Ole Gunnar Solskjær | Managerial Watch

[bludsucker]

Ole was a manager who didn't rate tactics and had nothing outside of a counter. He didn't even know how to set up a press.

Saying we came back from behind a lot is such a soft point, to go behind in the first place that frequently was a big worry. He won nothing, his best season didn't even accumulate more points than ten hag in Year one. He had no discipline, he overplayed certain players into the ground and he allowed a terrible culture to develop.

At least we came back from behind to win against out opponents. That shows that ole at least had the humility to accept he got it wrong and had the vision to correct it.
Is pressing the be all and end all of playing football? There is more than one way to play you know. Regarding the winning nothing jibe he was one penalty save away from winning a trophy. It wasn’t as if he was a million miles away from winning a trophy.

 

[Sarni]

My apologies, I was referring to 23-24 and misread your post. I see you were comparing Ten Hag's debut year to Ole's peak year. Which in itself is a flawed comparison for obvious reasons.

I have been comparing their best seasons, ETH’s second one is headed for a much worse ending than the first one so I thought it more fair to use 22-23 rather than 23-24. Quite clearly ETH had a better first season than Ole but will end up having a far worse second. If we however go on a run now and finish above 75 points, this comparison will shift.

 

[Nevilles.Wear.Prada]

3rd, 2nd, a final, and then a collapse of huge proportions. I dont think he'd ever have been great, but I do think he'd have made us better under a proper structure. People overstate how 'poor' he was because of those last few months. He beat Guardiolas city 4 times and people still pretend he had no tactical clue. We were very good to watch at his best, hit some high scoring games including 8 against southampton, and when ronaldo came and that season was met with an expectation for us to play even more on the front foot it just didnt work. He should have stuck with his plan to just upgrade on the personell of his final full season, he might have got a tune out of sancho the same as he was doing with martial, rashford and greenwood. Anyway, good luck to Ole wherever he goes.

Ronaldo. He came and screwed up everything Ole made right. Alot of things went south but it was Ronaldo who fully destroyed the morale, last remaining authority Ole had.

 

[Zen86]

Ole was a manager who didn't rate tactics and had nothing outside of a counter. He didn't even know how to set up a press.

Saying we came back from behind a lot is such a soft point, to go behind in the first place that frequently was a big worry. He won nothing, his best season didn't even accumulate more points than ten hag in Year one. He had no discipline, he overplayed certain players into the ground and he allowed a terrible culture to develop.

He didn’t rate tactics? The main criticism of him at the time was that our tactics changed too much, that we would change our approach to fit the opponent. It’s a bit idiotic to say that just because he preferred to play direct, he “didn’t rate tactics”. It was quite the opposite.

 

[anant]

He is comfortably the worst manager we've had in 30+ years.

We must have had some really high standards if under his tenure we've had the 3rd most goals/game in our history (more than SAF as well) and we also had the highest GD/game among literally any manager in our history.

People can go we didn't win a trophy, but I'm quite certain that had we signed a CM instead of Ronaldo in that season, we would have been closer to a period of sustained success now than where we currently are.

 

[TheRedDevil'sAdvocate]

This was pure Ole ball - imagine this now, people would be creaming themselves

Most of those spontaneous plays became possible because of Cavani's unselfish and world-class off the ball movement. It's a shame he proved more of an "in the spur of the moment" signing than a calculated decision. We traded that for the 40 yo version of Ronaldo who demanded everyone to work for him on the pitch. Then, we spent 75 million quid on a poacher to play alongside inverted forwards/wingers without an ounce of creativity in them. Even when we stumbled onto something good (probably by accident), we failed to recognize it.

 

[tomaldinho1]

Peak Ole ball was far more enjoyable than the peak ETH ball we’ve seen so far and ETHs Pit has been far worse than Ole’s, some will mention the trophy but they forget we were shit in that game but got away with it.

How can you say this when the Pool game at home happened?

 

[anant]

EtH had just walked into an absolute shitshow and a mess left by Ole/Ragnick with fans calling for every player to be sold.

I thought we were good enough to win the title with any other manager or was that not the case? We had enough individual brilliance that we were basically not coached in 3.5 years, yet managed to finish in T4 consecutively, reach latter stages of domestic competitions and EL. And we spent 250 odd million on that side as well in season1

 

[Zen86]

I thought we were good enough to win the title with any other manager or was that not the case? We had enough individual brilliance that we were basically not coached in 3.5 years, yet managed to finish in T4 consecutively, reach latter stages of domestic competitions and EL. And we spent 250 odd million on that side as well in season1

Fans have been calling for every player to be sold after pretty much every manager. Jose, Ole, Rangnick. And I don’t think the current crop under ETH would fare much better either.

