Our technical level, what do you make of it?

Marwood said:
But the test of techinal ability is doing it at pace under pressure.

Any pro can look great in the park or playing with space
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To some extent I agree with you. However, I think we can all agree that on easy street Pogba and Bruno are great players. I don't think its controversial to say that Pogba and Bruno are better more technical players than McTominay. However, in Gdansk McTominay actually had a decent game. His first touch didn't go to pot. His short passing was no better or worse than it usually is. We can't say that about either Pogba or Bruno. Too often, we see with our supposedly better players that they wilt under pressure.

I think of players like Taarabt or Ben Arfa who are wonderfully gifted. However, never managed to do 'it' when at big clubs because of the added layer of expectation. IMO we have too many players like that. Too many players who can only show what they got when there's not much riding on it.
 
It's awful, and has been for way too long. Pogba really kills us being so great technically on the ball but so lazy half the games. So ,we have to start too low technical middies like Fred and McTominay. It's brutal.
 
Hammondo said:
You are massively overrating the technical ability of our players, even our best technical players have technical weaknesses.
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Not really. Of yesterday's lineup.

Lindelof - very good
Varane - very good
Maguire - average
Shaw - very good on his left foot
Fred - very good
Pogba - very good when running with the ball
Rashford - average
Sancho - very good
Bruno - very good
Ronaldo - was once very good

AWB - very good on his right foot
Lingard - good
Matic - very good
Elanga - too young to tell
Telles - very good on his left foot

Most of our players are very good technically, as long as we play them in the right system.

Lindelof is no use in an unfamiliar right back position, he doesn't know where to position or where to pass.
Fred needs quick passing options, he can't play on his own in midfield surrounded by 3 players.
Pogba is good when he's got space to run into, not so when he's asked to receive the ball back to goal.
Bruno's got excellent ability but he will take risks in his play, so don't put him somewhere that becomes a problem.
 
We don't yet know how to handle intense press.

That is the crux of the problem. technique is not the issue.
 
11101 said:
Not really. Of yesterday's lineup.

Lindelof - very good
Varane - very good
Maguire - average
Shaw - very good on his left foot
Fred - very good
Pogba - very good when running with the ball
Rashford - average
Sancho - very good
Bruno - very good
Ronaldo - was once very good

AWB - very good on his right foot
Lingard - good
Matic - very good
Elanga - too young to tell
Telles - very good on his left foot

Most of our players are very good technically, as long as we play them in the right system.

Lindelof is no use in an unfamiliar right back position, he doesn't know where to position or where to pass.
Fred needs quick passing options, he can't play on his own in midfield surrounded by 3 players.
Pogba is good when he's got space to run into, not so when he's asked to receive the ball back to goal.
Bruno's got excellent ability but he will take risks in his play, so don't put him somewhere that becomes a problem.
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I hope you aren't serious? Neither are all these players very good, nor is technical ability depending on the system.

It makes sense to build a system that covers the technical weaknesses of players, if they would all be very good the system doesn't matter for technical reasons (though obviously for tactical reasons it matters).

But you don't need to think about stuff like "how do we prevent that player X has to do a first touch under pressure". You have to think about such things for a lot of United players.
 
11101 said:
Not really. Of yesterday's lineup.

Lindelof - very good
Varane - very good
Maguire - average
Shaw - very good on his left foot
Fred - very good
Pogba - very good when running with the ball
Rashford - average
Sancho - very good
Bruno - very good
Ronaldo - was once very good

AWB - very good on his right foot
Lingard - good
Matic - very good
Elanga - too young to tell
Telles - very good on his left foot

Most of our players are very good technically, as long as we play them in the right system.

Lindelof is no use in an unfamiliar right back position, he doesn't know where to position or where to pass.
Fred needs quick passing options, he can't play on his own in midfield surrounded by 3 players.
Pogba is good when he's got space to run into, not so when he's asked to receive the ball back to goal.
Bruno's got excellent ability but he will take risks in his play, so don't put him somewhere that becomes a problem.
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Honestly you are not in the real world. I would maybe put 2 of them into the very good category, with the rest good, average (most of them), or not good.

We generally look over technical players.

If a player is good only in space, then that's a clear obvious technical weakness.
 
stefan92 said:
I hope you aren't serious? Neither are all these players very good, nor is technical ability depending on the system.

It makes sense to build a system that covers the technical weaknesses of players, if they would all be very good the system doesn't matter for technical reasons (though obviously for tactical reasons it matters).

