Paul Pogba image 6

Paul Pogba France flag

2020-21 Performances


View full 2020-21 profile

6.0 Season Average Rating
Appearances
42
Goals
6
Assists
6
Yellow cards
9
Status
Not open for further replies.
That mistake from Pogba is just what he does, you can never protect against it. It would happen if he had 5 DMs behind him in a formation, you just have to accept that at some point in most games, he is going to lose the ball in a dangerous position in midfield, when his team are pushing up(because they believe themselves to be in safe possession of the ball). Everything else he did far outshone that 1 mistake, he literally put it on a plate for 3/4 people, scored an insane goal, and a perfect penalty. If anyone should be blamed in the France team for last night, it's Mbappe, as he was absolutely awful, capping it off with a terrible penalty.

Viera and Keane etc. view Pogba through their own lenses, when in reality, he does things as a midfielder that they could have only dreamed of doing. He is never going to be that type of diligent midfielder, while also creating the chances he does.
This pretty much sums up everything that needs to be said about this topic. There's no such thing as a flawless player, no reason to hold it against Pogba. If used properly, he's a world class player and if we let him go, we'll only have ourselves to blame.
 
Reminds me so much of Veron.

Give him time on the ball and he oozes class..

International football where he has those extra couple of seconds suits him down to the ground.

Domestic football specifically the Premier League where the pressing is intense not so much.
 
Standard Pogba at United that, great passes, then follows up by reminding us why he is a liability in a midfield two, even with Kante next to him.
 
There it is. He was terrific which is the entire point. That he made one mistake doesn't affect that, everybody does. Just because someone else giving the ball away doesn't result in the team getting punished isn't Pogba's fault. He could have kept it but shit happens, there are no perfect performances. Had Mbappe finished one of his gazillion chances France would be in the tournament. Had the defender not got so poorly beaten after Pogba got dispossessed France would be in it. Had 3-4 other team mates who were piss poor been 1/3rd as good as Pogba on the night, they would have walked the game. He was fantastic.

That is literally what I've said from the start and like I said from the start you're arguing for the sake of arguing. By all means turn a blind eye to those costly mistakes that he does make though.
 
I’ve not seen anything mentioned anywhere, perhaps others have….has anyone criticised the Swiss player Pogba tackled on the edge of the Swiss box, which led to Frances second goal?

Create the thread then but while you're in a Pogba thread, its kind of reasonable to expect the discussion to be about Pogba. Whataboutism at its finest.
 
If France hadn’t went out Pogba was probably going to be a shout for player of the tournament.

Pogba is world class and I’m fed up of pretending he’s not.

No wonder he looks better for France playing with the likes of Mbappe & Kante vs James and Fred.
 
I’ve not seen anything mentioned anywhere, perhaps others have….has anyone criticised the Swiss player Pogba tackled on the edge of the Swiss box, which led to Frances second goal?

Is that Swiss player rated as one of the best midfielders in the world?
 
Excellent game by Pogba, created some scoring chances for Mbappe who fluffed his lines, and scored a worldie, and as usual was suspect defensively.
 
That is literally what I've said from the start and like I said from the start you're arguing for the sake of arguing. By all means turn a blind eye to those costly mistakes that he does make though.
If he performs that brilliantly, I will, which is the entire point. And if our defenders are competent, it probably won't cost us barring the odd rare occasion. I'll happily take that trade off instead of spending all my moaning about that one time he gave the ball away.
 
It just frustrates the hell out of me that somebody like KDB could lose the ball in exactly the same way, but not one mention would be made of it.

It's this sort of thing that rubs off to the neutrals that can't make a decision for themselves. Pogba is just held to a different standard of any player I've ever watched.
To be fair, I do think Pogba has flaws that are ill-suited to a (usually) struggling team like ours. It's true that he hasn't got that split second intelligence and reliability on the ball that someone like Scholes does which leads to performances where to takes too many touches, looks clumsy etc But if he plays that brilliantly, nobody should care. He had an absolute smashing tournament, if he plays like that for us with the odd giveaway, who gives a flying feck. It's like a CF who is quite greedy (say, Salah) who could have laid it on a plate for a teammate a few times but is playing stormingly well. Question is whether he can do it week in week out for us as a top performer and whether we can ensure we surround him with a team that gets the best out of him. Big question marks on both. But like I said, for this tournament, huge credit to Pogba, he was quality.
 