 

[kettledrumhamster]

I share the feeling more or less, but in my case I wouldn't back a legend if we were as bad as we're now under ten Hag. I think results are important too.

The thing with Ole is that he kept us in that spot behind City and Liverpool for years. The second full season we reached a respectable level of performances so I had time for him, to see what he was capable of, if allowed more time.

I don't think the club is structured to reach the +90 points step or fight for the CL under any manager (which is what I undertand as success at a club of our size and resources) so I gladly took the 3rd and 2nd finishes, and just seeing what happened next while hoping for improvements at club level.

Once he lost the group and it became a mess he had to go. It's sad but it happens. If there isn't the bare minimum at least there's no margin for romanticism, in my opinion. But I appreciated the job he did for years in difficult conditions. Those who were super-critical must be realizing now that things are not easy at this club.

Yeah I also agreed it was probably fair to sack him. But on reflection, he had only lost 5 games in the league and finished top of the CL group! Even Ole fans like me felt that 4 defeats in 5 during a bad run including city and Liverpool was too much. But then you compare it to ETH this season and it seems madness to have sacked Ole so early ( or to keep ETH so long)

 

[Sarni]

I see VP is bigging up Ten Hag and laying the snack down on Ole despite their PL stats being almost identical. I think Ten Hag has 1 more point combined? Conceded more goals and scored a lot less, has a better win percentage but a significantly worse loss percentage. Spent roughly the same amount of money no?

It's a lesson against fanboyism. Don't do it lads, stay clear! Good night.

Yeah it’s really perplexing how they have basically been the same manager for us (results, money spent, failures) yet one is a resounding success and the other is the worst appointment in 30 years.

I personally would not rate a League Cup win (with that draw) and one extra point in the league that highly ie had Ole managed to grab one extra point and maybe win League Cup (or win EL which he was a penalty away from doing), this would not have massively changed my view on his tenure. It would have looked better but would not have gone from a failure he ultimately was to a historical, incredible success.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

Yeah I also agreed it was probably fair to sack him. But on reflection, he had only lost 5 games in the league and finished top of the CL group!

Erm… he didn’t finish top of the group at all.

He lost to fecking Young Boys away, then beat Villareal and Atalanta at home, drew to Atlanta away and then got fired with 2 games left to play, one of which Carrick managed, the other Ragnick.
He was already out of the League Cup and was averaging a miserable 1.42 points per game in the Premier League, even now ETH is bettering that with 1.55.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

Yeah it’s really perplexing how they have basically been the same manager for us (results, money spent, failures) yet one is a resounding walking success and the other is the worst appointment in 30 years.

Absolutely no-one is saying the bolded though. Most are admitting he’s failing now, but a win today and he’s not far off the points per game for Ole’s second best season. So right now, it’s clear which one was worse.

Of the two, ETH has clearly had the best full season. Ole had a shit last season and this may or may not go that way for EtH too, but right now the only thing you are saying Ole has on ETH is a 66 points season

 

[Sarni]

Absolutely no-one is saying the bolded though. Most are admitting he’s failing now, but a win today and he’s not far off the points per game for Ole’s second best season. So right now, it’s clear which one was worse.

Of the two, ETH has clearly had the best full season. Ole had a shit last season and this may or may not go that way for EtH too, but right now the only thing you are saying Ole has on ETH is a 66 points season

By a point. It really is a negligible difference.

 

[mk7]

Most of those spontaneous plays became possible because of Cavani's unselfish and world-class off the ball movement. It's a shame he proved more of an "in the spur of the moment" signing than a calculated decision. We traded that for the 40 yo version of Ronaldo who demanded everyone to work for him on the pitch. Then, we spent 75 million quid on a poacher to play alongside inverted forwards/wingers without an ounce of creativity in them. Even when we stumbled onto something good (probably by accident), we failed to recognize it.

And you cannot discount the no pressure environment of the empty stadia that enabled our mentality monsters to play. It all went to bits as soon as fans re-entered the equation.

 

[Leftback99]

Getting into miniscule point differences (ignoring goals scored etc) just confirms that it's been nowhere near the improvement we were told we'd get once we replaced him with a 'proper coach'.

 

[golden_blunder]

I see no reason to keep slagging the fella, he’s united through and through.

