Ole Gunnar Solskjær | 2021/22 Discussion
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Am I missing something here? @Eriku you said "RM Castilla" which means Zidane. Ole won Norway league title before Zidane landed Madrid job
Who cares. Ole has got it tough. Woodward must have shown him the list of potential players wanting to come to United,but didn't tell him we have no plans of buying any of them.
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Poor Ole got suckered and now is going to pay the price of the board and Glazers greed. His new brief will be "Turn Sanchez into the new Ronaldo", Young into Cafu and so on so forth.
I am not at all disillusioned.
.Poor Ole got suckered and now is going to pay the price of the board and Glazers greed. His new brief will be "Turn Sanchez into the new Ronaldo", Young into Cafu and so on so forth.
I am not at all disillusioned.
Hah, thanks, I forgot the full context of my own post and just assume he was interpreting me accurately.
Ole's preferred way of setting up his team takes a lot of inspiration from the likes of Guardiola, who is someone he has even stated himself to be a chief inspiration. This is the case for several managers across the world for obvious reasons. I think people can calm down with the claims that he doesn't understand football and is just a passion pace counterattack merchant. He's got 10+ years of experience in management and several successful stints at that. Ultimately we'll see his football next season and an improved version on the season after that if he's given that time and the proper players to implement it. He can hardly make his teams play like prime Barca if he's got a midfield of Pogba, McTominay and Fred.
Not really. Saying there are no parallels between Pep, Zizou and Ole is stupid, because there clearly are parallels, at the same times as there are differences. It’s just not very relevant.
Yes, you can say: They all played for, coached youth and managed at the same big club, they were all known to be intelligent players who analyzed the games more than the other players did, they all won leagues and CL as players, played internationals and WCs, they were all understudies of great coaches/managers, and then you could list all the differences - but the point is none of this is very relevant to why Pep and Zizou is mentioned in these discussions.
The comparisons drawn are actually between the choices of Laporte, Lopez and Woodward (and their advisers!) in their situation of choosing an unproven manager and former player. And between the grounds for criticism and doom-mongery among fans at the moment of these three appointments.
Did Laporte know what he was doing, or did he just take a one-in-a-million punt? Did his advisers who knew Barca and knew Pep tell him reasons apart from trophy count that convinced him it wasn’t a maniacal choice to sack a CL winner to appoint a junior team coach? Maybe so. Did the fans know all these behind-the-scenes-things Laporte and the rest of his crew knew? Probably only to a very limited degree. Probably some where vocal about a former legend with the right mettle and philisophy being a brilliant choice, probably even more said it was a crazy experiment to entrust a possible golden era team to a rookie with no managment/coaching experience to speak of.
In hindsight the latter are made to look the fools, and they indeed have much in common with the people judging Solskjær before he has been given time to show what the Old Trafford hierarchy have seen in him. But also the former were likely fools, what did they know if it would work, without working the corridors of the club, without seeing Pep at the training ground as a player, as a junior coach? It could be a genial appointment, but if the basis were only the factors that a fan has access too, it would likely have been a fool who who thought that a likely recipe for success.
The only valid point in bringng up this comparison, is in counter to people claiming they know it’s a bad appointment based on lack of proven, accessible-to-all credentials.
So last year terrible run of form was due to fitness issue of the players. Ole promised to built up their fitness level and serious about it to start 1 July including many new signings to train and gel with the team. This is the summer of major rebuilding that we were promised.
We are running out of time and so far only signed one unknown player. Pray hard!
We are running out of time and so far only signed one unknown player. Pray hard!
It's a stupid comparison to make, yes, but you've actually just done away with being objective and made a few terrible points here.
Solskjaer stated that the majority of players had impressed, and would be given a new chance come pre-season, only a few had not response well to his demands. He also promised 2-3 signings this summer. You can also assume Greenwood and Tuanzebe will act like new signings this summer and be part of the first team squad. Lingard might be moved to his natural position CM. Sanchez should not be writen of yet.
- I've already explained those points many times. Pep and Klopp don't abandon their style when some of their players are tired, Ole did. He also was subject of criticism for being a rotational manager and changing styles both at Molde and Cardiff before.
- Because it's a world of difference between Pep being understudy of Cruyff and Ole understudy of Ferguson. As I've already said Pep based his approach and tactics on Cruyff's and you can easily see that. If you say that Ole based his on Klopp then your point isn't valid is it? Also as I've said Cruyff was there for Pep in his tenure and actively helped him to mould his style, Phelan is not Fergie.
- Our u23 are in second division if you haven't forgotten. The youth teams are long until they are ready for the first team and most likely Ole will be gone by that time.
Makings of his own downfallIf Ole is counting on this, the outcome is gonna be too obvious to not predict.
What have you seen in him ?
It is not a good counterpoint. While you are listing the similarities and differences add 1. the state of the club and 2. remedial action taken (timing and effect) when a "long shot" manager is given a "chance" and 3. the depth of the local competition.
Huge difference between Pep and Ole, is that Pep has played under 3-4 different world class managers in his playing time. Ole played under SAF, which is a great thing, but can also be a bad thing as manager going forward. Is he going to try to be a clone of SAF, because of that. If Lampard goes to Chelsea, I think he will be better equipped than Ole is now, in terms of playing staff and tactically!
