he could read the sport very well.
I say this because he must have built a fantastic ability to read the game from the subs bench that has led to some of his management skills that we have seen today (alongside being a player of SAF etc). I always felt he could read the sport very well.
Liverpool just draw. So with a game in hand if we win our next match, we will go level on points with Liverpool on top of table.
That is quite an insane comeback, considering how poorly we start our season.
That is quite an insane comeback, considering how poorly we start our season.
I couldn’t think of anything worse or more damaging to us than to do that.
Hard to believe that some would be all to willing to do so as well.
This is progress, you don’t halt progress unless your an idiot.
He has done well this season after a horrible start. But we have to keep the momentum going. We have to win against Villa.
Completely understand where you're coming from mate. And I completely agree regarding the stability which is very important.
But I've got to say that under Solskjaer, the short/long-term prospects look far better than under the previous 3 managers. We're also on course to finish in the top 4 for the second consecutive season at the very least, which never happened under any other manager post SAF. We've also got some very good young players coming through which I personally feel confident will develop nicely under Ole. I also feel we will see a very attacking version of Man Utd under Ole, once he gets the players he desires in the next 12 months.
Glad you can now see what I’ve been seeing for many months. The rebuild and incremental progress is similar to what happened under Ferguson, whom I’m sure is counselling Ole when he is required.
Ole clearly has a visionary template he is working towards. And it takes time and bumps to make permanent forward progress in any aspect of life. My only surprise is how quickly we are making this progress.
Now I’m over the shock of getting knocked out of CL, I’m actually not that fussed about it as it allows us to focus on our league challenge. And there are so many positive signs that’s we are a club on the up right now.
Stop fretting and just enjoy the ride!
I'm with you bro..
This can't possibly be argued no matter what side of the debate you fall on. Ole and the club have built a talented, settled (with a few exceptions) side with both flair and function, and a clearly defined yet still flexible playing style. I think the point about the youth of the side is important too; it feels like the best may be yet to come from a lot of these players, and we're continuing to add more youth as well.
My concern has always been whether the club will have the bravery to make a tough decision if we have a situation where Ole is doing good but not great, and there's a window to get a better manager (I don't wish to turn this into a Poch conversation, but his situation is the kind of thing I'm talking about). But I think the big moment of truth will come as Ole's contract comes into it's last 12 months. Do we extend, or do we say "thanks Ole, you've done more than we ever could have expected of you and made us competitive again, but there's someone else available right know who can take us to the next level". I think that will come down to what we see over the remainder of this season. If we make a serious title challenge I think Ole can be confident of getting a new contract; if we fall away and scrape top 4, I think we should be at least considering alternatives. In other words, will we see more steady, gradual progress over the next 12 months, or have we already reached our ceiling? I devoutly hope it's the former, but I want us to be prepared for the latter.
i was always behind ole as i thought he gets united and will manage us the right way. i think he did so and the evolution was right to see allready at the end of last season. sadly there are enough people who think the grass is greener on the other side and pep and klopp are much better. feck it - ole might be better. i am not saying we are winning the league cause thats too early to predict but we are in a good position. in fact it is the best position we are in since saf. so please at least give ole and the players some time because we will loose some games in the future. thats the business - even for champions
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The progress is clear as day to see. Whether he goes on to be a long term success or not we will benefit in the long term so much from the work he's done. Definitely the best of the post Fergie managers for me.
I think you're absolutely right with your concern. However, I have an additional concern that I wouldn't trust anyone at the club to make the correct decision on that front. Honestly, can you imagine anything worse than us having a good overall season but we have a few tough breaks towards the end like semi final exits and then Woodward sweeping in and firing Ole? I'm convinced we'd be right back to square one and the new manager will have his vision and completely rip our team apart.
Another point to consider. The two most successful periods in Man United history have come when we had stability at the manager position. I would advise and urge Man United fans to not make "perfect" the enemy of "good". So yeah if Ole does hit a bit of a ceiling, I think he's earned the right to work through it for a while before we determine his ceiling for him and preemptively fire him.
My concern is though if the club will be brave enough to keep supporting him in term of signing players and see the process out before they decide with Ole's ability to take us further.
I think it is more important. It is not like we never tried to hire 'better managers'. We did. It just does not work that way with us for one reason or another so far.
Hey guys, please do not turn this to another Ole in/out thread. This is the last place here I could find people talking about Ole sensibly.
Would you move to this one
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/the-“ole-in”-brigade.452433/page-85
Or create a new thread please?
Thank you.
Would you move to this one
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/the-“ole-in”-brigade.452433/page-85
Or create a new thread please?
Thank you.
When we brought Ole in, I thought it was a good idea and a “nothing to lose” approach. I was happy with what he did in the interim but always felt at some point “this amazing lucky run is going to end soon”. Then when we gave him a new contract during the time we started struggling, it baffled me and I thought it was stupid timing. It made no sense in any shape or form.
