Nice way to deflect from the pertinent question, and nice excuses for the others. You're basically admitting Pogba had no help
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Nice way to deflect from the pertinent question, and nice excuses for the others. You're basically admitting Pogba had no help
I give up...
Its for the best
So now he makes the players worse
That is the headline statement but is it really so absurd to consider that having Pogba in a midfield 3 creates significant challenges? He is ill disciplined in his positioning, he does switch off and allow players to run off him. Your midfield partners have to trust that you will be do your job defensively, only way to build the structure that makes top teams.
Are people arguing that he should have no defensive responsibilities whatsoever? What midfield role allows that nowadays?
All this talk of not running smells of the media driven "black and lazy" tag in my opinion. Hoddle, Pirlo, Zidane, Molby, Scholes didn't charge around but had skill and vision but that was ok. Pogba with better / clever players around him would unlock any defence. Don't worry next season the likes of Matic and Mctominay will unlocking defences and scoring goal from midfield :-)
Matic is alot worse than he is and he is the DM
Infact Pogba makes more tackles and win more duels than him. Thats our defensive midfielder...
No one is saying he shouldn't have defensive responsibility and shouldn't do better but he absolutely doest make his team mates worse. Thats a load of crap
Matic is done, and his decline was obvious even at Chelsea. It was a foolish signing with issues that should have been foreseen.
Pogba making his teammates worse is an overly dramatic way of putting it, really the point should be that he makes his teammates job harder than it needs to be at times. This is hardly a new concept either, people were calling him the Utd version of Steven Gerrard early on, an immense talent, but he doesn't really fit easily into a standard midfield role, meaning certain accommodations have to be made.
This is another narrative that I hate. Remember what it was like when we had Cleverley in our midfield. Our midfield was criticized for not taking risks because the creative output was awful. Pogba may make it harder for them to defend, but he also takes away a lot of the attacking responsibility away from his midfield teammates. Without Pogba, they're going to be made to look worse because they're going to be counted on to pick up what they lost without him.
It's always the defensive side of the game that is stressed in these discussions, and never the attacking portion of the game that is highlighted.
All the hate against Pogba when everything good we do in the attacking side of our game comes through him. If you want to complain about players, at least complain about Rashford, Martial, Lingard, Young and many many others who have served complete crap on the field. The players around him are very average and it's very limited what 1 player can do by himself.
I feel that if Pogba doesn't win us games by himself, he will get criticised. If we lose Paul, we will struggle to get into the top 6.
I feel that if Pogba doesn't win us games by himself, he will get criticised. If we lose Paul, we will struggle to get into the top 6.
This. Im glad some people are finally waking up and speaking out openly about this type of bias and scapegoating driven by the media. We won't have anything close to Pogba's production from midfield next season IMO
Didn't Gerrard's best form come as an attacking midfielder behind Torres, with Macherano (spelling?) and Alonso covering? Or am I dreaming?
Edit: Gerrard also didn't win much in a team where he was the only world class player either.
The evidence that Pogba is the victim of ‘bias and scapegoating’ by the media is that Jan Molby and Glenn Hoddle weren’t criticised? It’s such a ridiculous argument, I can only assume it’s a wind up.
Right wing as well at times, it was only really the last 2-3 years of his career, when his legs were going/gone, that he seemed to twig on to how to play in a more orthodox midfield role. Liverpool struggled for years, until Benitez realized the futility of it, to fit Gerrard into a standard midfield role. England famously as well with that ludicrous Gerrard/Lampard phase. You can see why managers want players like Gerrard and Pogba to take on that role, guys with that level of ability plus athleticism solve a lot of problems for managers if they can harness it.
Haaman was also a great help for Gerrard, who was probably more consistently dynamic than Pogba, certainly played at a higher tempo, for good and ill.
I never thought of it before, but there are quite a few similarities between Pogba and Gerrard. Need a good DM, who's capable of running, and a CB.
Pogba does his work, when he's after sprinting 60 yards and one of his team mates touch bounces off them, you can't expect him to sprint a further 80 yards back to defend the goal when there are 5-6 players behind him. Bar the stories I hear of Di Stefano, ive never heard of a player that does all the jobs at the same time, it's not really possible.
Pogba has switched between roles quite often at Utd. When he is playing in deeper positions I think it is certainly ok to expect him to do better defensively than he does(while also understanding that his attacking possibilities are more limited)
The Pogba/Gerrard can possibly be summed up by stating that I believe they are/were both world class footballers but I don't believe either were/are world class midfielders. I thought the same of Pogba even at Juve and it is not as if France have always found it easy to balance what is best for Pogba and what is best for the team.
I assume this is why Ole has been talking about building a team around him. Play to his strengths because he's our best player, if we're lucky enough to keep him, we'll get to see it next season.
He just had to run 20 yrds to track a runner and help prevent a goal at the weekend, he wasn't tired...just couldn't be arsed.
