I'm not arguing, I'm being a facetious little shit.
I find its the only way to deal with the meltdowns after matchdays.
well, I say only way, the most fun.
Ole Gunnar Solskjær | 2021/22 Discussion
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
- Status
I find its the only way to deal with the meltdowns after matchdays.
well, I say only way, the most fun.
We are near the end of Ole's 2nd full season as manager and I'd say the good outweighs the bad. The only thing he's constantly misjudged is his use of substitutes, he often lets games drift too far before making changes. Another manager might be able to get us playing better football but if we win the EL then I don't see any manager having a better season than 2nd in the PL and securing a secondary trophy, not with these players and this board.
On the better football front I feel a large part of it is down to Ole being risk adverse in his selections, if he was willing to start Bailly over Lindelof or trusted Axel, and went with the defensively riskier option of Pogba in the double pivot we'd play better football but we might lose more points, however it could also turn 1 point into 3, Ole just opts for caution most of the time so the football is often crap.
On the better football front I feel a large part of it is down to Ole being risk adverse in his selections, if he was willing to start Bailly over Lindelof or trusted Axel, and went with the defensively riskier option of Pogba in the double pivot we'd play better football but we might lose more points, however it could also turn 1 point into 3, Ole just opts for caution most of the time so the football is often crap.
But, this is Bielsa. If it was any other manager I'd say fair enough and they adapted but Bielsa famously never does that, unless the circumstances force him to do so, like against City. Look at how Leeds played against Liverpool 6 days earlier, where they started off slow but became the better side by the end with Liverpool hanging on. That didn't happen on Sunday. Now, you could argue it was by design but considering his previous form, I'd wager it as being unlikely. We dominated possession and Leeds had nothing other than one counter-attack in the second half? Our final pass let us down more than anything else. We created plenty of opportunities where, if we had that bit of composure, we'd have been in and clear on goal, which won't be reflected in the end game stats. On the whole I thought we were decent enough and much the better side of the two, but our end product just wasn't there. A typical April game, really.
For all of 2 minutes and it'll then just be a bunch of whiney threads like "we are horrendously coached", "will we get relegated", or some BS simping threads for the latest flavour of the month manager.
It’s just his almost total lack of rotation or risk for me now. He never drops or rotates Rashford AWB Maguire Bruno Fred Shaw. I get that is the spine of our team and we are still short on quality but it’s bewildering that he wouldn’t take them out for even a game or two when their performances drop off and they visibly look tired. I don’t see the point in Ole having more squad players when he never uses the likes of tuanzebe Williams VDB or Amad as it is. It’s just more proof to me that signing players for the squad is pointless. Starting quality or bust
Caf summing up our season so far:
- No investment in the team
- No preseason
- The midfield with Fred and McTominay is mid table standard at best
- The centre pairing with Lindelöf and Maguire does not work. No pace
- We don´t have a right winger
- James is not United quality, and Mata and Matic are passed it
- Pogba has been out for more than 2 months (69 days exactly)
- Fernandes´ form has dropped significantly since Christmas
- Bissaka is no threat going forward
- Martial has been shit all season, and now even injured
- Rashford has been playing through injuries since last spring
- Cavani has been injured or not fit to start more often than not
- We need better coaches
- No substitutions, free Donny
- No rotation
- Ole has no tactics
- And we have been playing midweek games since the start of the season
Yet we are second in the league by good margin.
How the hell did that happen?
- No investment in the team
- No preseason
- The midfield with Fred and McTominay is mid table standard at best
- The centre pairing with Lindelöf and Maguire does not work. No pace
- We don´t have a right winger
- James is not United quality, and Mata and Matic are passed it
- Pogba has been out for more than 2 months (69 days exactly)
- Fernandes´ form has dropped significantly since Christmas
- Bissaka is no threat going forward
- Martial has been shit all season, and now even injured
- Rashford has been playing through injuries since last spring
- Cavani has been injured or not fit to start more often than not
- We need better coaches
- No substitutions, free Donny
- No rotation
- Ole has no tactics
- And we have been playing midweek games since the start of the season
Yet we are second in the league by good margin.
How the hell did that happen?