 

[VP89]

He didn’t rate tactics? The main criticism of him at the time was that our tactics changed too much, that we would change our approach to fit the opponent. It’s a bit idiotic to say that just because he preferred to play direct, he “didn’t rate tactics”. It was quite the opposite.

A bit idiotic? Go back and look at how he played, what he actually said about the importance of tactics and stop claiming daft things.

The main criticism was that we were only a counter attacking side and relied on individual brilliance to nick us games. Not that he kept changing his tactics. That actually happened when shit got ultra desperate.

 

[VP89]

We must have had some really high standards if under his tenure we've had the 3rd most goals/game in our history (more than SAF as well) and we also had the highest GD/game among literally any manager in our history.

People can go we didn't win a trophy, but I'm quite certain that had we signed a CM instead of Ronaldo in that season, we would have been closer to a period of sustained success now than where we currently are.

Football is about winning things, not solely scoring goals. At the end of the day, he won nothing whilst allowing our standards of professionalism to drop massively and failing to transcend our play. I don't give a feck if we scored a lot of goals in a patch in between, because the bigger picture is that we chronically failed. The bigger takeaway than GD is that we had our longest trophy drought under him.

 

[Samid]

Not that it changes much in the general picture, but we finished Ole's first full season in August because of the european games during Covid after the leagues had already ended, leaving us with a small margin for pre-season as the league started again around mid September.

While some teams were playing some friendlies here and there our players were resting, and when we played the first league games we got completely overrun. I remember how some of the clubs that played those late european games started poorly that following season. I think it was Bayern the ones I saw having a pair of blunders in the first weeks and I realized that we were playing our pre-season games in the league.

At the end of that season and as we reached the EL final the team just focused on it and we didn't win much in the final month. I recall we won one game with plenty of youngsters but we were playing for nothing. We could have got 2-3 wins more that season in normal conditions leading to 80 points and close to 80 goals too, but it wouldn't have changed anything. We were clearly the second best team but in the same way the gap with City was noticeable.

Considering the state of the club and the disgrace of a window they had that second summer (20-21), with 65 M spent on Van de Beek, Telles, Pellistri and Amad (who didn't even join that summer), and Cavani as a free agent, I think Ole did very well that season to get 2nd, the EL final lost on penalties and the big amount of goals scored, with plenty of good games throghout the season.

I don't know much about Sweden but if he finally goes there they're getting a good manager.

Don't forget the protests that lead to us having 3 games in 5 days. From one Thursday to the next we played an unprecedented 4 games.

With a normal season (the first month not being a pre season as you mentioned, and the end not being completely bonkers) we'd easily have ended up on 80+ points.

That was the most fun season post Fergie (not saying much but still a big samle size). And that on top of a disastrous summer window where the hierarchy didn't sign one useful player.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

By a point. It really is a negligible difference.

And a trophy like.

And one had 20 months in the job to prepare for his best season, and was still worse.

Doesn’t matter how you paint it, ETH needed much less preparation time, and much less money to better Ole’s best.

Now, he is failing and he’ll likely lose his job even if he gets players back and manages to match Ole’s second best season (66 points), because well, 66 points is shite, and standards should be much higher. Ole surviving that season put our standards down the toilet.
ETH’s first season was good/acceptable as a United manager, because it was his first. It’d also have been fecking shite if that was all he could produce after 20 months. Just as we absolutely should expect him to better last season, anything less is failure for me. But comparing him to the massive failure that was Ole doesn’t help anyone.

 

[Phil Osophy]

I would rate ETH way higher than I do if we had lost the cup final but we had kept playing and being competitive as we were doing before that game, instead of the drop in performances we saw after the cup and that lasts until now.

In that scenario you can bet the percentage of people voting "sack" would be around 10 % in the CAF instead of 54 despite no trophies and two finals lost, and we'd be looking forward to ETH under Ineos, me included. That's the relevance a league cup has in the big picture, close to zero.

The current scenario is leading to ETH's sacking for a reason, in the same way LvG got sacked right after winning the FA Cup. Any fool can win a tin cup with the stars getting aligned as we got last season, but those trophies aren't even celebrated with the bus around the city as it happens with the relevant ones. It's a matter of shame and common sense. The same reason they shouldn't be brought as something remarkable in these debates.

In EtH's case it can't hide how he lasted 6 months being competitive at United and 10 being a mess, being saved by a takeover taking place. A manager with that baggage and everything we're seeing this season from every angle (performances, tactics, results, records, metrics, decisions, in game management, etc) can't be dinning at the same table as Ole and Jose, but having a snack with Moyes in the garden.