But you don't need to think about stuff like "how do we prevent that player X has to do a first touch under pressure". You have to think about such things for a lot of United players.
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Technical ability is how good their control, touch and ability to move the ball where they want is. Most of our players are very good at this.

Limitations come from asking them to play in a style they're not comfortable with, but that's things like decision making and awareness, not technical ability.
 
11101 said:
Technical ability is how good their control, touch and ability to move the ball where they want is. Most of our players are very good at this.

Limitations come from asking them to play in a style they're not comfortable with, but that's things like decision making and awareness, not technical ability.
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Most of our players are not good at this. We are very limited in this area.
 
11101 said:
Technical ability is how good their control, touch and ability to move the ball where they want is. Most of our players are very good at this.
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They simply are not.
 
Our technical level, what do I make of it?
That’s like asking someone with an IQ of 90,
having an IQ of 145 what do you make of it?
 
Well, we'd be armchair scientists to have an accurate opinion about our player's "technical level", however, I do have my worries in regards to some of them not being able to control a ball and place a properly weighted pass.
The amount of times I see Maguire passing the ball too slowly really gets on my nerve, as an example.
Also, I've rarely seen our players bar Pogba and Sancho to pass the ball 1-2 meters ahead of their teammates, it's like they don't anticipate movement at all, especially in short to medium passing.
 
We suck at the fundamentals. Positional play, pressing, offside traps, off the ball runs, taking care of the ball...

Our strong suit is supposed to be counterattacking but our success in that realm is more chaotic than planned
 
adexkola said:
We suck at the fundamentals. Positional play, pressing, offside traps, off the ball runs, taking care of the ball...

Our strong suit is supposed to be counterattacking but our success in that realm is more chaotic than planned
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Agree with this. The technical skills are all well and good but no one is using them effectively.
 
We have too many players that are Jekyll and Hyde( Hide as well but that's a different discussion).

Players like Bruno, Rashford, Lingard, Ronaldo, Fred, Mctom, Maguire, Shaw, AWB,Dalot all have huge fluctuations. So on our day we could be technically superb or spectacularly turd.
 
Desert Eagle said:
We have too many players that are Jekyll and Hyde( Hide as well but that's a different discussion).

Players like Bruno, Rashford, Lingard, Ronaldo, Fred, Mctom, Maguire, Shaw, AWB,Dalot all have huge fluctuations. So on our day we could be technically superb or spectacularly turd.
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Which means their technique isn't top level.

The best players in the world don't fluctuate like our lot do because even on a bad day, they have that solid foundation of skill.

Our players, like probably every player in the Prem, can have moments, especially given space and time. But so many fans buy into those moments as evidence of top level ability.

When in reality the true test of technique is having that minimum 7 out of 10 performance twice a week. No matter the opposition.
 
#07 said:
To some extent I agree with you. However, I think we can all agree that on easy street Pogba and Bruno are great players. I don't think its controversial to say that Pogba and Bruno are better more technical players than McTominay. However, in Gdansk McTominay actually had a decent game. His first touch didn't go to pot. His short passing was no better or worse than it usually is. We can't say that about either Pogba or Bruno. Too often, we see with our supposedly better players that they wilt under pressure.

I think of players like Taarabt or Ben Arfa who are wonderfully gifted. However, never managed to do 'it' when at big clubs because of the added layer of expectation. IMO we have too many players like that. Too many players who can only show what they got when there's not much riding on it.
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I think it's the speed of the game rather than the pressure of the situation that gets to them.

But then one feeds into another. Anybody knows when you're a little out of your depth, you feel the pressure more.
 
It's been stated not only by me but multiple other posters here, but in these big time top level UCL and PL games the ability to play under pressure and in tight spaces becomes the most important skill a footballer can have. Games aren't wide open like they were 20 years ago, every top team emphasizes closing down space and compressing the pitch both tactically and physically and it's why you see a club like City with Pep constantly buying the top technical players they can find year after year whether they work out or not. It's also why I got frustrated when people were hounding Sancho earlier in the year when it was clear for anyone who had a clue that he had this ability unlike plenty of others in the squad. Players like Rashford, AWB, McT, Fred, Maguire, Lingard all operate both mentally and technically on a lower level than what's acceptable at the top level. Watch how Chelsea play out of the back when pressed then watch us. Being able to control a pass with one touch and then quickly move it on without needing to think for an extra second is a vital skill that gets sadly underrated compared to some English player with rapid pace or trickery on the ball.

We need to be buying more players in the Sancho mold as opposed to the Rashford mold.
 
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