Then we had that dire start to last season which was just terrible to watch. Ole took a lot of flack for that despite everyone knowing that the players we had playing at the time were just not good enough. When Bruno came in, our results dramatically changed. Ole didn’t seem to get the credit for it. Bruno did. But it went to show that if you give him the right players, he can get results.
If I look back at where we were when Ole came in and where we are now, I don’t think anyone can deny that we look in a much better situation than we did then. The players in the team are much better. The depth in quality is much better. The quality of football is much better (even though it can be inconsistent but which team isn’t in a transition?).
I went to Jose’s last game which was at Anfield. I was in the away end. It was shite going to that game knowing that there was no chance we were going to play anything exciting. We were either going to get pumped or we were going to try and cling on for a damp draw. The team Jose put it out with 5 at the back and the likes of Darmian as one of our centre backs. Lingard and Lukaku in our forward positions. Ashley young and Dalot as our full backs. Pogba pissed off and the mood of the team was terrible. It was such a shite situation we were in.
If we look back at that time and compare it to now, it’s an incredible difference. Yes there is still much more room for improvement but we can not argue there hasn’t been huge progress. Our transfers have been better than they have ever been since Fergie left. Yes they could have been better but at least they haven’t been disasters like some of the ones under LVG and Jose. We can’t sit and pretend that Ole has had no part to play in this improvement and the situation we are in now. It was never going to be perfect or be immediate success, but it was always about progression. We have progressed and are continuing to progress. In the last 12 months, ole has helped make us the best team in the league results wise while playing some attractive football and not jose style shite. He’s shown you can get results while playing decent at the same time. I’ve always held the opinion that he deserves the chance to keep going while he continues to show signs of progress.
A lot want Poch in now. I wanted him as well. But to sack Ole and bring Poch in would be ludicrous. Poch would literally have to win us the league to improve on what Ole has done and is doing in the last year. Otherwise it would be a backwards step.
I feel Ole doesn’t get a lot of the credit he deserves simply because of how he comes across in the media and interviews. Yes he does seem like he’s too soft or out of his depth at times when he talks but i genuinely think that’s due to it being lost in translation and with English not being his natural language. He is always conscious of what he says in the media but at the same time having the pressure of what comes with being Utd manager. I feel like if he came across as a stern, abrupt person in interviews he’d somehow get a lot more credit. A lot of rival fans base their verdict on ole just by how he talks and his press conferences. But that’s not really a reflection of his managerial skills in football or his tactical knowledge.
He absolutely deserves respect and I wish him every success while he is at Utd. We should back every manager of ours especially when they are performing to a level which we haven’t been at for a long time.
Agree mate. Lets hope he gets the players he needs for the high-line, high press style he desires so he can complete the transition, which I feel is close to completion if we can add a CB and DM with the requisite attributes which would allow him to play a more expansive game.
Definitely. I think all he needs now is to finish the season in top 4 and win something, even Mickey Mouse cup. Will do his confindence a wonder. Sometimes that's all it takes.
If Ole had got the players he wanted in the summer (i.e. Sancho, Grealish, Upamecano), I'd be inclined to go with that line of thinking but the fact of the matter is, he didn't. The fact that he confounded expectations after a pretty poor summer window last year, and is seemingly doing so now, after an even worse one this time round, seems to tell me that he deserves to see out this season at the very least and see out next season as well (on the proviso that he gets Top 4).
Make no bones about it, Jose had a very similar window to what Ole had this year and he literally burned the ground in response. That response led us languishing 7th and closer to relegation than we were to Top 4. Ole took that disappointment on the chin and has learned from the mistakes he's made. He's very adaptable and he's been able to make good use of the players who were already here, brought through a couple of the academy lads and supplemented them all with good signings from outside, even if they weren't the players he had originally wanted.
Expecting a title challenge or a deep CL run when we have never even sustained a Top 4 finish in two consecutive years since 2013, is not realistic IMO. We'll get there, I'm sure, but I don't think we'll be in that position until the end of next season, when the players Ole wanted from this season will be bought and bedded in. Just like it took VVD, Allison and Fabinho that season to bed in and challenge without the expectation of winning the league, so too should those crucial missing pieces who we are likely to bring in, in summer 2021.
I said it a few weeks ago and was admonished by @Bilbo for saying the following, but I do still stand by it, even as someone who has been staunchly fighting Ole's corner on here from the start and not wavered in my support of him at all, but if we do challenge for the title this year, it is going to say more about those teams who were expected to challenge than ourselves or anyone else from the chasing pack, and if by some miracle we actually won the league, it isn't a vindication of this team or even of Ole's team building as I still see us as a team and club, and Ole as a manager as a work in progress. He's done amazingly well to bring us back from what was the deepest depths I'd ever seen the club in. I was there at Anfield for Jose's last game, and I remembered when I pulled into my house at midnight afterwards deeply contemplating why I actually bothered to follow the team home and away. I'd never felt that, and it was a bitter pill to swallow. But Ole came in and changed it all, and for that he deserves immense credit. Yes, he's made mistakes in these 2+ years, but unlike the ones before him, he retains the humility to actually admit them and even more importantly, he has the capacity to learn from them.
