Pochettino | Agrees to be US National Team Coach

Sames story. Their recruitment team will look at this game and say, why didn't we sign players that can finish. You can point out multiple missed chances in the game.

As I mentioned before, the underlying statistical numbers favor Pochettino, however he needs to find a way for them to score. Perhaps start Borja or Washington :lol:. Or loose that defensive solidarity to get more offensive players in the team that can flood the attack


Seems like the chelsea fan are also starting to notice how badly their recruitment team dropped the ball

A bunch of attackers who have no proven track record of scoring goals bar Sterling, 100 point team planning. Today and this season is on the recruitment team more than anything, attackers lack the cutting edge. Simple.
https://x.com/CFCPys/status/1703424036762497482?s=20
 
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Unbelievable how uninspiring they look. I know they have so many injuries but that attack is just terrible, especially on the left side. No clue why Colwill is playing left-back, they have three that are way better than him. Midfield is also very uninspiring, they need to have Nkunku firing right away when he comes back, relying on Gallagher to provide creativity is tough.
 
You spent a gazillion on prospects and U21 players and you’ll get a group of prospects and inexperienced U21 players who need time and patience to iron out inconsistencies. Obviously the injury list is a problem but even by my lowered standards, this is awful.
 
Just shows how important a top owner and executive staff actually are.

Post Abramovich Chelsea are turning into us under the Glazers and it's happened really fast.
 
Wow, we've had the worst start in our club's history but we're somehow still 1 point ahead of them.

Poor-chettino!
 
Just shows how important a top owner and executive staff actually are.

Post Abramovich Chelsea are turning into us under the Glazers and it's happened really fast.
Owners with ambition and high standards are what you get with City and Real, lots of money but greedy owners with no ambition at all is what we have.
 
Have Chelsea and united ever had a start to the season together like this? I mean their main rivals as it stands are Bournemouth and Forest. Two good managers with a ton of money spent. Is fecked up ownership that influential or is this just terrible transfers.
 
Don't think there is another club in the game who burn through attackers like Chelsea, turnover is mad.
 
You spent a gazillion on prospects and U21 players and you’ll get a group of prospects and inexperienced U21 players who need time and patience to iron out inconsistencies. Obviously the injury list is a problem but even by my lowered standards, this is awful.

That’s the catch 22. Young players need game time to improve. But your squad is too bloated to give them the minutes they need.
 
That’s the catch 22. Young players need game time to improve. But your squad is too bloated to give them the minutes they need.

The thing is we’re bloated in certain areas but undermanned in others. Regardless, the team that plays is still full of very inexperienced players sprinkled in with a couple of older heads. No matter how much is spent on them, which is a grotesque amount, granted, they will need time to a) gel with each other and b) iron out inconsistencies and mistakes. I know people will laugh at that but it is what it is.
 
This Arsenal performance is worse than our performance earlier. Barely created anything, but a goal out of nothing with a super clinical finish and they’re about to win the game. Us in the same situation would either try to control the ball and fail or balloon it over the bar.
 
Considering that Poch was presumably our other candidate post Ole, and Chelsea spend as much/more than we do, it’s nice to see them not getting up to much either :lol:
 


Not looking good for Chelsea.

It's weird because despite changing most of their 11, they still seem to have the same problems they had as last season.
 


Not looking good for Chelsea.

It's weird because despite changing most of their 11, they still seem to have the same problems they had as last season.


Well that did decided to buy an U16's squad, so it is not that surprising they have no knowledge of how to play in a men's league.
 


Not looking good for Chelsea.

It's weird because despite changing most of their 11, they still seem to have the same problems they had as last season.

That's positive for United that it's probably too early to panic over the bad start given we've had the difficult games, it did seem like we had a tricky start with 2 away games against traditional big 6 teams in the first 4 matches.

Brighton are also a top half side so it's seen as a difficult game on this metric, but you shouldn't be losing that game really. They'll probably finish 7th-9th, you have to be winning these home games against that level of opponent if you want to be confident of finishing top 4, you can't be getting played off the pitch and conceding 3 in the process anyway.

What's most concerning really about United is performance levels rather than just results. The win against Wolves may have actually been our worst performance in a sea of bad performances, conceded 2 against Forest, got comprehensively outplayed on our own pitch against Brighton.

On another note, Liverpool being on 13 points with a fairly tricky start is a bit of a worry.
 
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That's positive for United that it's probably too early to panic over the bad start given we've had the difficult games, it did seem like we had a tricky start with 2 away games against traditional big 6 teams in the first 4 matches.

Brighton are also a top half side so it's seen as a difficult game on this metric, but you can't be losing that game really. They'll probably finish 7th-9th, you have to be winning these home games against that level of opponent if you want to finish top 4, you can't be getting played off the pitch and conceding 3 in the process anyway.

What's most concerning really about United is performance levels rather than just results. The win against Wolves may have actually been our worst performance in a sea of bad performances, conceded 2 against Forest, got comprehensively outplayed on our own pitch against Brighton.

On another note, Liverpool being on 13 points with a fairly tricky start is a bit of a worry.
We did have a tricky start tbh but it shouldn't be an excuse. Last season in the same tricky fixtures we managed one point. This season we've done worse and managed 0. Not much optimism in terms of an improvement on last season.
 
We did have a tricky start tbh but it shouldn't be an excuse. Last season in the same tricky fixtures we managed one point. This season we've done worse and managed 0. Not much optimism in terms of an improvement on last season.
Almost no chance we're going to significantly improve on last season. I'd have snapped your hand off for top 4 before the season started.
 
