Not sure when he came in or under what circumstances but Ole had to firefight the first few months, then it went south as the season closed out. Then it was holiday time. We start the season, starts ok then falls apart due to injuries, lack of options and general shit performances from certain players.
Firing Ole will not solve much, we will be back here arguing in 12 months
Go back to Ole's words during our winning run, how do we do once we start losing or facing adversity. How do we do when we go down a goal? Take an objective view of how he has handled it and it has been amateurist at best.
As a manager, watching games when things are not going right on the pitch, how often have we seen him adjust the team tactically or through smart subs to really affect the game? Almost never and the latter part of last season, it happened, we should have seen signs but, there weren't. We were told he needed a preseason and fitter players to sort it out. That hasn't worked out very well.
As a manager, who has had ample time to assess those available to him, know their strengths and weaknesses, you'd think he'd be prepared in the eventuality of injuries/suspensions. What is his approach based on the squad he has available? Stick to the same formation as though he had everyone available. Play players out of position like playing a 17 year old Striker on the wing while a 21 year old winger gets played as a striker and playing the likes of Mata and Gomes together well because they are the closest he has available to stick to that one formation he knows.
Even the most basic of managers would know that if you don't have the personnel to play your favored approach, you adjust based on what you have. Only if you are tactically inept, do you then just try random players in positions / roles they don't really excel at and hope for a performance out of them.
He had Young, Dalot as fullbacks, and only has James and Rashford as real forwards as Greenwood as much as he talks him up, does't rate him as a forward and in midfield he has the options of McTominay, Fred and Matic, none who are great creators from deep, in the first 2 he at least has 2 hard working mobile players. So how about fielding a 3-5-2. Allowing Rashford who is not really great as a lone #9 to have a partner in James who can also get in behind, thus not having 2 CBs at all time watching him and they'd both have someone to play off of as well rather than being totally isolated all game. In Dalot and Young, you do have 2 players that can provide width and in Tuanzebe, Maguire and Rojo (or Lindelof when he was fit) he had defenders that he could count on to make a pass out of the back and still be good defensively and in McTominay and Fred players that could get up in support of the forwards as they push up.
It doesn't even have to be a 3-5-2, it could be a 4-3-3, 4-5-1, 4-4-2 Diamond or even just old traditional 4-4-2. Point is he could adjust and not use the excuse oh I have injuries and players that are performing shit who need their heads sorting out so I can play just one way. He needs his head sorting out to know that whatever positives he is seeing are a figment of his imagination.