Maybe I didn't see the goal properly (unlikely), but I didn't think he was the main culprit for the goal.
The thing is both Gerrard and Pogba problem is that they both want to play a position, that doesn't suit their strenghs, Gerrard wanted to play the role of deep lying playmaker, but his strength were short passing, crossing, running, playing early passess, hence why he was so successfull with Torres or virtually every striker he played with, whereas Pogba wants to play the second striker role or attacking midfielder role but, he tends to loose the ball alot if played high up the the pitch, which puts pressure on the team against counter attacks, because he is not as nimble and dynamic as Gerrard or most players that play that role, you also have the issue is he not one for pressing, POgba will hate it but his strengths are his long range passing.
It's the very reason why Deschamps, plays him deep, thru the centre, when he could of easily played someone else there and played Pogba in Matuidi position or Pogba behind Greizmann in attack with Mbappe on the right.
There's more than a little truth to this.
Pogba's best performances as a more conventional central midfielder arguably came for France in the last WC. He was good, worked well in the setup (unlike Gerrard for England, one could add - that was rarely anything but a clusterfeck), but hardly outstanding.
He was brilliant in the world cup. Its not a full season though and consistency is more his issue
Don't agree that he was brilliant, but that's not worth bickering over.
Consistency is obviously where it's at, we can definitely agree on that. For a conventional CM (to use that term again) consistency is part and parcel of (potential) greatness. You certainly can't swing between brilliance and performances in the 3/10 range.
To be fair, a significant amount of the times he loses the ball (not all) are because he has nobody to pass to. Our movement as a team is absolutely atrocious, and time after time there is nobody ahead of the ball carrier to actually pass it to. Certainly there are times where it's more on Pogba, but even those would probably reduce if he were fully confident in the movement around him.
IMHO If Paul Pogba were to be at the end of his own passes, we would score way more goals than we do atm.
Obligitory that these lowlights comps are shit and anyone does them for the "lollzzzzzz look how shit he is" points is a bell end.
This one is kind of fascinating though. Similar things keep happening to him over and over in the domestic games. Players either stay tight in areas and mark up in a double team while he either takes ages on the ball to do anything or they dare him to dribble and then just hit him hard and take the ball. If he stays on next year he absolutely has to work on this it is his glaring weak point. Releasing the ball quicker, passing and moving and instead of trying to hold players off in his area he needs to work on keeping the ball moving when he does it. On the ball at times he was absolutely diabolical this year, this clip proves it (minus the bad touches because who gives a balls about those).
There is no reason why with his physique he should be losing one vs one battles this many times against domestic opponents, enough to make a compilation about it. It shouldn't be acceptable from any player, even himself. No fan should find any kind of growth on his on the ball game in the coming season if he stays acceptable if it doesn't evolve.
I agree. Anyone who uses these lowlights to reinforce opinion is a bellend. Thanks for clearing that up.
Im watching him against Bolivia right now, completely bossing it. United would be stupid to let him go without a fight
Completely ran the show, majestic at times.
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Must feel good to see your incisive passing not being wasted by sub standard players.
Sell him !
Notice how his passes look effective due to runners/movement off the ball. Amazing that.
Maybe,just maybe,we could utilise this clear personal strength in this particular player.
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Nah but some on here will have you believe it's all his fault and not players like Mctominay, Herrera, Matic, Lingard, Lukaku and Rashford's fault. It's Pogba's fault for them not being good enough to make runs or being able to control a ball
These are the people who enable mediocrity to be given a pass at man Utd because they "try hard" and "came from the academy" as opposed to actually being good at football
Nah but some on here will have you believe it's all his fault and not players like Mctominay, Herrera, Matic, Lingard, Lukaku and Rashford's fault. It's Pogba's fault for them not being good enough to make runs or being able to control a ball
These are the people who enable mediocrity to be given a pass at man Utd because they "try hard" and "came from the academy" as opposed to actually being good at football
My man ive been labeled a joke for thinking McTominay is nothing special, and I wasn't even criticizing his output or attitude
Which position did he play?
Edit - He was apparently paired with Ndombele. That's interesting.
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Nah but some on here will have you believe it's all his fault and not players like Mctominay, Herrera, Matic, Lingard, Lukaku and Rashford's fault. It's Pogba's fault for them not being good enough to make runs or being able to control a ball
These are the people who enable mediocrity to be given a pass at man Utd because they "try hard" and "came from the academy" as opposed to actually being good at football
Feckin hell. Nobody is even saying it's all his fault. And pretty much every player you just mentioned gets shedloads of stick on here. And even if they didn't, you're using the fact that he bossed a game against BOLIVIA of all teams to prove your point. Can you even name 1 player from Bolivia? I mean I rate Pogba but the state of this place..
Why does the opposition matter? This Bolivia squad have beaten Argentina, Chile and held Brazil in recent times
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