Last edited:
Because Ole is a genius who gets the best out of the resources available and their condition
I do worry he's going to be left hung out to dry again this summer. He's done amazingly well to last this far, all things considered and I think if he doesn't get what he needs this summer he'll be gone by the end of the season through no fault of his own, IMO. There is, after all, only so far you can get with a squad who the previous manager thought wasn't worth persevering with (especially since you let go of or sidelined almost all of his main players like Lukaku, Sanchez, Fellaini, Matic, Young, Valencia, and now DDG) and instead built around those who he either didn't want (Pogba), rate (Martial), or only saw as a squad player (McTominay, Rashford), or were seen as borderline joke figures (Shaw, Fred), as well as kids who likely the last manager didn't give a single toss over (Greenwood, Williams).
For me, it seems that Ole has been paying for the sins of Jose and LvG and their profligate and reckless spending ever since he arrived, and I do think that's very unfair on him. He won't complain about it, and most of this myopic fanbase can't cast their mind further back than the last result, but when next season rolls around and we still haven't bought anyone of note to fix at least two of the four glaring holes in our squad, then please for the love of God do focus your ire on the root cause of the problems and not the manager who for the third summer running will not have gotten the players he needed to be successful.
For me, it seems that Ole has been paying for the sins of Jose and LvG and their profligate and reckless spending ever since he arrived, and I do think that's very unfair on him. He won't complain about it, and most of this myopic fanbase can't cast their mind further back than the last result, but when next season rolls around and we still haven't bought anyone of note to fix at least two of the four glaring holes in our squad, then please for the love of God do focus your ire on the root cause of the problems and not the manager who for the third summer running will not have gotten the players he needed to be successful.
I'm actually going to say this about the subs. The second half and up to 75 minutes we were very close to scoring several times, so he simply let the team that was on there play since they were in a good place, a sub would interrupt that.
Leeds aren't exactly a pedestrian team, they drew against Liverpool and beat City before they now drew with us. The difference is that we have this inate ability to make good teams look completely pedestrian most of the time. That is so rarely recognised.
Great post that puts things in perspective.
I agree with this. People just look at numbers and just conclude Ole was backed. Like last summer we spent close to 80m but in reality 30 odd were spent on 18 year old youngsters and 36m on a player that seems like was never Ole's choice and 12m on a back up lb. That's not called backing. I feel we missed a chance to strengthen further in last summer. And now this summer we will just play catch up and will have to sacrifice strengthening some key positions because of that.
Last edited:
Yep, and when you bring it back to that first summer, Maguire was literally paid for by Lukaku's sale. If we discount that alone (which would ignore all the other sales like Fellaini in Jan for 8m, or Darmian for 2m, as well as taking off half of Sanchez's wages etc) then we actually only spent c.£55m-65m that summer.
It's actually horrendous when you look at what LvG and Jose did in their first two summer windows at the club. Ole deserves a lot of respect for what he's been able to achieve with this squad, especially with the risks he took in putting his faith in the players who were left over. He's been here for over two years, and in all that time he's only been able to add three first team players (four if you're going to be charitable and classify Cavani as one).
It's just not good enough from those above him. Especially when you see what the others before him got in the way of backing, despite not doing proving anywhere near as much during their times in charge of the club.
Since Sir Alex retired, the 2nd placed team has won the subsequent title only one time, and that was Liverpool last season.
I say this to say that league position doesn't always tell the whole story, nor does it guarantee anything in the future. After all we finished 2nd with Mourinho in 17/18 with a fairly average setup, and the concerns then were still valid despite our league position. Last season we finished 3rd with 66 points, 1 match away from 5th, and the concerns about our team were still valid.
Ole hasn't done a bad job, but league position isn't the way to go about showing it. And the concerns you mention are issues which we'll have to address if we are actually serious about winning the title next season.
I think United are in sort of a difficult situation with Ole. I think Ole has done nothing but good for the club so far. He's changed the culture and attitude of the club, including influencing those above him as well as the team. He's got the team playing football that's way more like how it should be at our club. He's got rid of a lot of crap players and the purchases under his watch have by and large been very good. He's enhanced his status as a United legend with what is tantamount to a salvage operation, given the burning pile of shite left him by Mourinho.
However I still personally think he lacks what it takes to win the title. City had a poor start to the season, but since losing to Tottenham they've been back to their best. Carry on with that form and next season they'll be back to 95+ points again. Liverpool could easily get their mojo back with a new season and VVD back. While Ole has done well this season to improve our points tally, I just don't see that relentless consistency with his teams that would allow us to post those kind of numbers. I think 80 - 85 is probably his ceiling. We have too many games where we drift until we get a kick up the arse. Which might be enough if everyone else fails, but you cant rely on that.