He'll be gone by October If that's his thinking.....
It's also totally different because Cruyff was the exponent of a footballing system - a style and type of football. That was something that Pep was able to study, implement and develop. With Fergie it was much more about him as an individual and his unique personality traits that made him a genius. Try as they might (and lord knows plenty of his ex players have tried) they can't replicate what Fergie did, because they are not Fergie.
Christ on a bike, where have we heard this before? this was supposed to be the summer we actually react to the clearly visible issues within our entire squad, not only glaring positions that we've failed to address for the past 6 years but poisonous free loaders that just aren't contributing anymore. If this is genuinely Ole' point of view, legend or not, he's an inept manager that will need booting asap.
Why does this seem to happen every time we change managers? These players have had enough second chances.
Why does this seem to happen every time we change managers? These players have had enough second chances.
Happens with every new coach, these players are toxic and have been throwing managers under the bus for years to save themselves. Basically:
- New boss comes in.
- Gives everyone a chance to show him what they've got.
- Eventually the boss decides on who needs to go and who should stay.
- Players down tools and the coach is gone before they get the chance to sell either them or their buddies
- His replacement comes in, gives everyone the benefit of the doubt/fresh start and the cycle continues.
The only aspect of success Ole has here was a crucial summer window bringing a new spine of individuals in. That's not going to happen given the current circumstances of our business thus far. I think the facts are while Solskjaer is an undeniable club legend, we have one of the worst managers in the top 6. All these stupid comparisons between Zidane / Pep / Klopp is straight delusion.
If Mourinho never got sacked Ole would still be in Norway, so you have to question his aspirations and success as a manager. Solskjaer has been in management for 10 years and all he's done in the most competitive environment is get Cardiff relegated. He was an awful appointment.
If Mourinho never got sacked Ole would still be in Norway, so you have to question his aspirations and success as a manager. Solskjaer has been in management for 10 years and all he's done in the most competitive environment is get Cardiff relegated. He was an awful appointment.
What Ive been saying all along.
Only reason Mourinho got sacked is Mourinho. There has been no evidence of players actually downing tools, but plenty evidence of players not being fit enough.
No doubt. Moyes, Van Gaal, and Mourinho all weren't up to it, but we have many self serving cnuts in that dressing room who know when to hide behind the manager or their teammates.
We keep changing managers and these players keep getting a stay of execution. I know I shouldn't say it, but Pep would have had them out of the door pronto.
We won’t even be in the top six by the end of next season so it’s moot.
Moyes’ 6 year contract expires in a week.
Will the curse finally be lifted after that ?
Will the curse finally be lifted after that ?
Here we go. Say you've not got an agenda? What a fecking stupid thing to say. I was actually expecting this, with Lampard apparently going to get a big job, it's not "what's he done to deserve this?" or "what are his qualifications?" it's "he'll do well", "he's better tactically than Ole" with no fecking evidence of anything. Cretin.
Yup.
Pep and Ole comparisons are way off the mark. They actually have nothing in common, besides being managers.
The unproven thing is also incorrect - Ole has been in management for 10 years, whilst Pep 0 when appointed by Barca.
Pep also played in Cruyff system that he later on developed and based his management on the same system which is recognizable from the off. Ole has been managed by Fergie but we don't see his style being the same like his this year. You might make excuses about players and fitness, but it's not like Pep didn't employ the same recognizable style from day 1.
Fergie himself varied in style - his early 4-4-2 exciting days and then the more pragmatic style after we won CL. He was first and foremost a brilliant man manager and got most of his players almost every time.
Not sure why you shouldn't say it, it's true. It's true for any manager that's worth his salt to manage this club. God knows why someone like Mourinho persisted with some of them, but that's the question on everybody's lips, who exactly is running the club, how much power does a Manchester United manager actually have? We've seen both Pep and Klopp walk into our two biggest rivals and being freely allowed to clear out whoever they want, even players of Coutinho and Hart(at the time) status. What is this immovable force that's stopping our managers, it can only be Woodward.
It is either the board are running the club playing side for marketing rather than footballing reasons or it is another instance of the tail wagging the dog.
This squad is a team that came 2nd a season ago. It’s a team that won 11 in a row including beating Arsenal, Chelsea away and PSG.
If we did nothing else but get these guys to perform to the level they can consistently it would already be a 100x bigger improvement than anything any manager has done since Fergie left. We have so many more problems than not signing more quality players, we actually have talent all over the squad we just can’t get them to perform. Think about it - Pogba World Cup winner, Martial debut season scored 20+ goals, Mata 2 time player of the year, Sanchez one of the best pl players of the last 5 years, Matic PL winner, Rashford a highly promising player etc
Why do these guys not perform to the level we sometimes see and know they can play? That’s the biggest issue we need to solve. It doesn’t matter how many good signings we make if they never perform to their actual level what’s the point?