There are and were still so many holes within it. We need to desperately fill those holes and then see where we can go under Ole. At least half of those holes should have been filled in the summer window just gone but they weren't, and now we are going into 2021 with an absolutely crucial window of opportunity that we simply HAVE to take. If the board feck it up again, then everyone should know where the blame lies...
Agree with everything you said except for the bolded part. There's nothing wrong with his English, he's fluent. The issues some have with the way he talks (in my opinion, a silly criticism) is that he relies to much on referencing history and doesn't appear to be decisive or ruthless. I think it's a silly criticism because press conferences are as much about PR and misdirection than anything else, and what managers say in them shouldn't always be taken as gospel. But it's got nothing to do with his English.
Ole, get up to the boss’ house, give him his birthday present, and ask for some advice on how to wind Klopp up. Just imagine him gurning over Ole’s words 
Probably wrong explanation by me. Of course he can speak English perfectly fine. But at times it appears like he’s thinking too much as to what words to use and or what cliche to throw out there which ends up with rather confusing sentences. But I don’t see that as a slight on his management style. I actually think he’s a very different person in the dressing room as he is in front of the camera. I’d love to be a fly on the wall.
Ole is a man who passionately cares about our club, something that has not been the case with our managers since the great Sir Alex.
It is genuinely embarrassing to read some of the vitriolic and pathetic comments towards our club legend from posters in this thread and elsewhere.
It is genuinely embarrassing to read some of the vitriolic and pathetic comments towards our club legend from posters in this thread and elsewhere.
Potentially the best defensive fullback in the league made sense when Solksjaer anticipated getting a truly threatening creative winger who he didn't want to overly bother with defensive responsibility. But neither Sancho nor Graelish have panned out yet and Pellestri and Diallo are teenagers who'll need to bed in gradually.
Pretty sure we lost the last time we played the diamond. The problem with that formation is that you rely entierly on fullbacks to provide attacking width and we get none of that from ours
4222 might work
The fallibility with this argument is that the greatest of all, SAF himself, was not a sophisticated coach. He was very limited tactically, did very little actual coaching and his signings could be hit and miss; but his strengths lay elsewhere.
I see Ole very similarly. Despite what many say on here, Ole has great strengths, hence him bringing the club together, that old "never say die" mentality returning, good signings so far from what was available to us at the time, clearly very good man-management. In fact the latter is possibly the rarest and most important facet of a manager.
This is not to say Old will achieve one fiftieth of what SAF did, but he could certainly lead us to a PL and back to the top in Europe if he brings the right people in around him.
That's the big question for me - will Ole have the confidence to bring in Queiroz type personalities to support him on the coaching side. If he does, I think we can achieve anything.
We need a better coaching team to support Ole. Fergie had several assistants who brought a lot to the team.
Even against Wolves, we looked disjointed, our midfield is bypassed too easily because we still don't press as a team. The second issue for me is that Bruno has too much freedom to roam, I'm sure he would be even more effective if he was more disciplined, again a coaching issue.
As much as he's a good man manager he needs help, some young players like Greenwood, James and AWB regressed which is alarming.
We should look to upgrade the coaching team next summer.
Even against Wolves, we looked disjointed, our midfield is bypassed too easily because we still don't press as a team. The second issue for me is that Bruno has too much freedom to roam, I'm sure he would be even more effective if he was more disciplined, again a coaching issue.
As much as he's a good man manager he needs help, some young players like Greenwood, James and AWB regressed which is alarming.
We should look to upgrade the coaching team next summer.
1) Spot on.
2) Pogba's work rate is definitely up a notch lately. Last couple of games there's also been a somewhat less ponderous Pogba on the ball, willing to take the easy pass instead of a fancy trick (which he may or may not pull off) under pressure. If his decision making in this regard improves, he makes a good cog in the team machinery.
As for Martial and Rashford, I am sure they have team tasks and improvement goals set for them. However, I think they are allowed to play themselves confident as long as the work rate and positive intent is there. Personal decision making and "intuitive play" I believe is developed most efficiently that way.
It was OGS’ management of Greenwood last year which helped him have such a good breakthrough season.
the lad has clearly had some issues, and so many players have that difficult second season. He hasn’t ‘regressed’, he’s just not the new kid on the block, and teams know how to play against him better.
I’m not in anyway alarmed about it. Players form fluctuates, especially when the my are young. Their career trajectory is not linear.
I could never understand some of that. I have wobbled on Ole since he came in, wanting him to succeed but not quite being 100% convinced if he has what it takes to bring us long term success. But seeing some fans throwing abuse and calling him the C word etc in threads is bizarre. We all get angry but surely if anyone deserved a little more time and respect to prove themselves it would be him?
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