How many times have you read this on the Caf for the last 6 years. If it keeps happening again and again then it is because the team and the coaching is not good enough.There are always games that you feck up and have "those games where nothing goes quite right". Even with Fergie when we were the best team around. It happens. And I completely disagree, we are not 5th to 8th bracket, very clearly there is not much between the top 4 challengers outside of Liverpool and City but we'll see how the season turns out. I'm pretty confident we'll finish 4th. I mean, we did also just 2 weeks ago beat a fellow top 4 challenger 4-0. Though I guess people on here forget instantly.
And yes, we aren't a world class team. We have a very young team that is growing, developing and progressing, but we'll be inconsistent... Ultimately I think we'll be good enough to make it. Just have to wait and see though. Important to not overreact though and see things as they really are. Like if Pogba and Rashford put away their penalties, we're on 4 points more already. Individual mistakes that just need to stop happening, but sometimes you get a run like that and all we can do is push through.
Jose wasn't underachieving with this squad, he massively overachieved in 17/18 and made people actually believe we had the quality to be right behind City.
It's going to take some turnaround now, considering the context of the summer and end of last season.
If Solskjaer fails, can we finally point the finger where it should go? Ed Woodward and the Glazers.
Against a top team I would accept that but not against Palace at home. We had no idea how to play football.
Clear as day we don't have the players forward of the defense to play the way Ole wants. Back him, hope our stars (and future stars, ie James) stay.
No reason to be pessimistic when we just destroyed Chelsea by 4.
3 wins in 13 games (competitive) since PSG !!! That's bad.
I think you can say there were some questionable decisions e.g. sticking with lingard, not bringing on Mata earlier but in reality today was the players mixed with the ref. You can't plan for missing a pen, being denied a pen, potentially being denied a red, gk error, general erratic passing etc. Some of it was a lack of experience/maturity by the players which OGS needs to factor in as he's backed youth but in general the players weren't up to it today. There was definitely enough talent to beat them today.
There is a worrying piece around how creative we are though, we struggle in open play and we don't seem to be working on set pieces. Again you can do all the drills you want but if on the day the players don't perform than that's one thing but I do think that it's hard to see what they've been seeing in training to make them think an established CAM/attacker wasn't needed or CM to push pogba forward.
@Ace of Spades surely no one says Palace outplayed us?
I can't speak for others but like I said the problem lies through every facet of this club from the players, manager, board all of these are much more prominent than any refereeing display ever will beThe deflection I'm seeing is happening in this thread, and it is aimed at the manager.
And then look against who we played today. Would any Palace player be in our first 11 except Zaha? That excuse is really boring. We can be outplayed by Liverpool, City even in some away games but against Palace at OT we didn't create anything in first 45 minutes. In second half it was better but we didn't create much clear chances.
Anyway, as i am saying for months now, it is not result what is a problem. It is the way how we play. Tell me honestly, do you think that this is good enough after 9 months in charge?
We played Crystal Palace not Liverpool.
Jose wasn't underachieving with this squad, he massively overachieved in 17/18 and made people actually believe we had the quality to be right behind City.
Today felt like an uphill battle where almost nothing went with us. We should have won and Palace were lucky. We somehow have to manage to turn this around, to get the young players to consistently perform at a higher level or Solskjær will be out.You would think with how Ole is blamed that they did, as that is the time that he should be blamed. No matter who the manager is, the mistakes that happened today can happen to anyone, and the manager can't do much about these things.
I keep hearing this but what is his idea? People here judge him too often based on what he says in public. Jose and LVG also said that they are playing attacking fast football and that the best players will play and that they play youth etc...He's got the right idea but something is badly wrong when we try and put it into practice.
I keep hearing this but what is his idea? People here judge him too often based on what he says in public. Jose and LVG also said that they are playing attacking fast football and that the best players will play and that they play youth etc...
Based only on what we see on the pitch, what is Ole's idea? I am maybe wrong here and i know that people will say it, but i see style something like Jose's. All players behind ball and waiting for quick transition. We look absolutely clueless when we attack team that play defensive football.
We still look like we looked last season. So i guess it is Ole's plan. I am sorry but if you are big club and you want to fight for titles or at least for top4, your main gameplan can't be counter attacks. And after 9 months and pre-season i don't see what will change here. It is our style of play and it doesn't look good. It will win us some games but in most of games we will struggle.
The board never backed him. It was clear this season we was a few players short in midfield. We all knew that, so why the surprise?
Today felt like an uphill battle where almost nothing went with us. We should have won and Palace were lucky. We somehow have to manage to turn this around, to get the young players to consistently perform at a higher level or Solskjær will be out.
He isn’t good enough but in truth the team isn’t good enough. He hasn’t been backed, there is no way he would have been happy with that front 4 going into the new season.
Fans need to wake up to the absolute mess Woodward has created. He has done nothing to benefit this club from a football aspect. Wrong decision after wrong decision. I for one am fed up with it, I barely look forward to games anymore. I genuinely expect us to finish 10th this season. We can’t break down teams. Relying on counter attacking football.
The only thing I can blame Solskjaer for is his persistence with Pogba in the midfield two. It has never worked and it’s 3 seasons later and we are still trying it. He loses the ball too often which costs us goals. He should play as a number 10 and feck off Lingard out of the team at the same time.
People ridiculed him for saying it was the biggest achievement of his career. Perhaps a bit hyperbolic given that he's a treble winner, but the gist of what he was saying was very sensible.Jose wasn't underachieving with this squad, he massively overachieved in 17/18 and made people actually believe we had the quality to be right behind City.