I know Pogba is liability defensively, but yesterday, it seemed to me that France's defensive shape was terrible, 1st half with the back 3 setup, the 3 CBs were totally lost and didn't know what to do, in 2nd half after going up 3-1, i saw Sissoko coming in and i thought he was gonna play centrally to support Pogba & Kante, but he played RW!! they tried the 2 banks of 4 with Sissoko at RM & Coman at LM, but Mbappe and Benzema didn't offer much of pressing and Switzerland were able to easily play from the back and progress the ball almost uncontested!!
 
Stream froze for replay, but in real time the pass from benzema felt wrong the moment it came to him - he was already under pressure.
Was that the case, or did he have time to get away/clear?

Either way, i thought he created (and scored) enough chances to more than make up for one mistake, mbappe's impotence is not his fault.
 
The main reason that people will harp on about a single incident like this with Pogba, is because it happens time and time again. You can say all you want about his performance last night, I have already said it was excellent, but not even the most ardent Pogba supporter can say that he hasn't made that sort of mistake over and over for Utd. KDB simply doesn't do that on a regular basis, so why would anyone talk about it to the same extent? Also, any player in the world makes that mistake that leads directly to a goal is going to have something said about it, let's be honest.
They do though, you just don't get told about it 100x on repeat. I've seen KDB give the ball away against Chelsea for them to score in a much worse position and not a mention was made of it. If that was Pogba we'd see 20 replays and he'd be deemed a disgrace.

All players on the pitch lose the ball at times, especially players that don't hide. The more simple you play the less mistakes you make - but Pogba isn't in the team to keep it simple.

You have to accept he will lose the ball in places but he will come up with clutch moments. Who had more effect on the game, Pogba or Kante?
 
There's been many a game where we've played Pogba in a 10 role and he failed to deliver. It's not a dead cert guarantee he will be a consistently world class player in the 10 role.

If he is in the 6 role, he has to defend. If he is in the 10, he needs to have better G/A output. He's a world class talent but kind of stuck tactically in no man's land really, unless you have the likes of three lung Kante covering him all the time to 'unlock' him.
 
Last edited:
There's been many a game where we've played Pogba in a 10 role and he failed to deliver. It's not a dead cert guarantee he will be a consistently world class player in the 10 role.

If he is in the 6 role, he has to defend. If he is in the 10, he needs to have better G/A output. He's a world class talent but kind of stuck tactically in no man's land really, unless you have the likes of three lung Kante covering him all the time to 'unlock' him.

Did he play 10 yesterday? He just needs to be more advanced not play the Totti/ Del Piero role Bruno plays.
 
Did he play 10 yesterday? He just needs to be more advanced not play the Totti/ Del Piero role Bruno plays.

I thought he played a 6 but with more freedom because of Kante.

In the end, he's not really a 10, not really a 6, not really a left or right wing. Just a ghost somewhere in final third of the pitch, hovering around the forwards.

You can see why he's a tactical nightmare.
 
Stream froze for replay, but in real time the pass from benzema felt wrong the moment it came to him - he was already under pressure.
Was that the case, or did he have time to get away/clear?

Either way, i thought he created (and scored) enough chances to more than make up for one mistake, mbappe's impotence is not his fault.

Yes, it was the wrong pass. Pogba was already under pressure and clearly not expecting to receive the pass.
 
During the game you could tell that there were 'fans' almost glad that his mistake led to a goal, it's madness.

I didn't want him to leave, but I honestly wouldn't begrudge him now.
I've not blamed him from wanting to leave since the last game of the 18/19 season when he was booed by Old Trafford despite being our undisputed best player that season. Our fans have been a disgrace when it's come to Paul.
 
Yes, it was the wrong pass. Pogba was already under pressure and clearly not expecting to receive the pass.
People are quick to forget how easy it is to brush Kipbembe aside, he was France’s Lindelhof. So so poor but let’s focus on that one time Pogba got caught in possession eh?
 
I thought he played a 6 but with more freedom because of Kante.

In the end, he's not really a 10, not really a 6, not really a left or right wing. Just a ghost somewhere in final third of the pitch, hovering around the forwards.

You can see why he's a tactical nightmare.

He's a #8, surely! At his best in a midfield three in a 4-3-3 / 3-5-2.

If you play him as a #6, you risk losing the ball in dangerous areas too often and exposing your back four. If you play him as a #10, then he is already too high up the pitch to make those driving runs from midfield, which is one of his main strengths.

The problem Ole has, is how to do you play 4-3-3 or 3-5-2 when you have a word class #10 in Bruno Fernandes. The only way I can see us accommodating both players without significantly reducing their effectiveness, is a midfield diamond (4-4-2), with Bruno at the tip. That system unfortunately exposes the fullbacks quite badly, and has never really worked outside of Italy (where the pace is gentler, which, incidentally, also suits Pogba).