However you can't sack a manager in the postion that Ole is in. He's earned the right to fail, as it were. Logically it would be better to get a new manager from a position of strength, but in the real world that's just not happening. So I think United stick with Ole until its proven beyond doubt he can't win the title, which could easily be another 2 or 3 seasons, unless it all goes wrong sooner than that.
However I still personally think he lacks what it takes to win the title. City had a poor start to the season, but since losing to Tottenham they've been back to their best. Carry on with that form and next season they'll be back to 95+ points again. Liverpool could easily get their mojo back with a new season and VVD back. While Ole has done well this season to improve our points tally, I just don't see that relentless consistency with his teams that would allow us to post those kind of numbers. I think 80 - 85 is probably his ceiling. We have too many games where we drift until we get a kick up the arse. Which might be enough if everyone else fails, but you cant rely on that.
However you can't sack a manager in the postion that Ole is in. He's earned the right to fail, as it were. Logically it would be better to get a new manager from a position of strength, but in the real world that's just not happening. So I think United stick with Ole until its proven beyond doubt he can't win the title, which could easily be another 2 or 3 seasons, unless it all goes wrong sooner than that.
The bolded ones are questionable(or just plain wrong), but you do bring up a good point. We have been given less than ideal circumstances but we're doing quite well. I think if we could improve our results 5%, possibly by actually strengthening the starting XI, then we are back to being one of the best teams in the world. As in PL title challengers and consistently top 8/4 in the CL.
So yeah, Ole deserves a lot of praise. He's squeezing out results, improving players, off-loading deadwood, focusing on youth and being a ray of sunshine when dealing with the blood-thirsty media. The ball is in the owners' court now. Ole is doing his job more than well enough given his circumstances. This needs to be backed up by some big investments.
Remember when we came comfortably 2nd under Mourinho ...
As long as we are not the best expect complaints. Probably was more than.
I also think it’s probably more “areas to improve” than the way you’ve emphatically put it.
They both won silverware with united, Mourinho twice! Let's not forget we finished second under Mourinho with our first and only 80 plus points haul by the end of the season. LVG was pretty much gone when we won the FA cup but he had a good record against the big clubs (not too different from Solskjaers record). How has Solskjaer proved more?
I sometimes wonder if some of you expect Mbappe/Neymar like signings every window with 8 to 10 players coming in.
Our windows under him have been fine. They've been good additions(bar Dan James, where we should have done better). The only absence was a RW, and we all know why that is.
The others before got that because we were panic buying without determining suitability. How many of those players failed?
You're missing the point. They won that silverware after spending how much between themselves? How many first team players did they add to the squad in order to achieve that?
Ole hasn't had the chance to do that. Three first team players have been bought in during his 2+ years at the club, all of whom were purchased in that first year. So when I say Ole has proven himself more than LvG and Jose, it's because he's sustained the consistency of the team's form without the recourse to totally reshaping it. He also didn't have us drop as low as we did under both LvG or Jose (5th and 6th respectively), and for the last 18 months or so, it has been a consistent path of progress with us on course to achieving back to back top 4 finishes - something we haven't achieved since SAF. He's also been better in the cups than both LvG and Jose, but because of scheduling (Chelsea), being up against one of the very best teams in Europe (City) and rotten luck (Sevilla) he hasn't gotten past the SF stage as yet. If Ole had the sort of competition that Jose and LvG had in their successful cup runs (the likes of Shrewsbury, Northampton, Hull, Rostov, Anderlecht, Celta Vigo) I'd wager he'd have had a trophy or two before now as well.
However, make no mistake about it, Ole needs the tools to actually reshape the team and squad now. There's only so far this squad can be taken and with at least 4 (maybe even 5 if we include the GK issue) large holes within it, next season is shaping up to be a colossal feck up and implosion if he doesn't get the players in to fill at least two of those holes. I can see City and Liverpool certainly spending to refresh their teams, maybe even Chelsea too and Arsenal are going to be gearing up for a summer spend as well after their feck ups this season. If we stand still, we're going to fall behind.
When you are getting the wins people praise everything and when you are second everything is bad.