 

[kettledrumhamster]

Football is about winning things, not solely scoring goals. At the end of the day, he won nothing whilst allowing our standards of professionalism to drop massively and failing to transcend our play. I don't give a feck if we scored a lot of goals in a patch in between, because the bigger picture is that we chronically failed. The bigger takeaway than GD is that we had our longest trophy drought under him.

These are such silly arguments. What if de gea would've scored his pen and saved one? Would that tiny difference have made everything great just because we'd have won a pot?

 

[VP89]

These are such silly arguments. What if de gea would've scored his pen and saved one? Would that tiny difference have made everything great just because we'd have won a pot?

What if DDG didn't feck up in the FA cup final last year? What if Ole had so many injuries like Ten Hag now? There's lots of what ifs. The revisionism from supporters is what's annoying.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

These are such silly arguments. What if de gea would've scored his pen and saved one? Would that tiny difference have made everything great just because we'd have won a pot?

What if Gerrard didn’t slip, is Rodgers suddenly an amazing PL manager?

These things happened, stop with the what ifs or everyone could be an amazing manager. Ole wasn’t, simple as that, he had 3 years to show he was, he did the opposite. ETH showed potential for while, certainly more than Ole ever managed, but is also failing.

 

[Phil Osophy]

Don't forget the protests that lead to us having 3 games in 5 days. From one Thursday to the next we played an unprecedented 4 games.

With a normal season (the first month not being a pre season as you mentioned, and the end not being completely bonkers) we'd easily have ended up on 80+ points.

That was the most fun season post Fergie (not saying much but still a big samle size). And that on top of a disastrous summer window where the hierarchy didn't sign one useful player.

I totally forgot this.

I remember that the semifinal against Chelsea in the cup was part of the congested run, and they got few days more to rest which made a difference. On the top of it we had DDG scoring the goals for them.

Against Sevilla in the EL we created more chances and we deserved to win. Our start in the second half was great but we missed chance after chance. 9 attempts to 20 and we went home.

https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuropaleague/match/2030141--sevilla-vs-man-united/

Is I said I don't see Ole as a top manager and I understand why he gets criticized. I think he lacked things and it showed at some points, but partly he was also unlucky by not winning something with us. I think he wasn't far away from his time being remembered in a positive way.

Beating Villarreal on penalties would have led to our best season in the last decade. 2nd, EL winners and 125 goals. One penalty away. Such a shame.

 

[Sarni]

And a trophy like.

And one had 20 months in the job to prepare for his best season, and was still worse.

Doesn’t matter how you paint it, ETH needed much less preparation time, and much less money to better Ole’s best.

Now, he is failing and he’ll likely lose his job even if he gets players back and manages to match Ole’s second best season (66 points), because well, 66 points is shite, and standards should be much higher. Ole surviving that season put our standards down the toilet.
ETH’s first season was good/acceptable as a United manager, because it was his first. It’d also have been fecking shite if that was all he could produce after 20 months. Just as we absolutely should expect him to better last season, anything less is failure for me. But comparing him to the massive failure that was Ole doesn’t help anyone.

League Cup isn’t that important and the fact we had the easiest run in of all recent winners helped massively. My outlook on Ole would not have dramatically changed if he had managed to beat Charlton, Burnley, Forest and out of form Newcastle to claim the least important trophy there is. Also, Ole’s season included an EL final after a very decent run.

ETH will probably get to keep his job anyway because our owners appear as deluded about him as our fans, but he will certainly keep it if he gets to 66 points this season. That would mean 35 points in the remaining 18 games which would be a very drastic in-season improvement and bode well for next year.

 

[Ole'sgunnarwin]

People are rating a bloody Carling Cup too highly on here. For me beating PSG in a Champions League knockout is more impressive.

 

[Sarni]

These are such silly arguments. What if de gea would've scored his pen and saved one? Would that tiny difference have made everything great just because we'd have won a pot?

Indeed. I don’t imagine we would have been calling to keep Ole after that disaster of 21-22 even if we had won EL the season before which we were inches away from doing.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

People are rating a bloody Carling Cup too highly on here. For me beating PSG in a Champions League knockout is more impressive.

We were absolutely awful v PsG though, my God.

Next up, talking down Fergie’s first FA Cup because it was only vs. Crystal Palace and it took a replay, Ole was more impressive winning a game that made no sense due to how battered we were.