It’s clear Ole’s statements at the end of last season were to get players to buck up their ideas. If claiming Martial has played his last game gets him to perform then that’s what we want, we don’t need to sell if he actually becomes a 20 goal a season winger again
I think this is a fair point - but it really heaps the pressure on OGS to get them playing. I mean, he's already had half a season working with them as a free hit, and will now have had a full pre-season with them to get these fabled fitness levels up. It's on him to get them firing now - regardless of who we bring in.
That is Ole's job forget the 11 wins in a row and forget rubbish end of season - judge him on how next season progresses and see direction and improvement.
Wish Ed would fecking hurry up and get him what he wants.
On a positive note a lot of the players seem to be in training already which suggests they've bought into what he's asking from them regarding their fitness. Seems like half the squad have posted training videos in the last couple of weeks. It's a good sign.
While I generally hate seeing them post these type of videos for attention it's much better than seeing pictures of them looking fat on the beach like we've seen in other summers.
On a positive note a lot of the players seem to be in training already which suggests they've bought into what he's asking from them regarding their fitness. Seems like half the squad have posted training videos in the last couple of weeks. It's a good sign.
While I generally hate seeing them post these type of videos for attention it's much better than seeing pictures of them looking fat on the beach like we've seen in other summers.
I have more faith in Ole than any manager so far because at least he gets it. LVG and Mou both tried to stamp their systems they had at previous teams onto United and it didn’t work. I prefer the approach of working out what the team is and wants to be and developing a system around that.
It’s like Southgate at England, he wasn’t world class and didn’t have a big reputation. When he came in he didn’t try to make England play like the other big nations, he developed a system that worked with the players and culture we had. I think Ole will do something similar
Well I hope you are right, but I don't see that that is based on much more than vain hope.
Time will tell.
Pre-season might give us an idea of the system he has decided on, who has taken his threat of the players coming back in good shape. It will be the first game of the season where we will get a better idea of where we are. We need to get a win in that first home game and it will set back Chelsea a bit.
I think in general Ole will get a much easier ride from fans than Mourinho did, but that opening game against Chelsea is an interesting one. Given that they have lost their manager and their best player this summer, plus they have a transfer ban, it's going to be hard to explain away anything less than a good performance/result.
This squad finished second by amassing a grand total of 81 points which guarantees you only CL football nowadays unless we're talking about a freakish season like the one when Leicester won the league. The stats from the post-Ferguson era indicate that this particular total isn't exactly the norm for this side but a seasonal performance that actually exceeded expectations since in the previous seasons United had finishes between 64-70 points to show for. Funilly, the manager who got United to second place was very vocal about his team's capabilities. He claimed that United need serious strengthening and when asked about our title aspirations he said clearly that if the title is going to be decided on 90+ points, there's no way that this side will be able to mount a serious challenge. Next season saw United return to their usual form (66 points) and although the aforementioned manager pretty much sabotaged himself & his team, when he was asked to comment on United's crazy run of successful results, he retorted that time will prove that this particular run is the result of the honeymoon period under a new regime more than anything else. Time proved him right. But the case between this manager and our fans is as the saying goes: Better lose an eye than a good reputation. And his reputation among the United faithful wasn't good, to begin with. But this doesn't mean that he doesn't have a point every now and then.
Furthermore, the stats throughout the season were constantly showing that during our good run we're actually overperforming. When everything was rosy and we were winning games left, right and centre, the fans were laughing at the xgoals and the xpoints data which were painting a very different picture: One that was saying that we hadn't actually found a steady solution out of our problems but we were winning games on our incredible momentum instead. When the momentum left us (after De Gea's howler at the Emirates), the performances eventually deteriorated. You talked about consistency. Well, consistency is achieved through sheer quality, it's not built on momentum. And time and time again, it's proven that we lack quality. Lots of it. You said 11 consecutive wins as proof of undeniable quality? Arsenal, this season, remained unbeaten in all competitions for 22 games (including an 11-win streak) from 25/8 until 13/12. You won't find many United fans who believe that they are actually pulling up any trees.
I said it previously on this thread that Solskjaer has a great advantage in comparison with Moyes, Mourinho and LvG. He's not a sour, dithering character with zero charisma and he's not as arrogant and adamant about his ways as his previous two predecessors either. He also has his own history at the club and he's loved by the fanbase. This gives him leverage to force the necessary changes in the squad. And i believe that our fans will back him, even if the results aren't great from the get-go if the team starts looking like it's going places. But this won't happen if he believes that with a pat on the back these players will discover the quality they lack. It won't improve Martial's horrendous off the ball movement, it won't turn Rashford into an all-around forward, it won't change anything for Mata in his 7th season at the club, it won't make Lingard a top-class orchestrator or -enter the name of CB- a world-class and consistent defender. The worst thing is that it's beyond miraculous coaching abilities too. Mourinho had very few friends at the time of his appointment (and none when he was sacked) and LvG lost all of them on the way (apart from a selected few who are still in his corner on here) but they were good managers nonetheless. Many highs and lows in their careers? No doubt. But also one very scary similarity they share: United is the only club where they failed to deliver what their CV suggested they would. If that doesn't say something about the squad, i don't know what does. Ole should be very careful with his choices regarding the first team.
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