The key is to make the right new improvements and that is where people disagree and complain about different things.
Some about the manager and other players. I feel it is often the opposite. Some think the manager is the issue and should do more. Others think it is the players that should be better.
In reality it is probably possible to improve and win with better players or a better manager. Also it is possible to improve with the same team as well.
Also it might get worse with the same team as we have seen with Liverpool and buying your way into sucess is not certain to work either.
No, we're not expecting Neymar and Mbappe, we're expecting players to come in to fill in the holes of the squad. That didn't happen last summer, and arguably it didn't the summer before either.
Cast your mind back to the end of last season, and everyone said our major targets should be at least three of the following: CM, RW, LB, DM, CB - all of whom should be first team quality to relegate the current players we have in those positions to squad player status. What ended up happening was we got an AM for seemingly little reason, two teenage RWs who are long-term projects, and a LB who has maybe done his part in forcing the LB we had to up his game, as well as a striker who we could have gotten at any point since last March but decided to get him on deadline day so he missed the first month of the season unnecessarily. Arguably not one of those signings filled any of those needs and instead just bloated a squad which Ole had previously done well to trim the excess fat from.
Then, when we go back to the summer previous to that, we had to let go of Sanchez, Lukaku, Herrera, Fellaini, Valencia, Smalling - all players who had an important role to play under the previous manager and who needed replacing, in addition to the longstanding need for a RW and AM. What ended up happening instead was we got replacements for Valencia and Smalling but Ole had to risk his job and the whole season on Pereira and Lingard stepping up to fill the creative void and Martial + a 17 year old Greenwood to replace Lukaku. If it wasn't for Bruno, then he would have been out of the job and through no fault of his own because he did his part in selling the players that needed selling and the board didn't do theirs in getting him the adequate replacements for some of those who left. Primarily Sanchez and Lukaku.
The windows have only been fine in hindsight, because unlike Jose, Ole isn't a cnut and has made do with the scraps he's been given rather than agitate for more. By their second transfer windows, Jose and LvG had spent c.£750m between them in their tenures. Ole is likely going to be barely reaching half of that figure after three summer windows, with a bootload more outgoings which have paid for most of his outlay. The depth of support Ole has had doesn't match the support that Jose and LvG got.
Ole: £279,519,300
Jose: £334,237,500
LVG: £248,490,000
These are the numbers I could find, they are fairly similar, we treat everyone the same.
What you're describing here are limitations in the squad, not limitations in the manager.
Those are not net spend figures. If they were, Ole's totals would be well below 200, I should think.
Plenty of the top 5? Who do you think will be spending big that has been affected by Covid?
If you're calling what Ole has had "scraps", whether in the past or now, I'm not really gonna argue this any further.
Regarding net spend; there's a pretty detailed overview here: Manchester United - Transfer League . That's from pre-Bruno, so added 55 m for him, and calculated this season's net spend from the summary at Transfermarkt.
20/21: 66m
19/20: 120m
TOTAL OLE: 186m (93m per season)
18/19: 47m
17/18: 136m
16/17: 102m
Total Jose: 285m (95m per season)
15/16: 28m
14/15: 104m
TOTAL LVG: 132m (66m per season)
20/21: 66m
19/20: 120m
TOTAL OLE: 186m (93m per season)
18/19: 47m
17/18: 136m
16/17: 102m
Total Jose: 285m (95m per season)
15/16: 28m
14/15: 104m
TOTAL LVG: 132m (66m per season)
Scraps
He’s overseen spending of around 310m euros on new players.
Not sure that’s “scraps” in any sense of the word. He has overseen a much better transfer strategy from the club though, no doubt.
I dont think so, not entirely. A better squad would help of course. But there's a certain sense of routine and formula missing in our play. I don't like to overstate the issue of coaching because I think that gets overdone for Ole. You cant get to where we are in the league without being a decent coach. But City and Liverpool have raised the bar for title winners and there's a good chance it'll be back to a high level again next season. Basically the title winners nowaways will win 17 or 18 home games and maybe 14 or 15 away games. Personally I think you can only get that kind of absurd consistency by having the kind of hyper-drilled teams we see in modern football. Ole isnt that kind of coach by any means.
I agree with you. I think we can still win under Ole, but not be good enough to be seen as the favorite or be a true elite force.
We would need to have a season when we raise the game against City and win both games and then do great vs the weaker sides too.