 

[Sarni]

People are rating a bloody Carling Cup too highly on here. For me beating PSG in a Champions League knockout is more impressive.

I will get slammed by ETH cult but for me the Europa League run in 20-21 was better than the League Cup win. We beat Sociedad (4-0 at their ground), Milan and Roma (6-2 at OT being our best European performance since Fergie left) to get to the final which we unfortunately lost.

If we had got to an EL final last year instead of losing to Sevilla in a manner we had, that would have been a better experience overall.

I don’t place much value on League Cup though. I am not concerned when we exit it early as most top clubs don’t treat it seriously until semifinals anyway, I wasn’t bothered when Newcastle obliterated us the other day in the same competition (though for ETH fanatics it also stopped being so valuable the minute we lost that game).

 

[Zen86]

A bit idiotic? Go back and look at how he played, what he actually said about the importance of tactics and stop claiming daft things.

The main criticism was that we were only a counter attacking side and relied on individual brilliance to nick us games. Not that he kept changing his tactics. That actually happened when shit got ultra desperate.

You really are blinded by this crusade against him, it’s a bit sad.

 

[VP89]

You really are blinded by this crusade against him, it’s a bit sad.

There is no crusade, he said himself he doesn't place as high a value on tactics. He himself allowed a poor culture to fester and there was the longest trophy drought under his reign. These are facts to some crusade. The only crusade right now is from revisionists like you claiming facts are idiotic.

 

[golden_blunder]

He’s not manager now Jesus lads

 

[Sarni]

You really are blinded by this crusade against him, it’s a bit sad.

Largely driven by his immense love and admiration for ten Hag I think, which drives him to depreciate anyone other than him and get touchy when someone compares Ole to the best manager we have ever had.

 

[Zen86]

There is no crusade, he said himself he doesn't place as high a value on tactics. He himself allowed a poor culture to fester and there was the longest trophy drought under his reign. These are facts to some crusade. The only crusade right now is from revisionists like you claiming facts are idiotic.

Yeah it’s revisionism to suggest a Manchester United manager used tactics

You’re a bit of a parody at this point. Always on here criticising Ole at every opportunity, while singing hymns for ETH and Rangnick (of all people) at the same time.

 

[Zen86]

Largely driven by his immense love and admiration for ten Hag I think, which drives him to depreciate anyone other than him and get touchy when someone compares Ole to the best manager we have ever had.

He did the same with Rangnick as well, another manager whose reign was vastly superior both on and off the pitch.

 

[VP89]

Yeah it’s revisionism to suggest a Manchester United manager used tactics

You’re a bit of a parody at this point. Always on here criticising Ole at every opportunity, while singing hymns for ETH and Rangnick (of all people) at the same time.

I said he didn't value tactics or have enough of a grasp of it. That is a fact and this is an Ole thread. I've actually said ten hag has no leg to stand on if he continues poor form despite having players back, so next time you want to make shit up about singing hymns I suggest you read the posts better.

 

[Samid]

I see VP is bigging up Ten Hag and laying the snack down on Ole despite their PL stats being almost identical. I think Ten Hag has 1 more point combined? Conceded more goals and scored a lot less, has a better win percentage but a significantly worse loss percentage. Spent roughly the same amount of money no?

It's a lesson against fanboyism. Don't do it lads, stay clear! Good night.

450m spent, 9th in the league, 3rd fewest goals, finished bottom of a piss easy CL group, eliminated at home in the cup yet for some reason he's still the dog's bollocks according to the deluders.

I genuinely think his fanboys are amongst the worst in football. With the likes of Messi and Ronaldo you kind of get why their fanboys behave the way they do. They've been relevant for decades and performed at insane levels. So much blind love for a nothing manager though, that's mind-bogglingly worrying.

 

[Robbie Boy]

And a trophy like.

And one had 20 months in the job to prepare for his best season, and was still worse.

Doesn’t matter how you paint it, ETH needed much less preparation time, and much less money to better Ole’s best.

Now, he is failing and he’ll likely lose his job even if he gets players back and manages to match Ole’s second best season (66 points), because well, 66 points is shite, and standards should be much higher. Ole surviving that season put our standards down the toilet.
ETH’s first season was good/acceptable as a United manager, because it was his first. It’d also have been fecking shite if that was all he could produce after 20 months. Just as we absolutely should expect him to better last season, anything less is failure for me. But comparing him to the massive failure that was Ole doesn’t help anyone.

Yup.