Tl;dr Either we relocate Manchester United Football Club to Italy, or we sell Pogba.
 
Reminds me so much of Veron.

Give him time on the ball and he oozes class..

International football where he has those extra couple of seconds suits him down to the ground.

Domestic football specifically the Premier League where the pressing is intense not so much.

Honestly this is such nonsense.

People really think the Premier League is an entirely different sport.

He's had great performances in the Premier League too.

Every single player in football history does better when they have more time on the ball. This isn't exclusive to Pogba.
 
I've just watched the highlights back and tbf to Pogba it was a bit of a hospital ball played to him by Benzema, unless Pogba played a first time pass he was always going to get robbed there was literally no time to take a touch on it
 
He's a #8, surely! At his best in a midfield three in a 4-3-3 / 3-5-2.

If you play him as a #6, you risk losing the ball in dangerous areas too often and exposing your back four. If you play him as a #10, then he is already too high up the pitch to make those driving runs from midfield, which is one of his main strengths.

The problem Ole has, is how to do you play 4-3-3 or 3-5-2 when you have a word class #10 in Bruno Fernandes. The only way I can see us accommodating both players without significantly reducing their effectiveness, is a midfield diamond (4-4-2), with Bruno at the tip. That system unfortunately exposes the fullbacks quite badly, and has never really worked outside of Italy (where the pace is gentler, which, incidentally, also suits Pogba).

Tl;dr Either we relocate Manchester United Football Club to Italy, or we sell Pogba.

I don't think he is an 8 either. He spends far too much time coming deep to collect the ball from the defence to get on the ball, that is a job for the 6. As an 8 you need to stay nearer to your 10 then your defenders.

I do agree that at United we don't really get the best out of #8's though. I guess that's why Mata/Kagawa also hasn't really performed their best for us.
 
I've not blamed him from wanting to leave since the last game of the 18/19 season when he was booed by Old Trafford despite being our undisputed best player that season. Our fans have been a disgrace when it's come to Paul.

A lot of United fans don't deserve Pogba. Had he been at some other team they would have been wanking over him and wishing we had a player of that capability on our team. I wouldn't blame him for wanting to leave either. It's always one scale for Pogba and another for every other player in world football.
 
Also never seen a United talent divide opinion as much as probably since Veron's first season..

That says a lot.
 
I have no doubts Pogba is one of our best players.
But I maintain my opinion that we should replace him with someone of similar class but also fitting our team. Pogba doesn't fit us and I can't see this changing anytime soon, with no proper DM and Bruno around - it'll always be a mismatch.

I'd sell him to get money for a proper midfielder who can give us balance. The team would benefit from it more than forcing to play Pogba deep. I liked him on the left, but with Sancho (likely) coming I guess it makes even less sense now.
 
Standard Pogba at United that, great passes, then follows up by reminding us why he is a liability in a midfield two, even with Kante next to him.
Hah. More like it was an incredible Pogba performance in spite of Kante, who didn't seem to show up last night.
 
I've not blamed him from wanting to leave since the last game of the 18/19 season when he was booed by Old Trafford despite being our undisputed best player that season. Our fans have been a disgrace when it's come to Paul.
Ridiculous stuff. I'm pretty sure this was the same day they were chanting Herrera's name, who went and fecked off to PSG that summer.
 
He was incredible last night.

The over the top criticism for losing possession on the half way line really does demonstrate the agenda that pundits and posters have against him - absolutely ridiculous.
 
The number of United fans who are keen to criticise our players at the slightest opportunity amazes me. I am one of those who think Pogba has been okay for us and don't care that much if he leaves, but his performance against Swiss was amazing and lots to commend about.

Similarly, in this very thread, someone said Bruno needs to be brought back to earth:wenger:
 
Ridiculous stuff. I'm pretty sure this was the same day they were chanting Herrera's name, who went and fecked off to PSG that summer.

Yes but Herrera had pashun & ran around a lot, these are the qualities people value more in midfielders.
 
I thought he played a 6 but with more freedom because of Kante.

In the end, he's not really a 10, not really a 6, not really a left or right wing. Just a ghost somewhere in final third of the pitch, hovering around the forwards.

You can see why he's a tactical nightmare.

He is :lol: But most great midfielder are like Zidane. You have to give them balance. We just decided not to.
 
The 'great player but he can suck his mum' posts always gets a chuckle out of me :lol:

No fanbase despises their own more than United I tell you.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.