I think that's highly debatable. And we'll only know once we have a team that's good enough to be put to that test. We don't, currently.
With the finances involved in signing players nowadays there is never any chance that a club will be able to solve all of its problems in one or even two summers. I don't think we can complain about what has been provided to Ole in terms of players. With how this squad looked going into last summers window it was always going to be a smart move to add various 'squad' players over one expensive star. Obviously Donny and Telles have failed to become key players for various reasons, but I still feel that we did the right thing.
The key point to consider here, and its something that was mentioned this time last year by me and many others, is that this team still had a lot of potential to improve organically, and we did improve. I think we will also be better again next season even if nothing changes at all this summer, but obviously our chances of being able to win the big ones will be improved by adding two starting quality players.
As we near the end of this season we are still on track with the progress that Ole backers have always been hoping to see. Back to back top 4 finishes should not be undervalued in this league, and we have it done this one comfortably which people shouldn't take for granted now its real, or try to caveat this accomplishment with talk about what other teams have or haven't done. We took care of business regardless. Winning the Europa suddenly feels quite crucial. Not for Oles future because it seems secure, but this team will obviously benefit from lifting a cup together.
The key point to consider here, and its something that was mentioned this time last year by me and many others, is that this team still had a lot of potential to improve organically, and we did improve. I think we will also be better again next season even if nothing changes at all this summer, but obviously our chances of being able to win the big ones will be improved by adding two starting quality players.
As we near the end of this season we are still on track with the progress that Ole backers have always been hoping to see. Back to back top 4 finishes should not be undervalued in this league, and we have it done this one comfortably which people shouldn't take for granted now its real, or try to caveat this accomplishment with talk about what other teams have or haven't done. We took care of business regardless. Winning the Europa suddenly feels quite crucial. Not for Oles future because it seems secure, but this team will obviously benefit from lifting a cup together.
Good managers make players look good and poor managers make players look poor. You can't separate the quality of the squad from the quality of the manager like they're two unrelated things. The two go hand in glove.
I don't think it's anywhere near as simple as you're making it out to be.
I would argue this season is unique, with every team struggling for fitness, bar City and their inflated squad, so could be a tactic that is being invoked, being more risk adversive, to protect the players and with hindsight, EL semi and a comfortable second so far shows he has been correct, unless anyone had hightened ideas we could surpass City. For this, I don't mind the football, as sour as it can seem at times, we have very much seen progression, as you stated, which is all most of us hoped for for this season. Next year I would expect a more dynamic way of playing and returning to our harrying and pressing through out games.
I'm not making it out to be simple. Just the opposite, I'm saying that simplistic judgments about the quality of the squad are of limited use because the relationship between the players and manager is so interwoven.
I really think we are a RW and proper CF away from taking City all the way to the finish line. Ole isn't doing too badly as you said, so i'd rather let him build the squad a bit further and see how that goes. He had the right ideas in targeting Haaland, Sancho, Bellingham, etc. Just couldn't get them for whatever reasons.
Of course. But you can only tell if they'e being made to look good or poor relative to how good you think they should be, or "really are". So that's as much a problem for your position as it is for mine mate.
I was actually talking about the whole 2 seasons in charge as opposed to the Leeds game specifically. When evaluating Ole's 2 seasons I think his regular refusal to make changes and the crap football are the 2 biggest aspects of the con side, overall the pros outweigh them for now.
I think it has more to do with his lack of trust in Axel or Bailly at the back, meaning we have to play deeper to protect the slow CB pairing, and in midfield Ole really doesn't trust Pogba in the double pivot most of the time so we are stuck playing 2 mediocre workhorses who starve our front 4 of decent ball.
In the latter instance I feel Ole's caution is justified as Pogba isn't suited to the double pivot and it's not Ole's fault that his options in there are McFred, but his refusal to pair Maguire with Axel or Bailly regularly is a choice that just doesn't make sense.
Persisting with a 4-2-3-1 with Pogba as a DM surely has to be considered criminal at this point given how he's generally performed when Ole has pushed him further forward. Even now, shoehorning him onto the left wing and Rashford onto the right just so that we can accomodate the formation seems like a huge waste, especially when we can just play both Pogba and Rashford in their natural positions with a different formation.
It's little things like that which makes one doubt if Ole is really getting the maximum he can out of the squad of players already.
- Status