I’m starting to think he’s not really the elite manager many thought. He did not do well at PSG no matter how it’s dressed up, and to say he’s had a poor start at Chelsea would be an understatement.
 
I’m starting to think he’s not really the elite manager many thought. He did not do well at PSG no matter how it’s dressed up, and to say he’s had a poor start at Chelsea would be an understatement.
Was decent never elite. His time at Spurs his highlight at a time that Man City,Liverpool was in transition into strong teams on and off the field as we see nowadays and that period allowed Leicester to pop in to win the league.
 
Was decent never elite. His time at Spurs his highlight at a time that Man City,Liverpool was in transition into strong teams on and off the field as we see nowadays and that period allowed Leicester to pop in to win the league.

Exactly, he was massively overrated due to having some very talented players in the Spurs squad.
He comes across as a bit of an Ole, gets the players going at first because he’s likeable but then it all goes to pot because he has no authority.
 
Other than beating down a Luton side that really doesn't look PL standard, Chelsea have yet to lead in any match. I don't think they've been notably better than the other side in the first half of any of those four matches.

Their XG statistics are a bit of a mirage due to that Luton beatdown, the overall weakness of their opponents, and because they've spent so much time chasing matches (a game state which tends to produce more XG for the chasing team) and almost no time defending a lead (when teams tend to concede more XG than they create, even if looking to spring counters).

I think its harsh to judge Poch until he has a healthier squad at his disposal but right now its not looking good. If they were really dominating and controlling matches and just couldn't find the net it would be one thing but that's not what is happening. They are having up-and-down seesaw first halfs where they often go behind, and then they're having more of the play in second half situations where other teams are defending a lead or playing for a point.
 
Just shows how important a top owner and executive staff actually are.

Post Abramovich Chelsea are turning into us under the Glazers and it's happened really fast.

Turning into us? United never finished less than 7th under the Glazers, Chelsea have already finished 12th.
 
If you think the 2 managers that were given the biggest push to become United manager in the last few season were Conte and Poch.

Another example of how bad the so called experts can get it.
 
Other than beating down a Luton side that really doesn't look PL standard, Chelsea have yet to lead in any match. I don't think they've been notably better than the other side in the first half of any of those four matches.

Their XG statistics are a bit of a mirage due to that Luton beatdown, the overall weakness of their opponents, and because they've spent so much time chasing matches (a game state which tends to produce more XG for the chasing team) and almost no time defending a lead (when teams tend to concede more XG than they create, even if looking to spring counters).

I think its harsh to judge Poch until he has a healthier squad at his disposal but right now its not looking good. If they were really dominating and controlling matches and just couldn't find the net it would be one thing but that's not what is happening. They are having up-and-down seesaw first halfs where they often go behind, and then they're having more of the play in second half situations where other teams are defending a lead or playing for a point.

I don't agree with this. We have dominated every single team we've played this season. It's a young team though, so we've been unable to keep focus and concentration for an entire game resulting in errors and defensive lapses. Look at the goals we conceded vs Forest (a defensive error against the run of play) and West Ham (set piece, sucker punch against the run of play and a defensive error leading to a pen). The only goal we conceded this season that was fully deserved based on how the game was going when the goal was scored was Liverpool. The first two West Ham goals are fair enough. It's how they set up to play. They beat Brighton following that exact formula.

We've not yet had a single game that was see-saw as you say. apart from Liverpool, and even that was a case of them dominating the first 25 mins and us dominating the remaining 65 mins. Teams have had bright 5-10 minute spells in each game, which have not really resulted in any goals. The eye test and the underlying metrics both support this.

Obviously it goes without saying that if you can't finish your chances, a lapse in concentration ends up becoming super costly. It adds pressure on the defence and midfield to keep clean sheets in every single game when we're always finding ourselves still searching for a goal late in games.

With all of that said though, it is utterly pointless talking about xG, xGA and xP if we stay unable to finish chances, but for now, they paint an encouraging picture and I'm reasonably optimistic that results will start to pick up. I remember when we started reasonably well under Potter but the underlying metrics were telling us we were overperforming our xG and xGA. I was happy with the early results but knew it was unsustainable unless we fixed something. Results eventually came crashing down.

Villa at home this weekend should provide a good test. It's a step up in quality from the last 3 games and they're in red hot form.
 
I’m starting to think he’s not really the elite manager many thought. He did not do well at PSG no matter how it’s dressed up, and to say he’s had a poor start at Chelsea would be an understatement.

hardly anyone thinks he's elite mate
 
:lol:

It's a good article to be fair. I've said after every game that we actually played reasonably well and should have won but we can't finish to save our lives. It's always nice when the stats back up the eye test.

This is a pretty good video on Chelsea's struggles so far this season.



But wasn't that the case with Tuchel and Potter as well. Can't use that excuse for 16 months. The club in it's current guise has no knowledge in how to win games. I'll be amazed if Chelsea win 3 consecutive league games this season. I honestly see another mid table finish in and around 12th-8th.
 
But wasn't that the case with Tuchel and Potter as well. Can't use that excuse for 16 months. The club in it's current guise has no knowledge in how to win games. I'll be amazed if Chelsea win 3 consecutive league games this season. I honestly see another mid table finish in and around 12th-8th.

It was like that early on with Potter but the underlying metrics showed in that period that we were over performing xG and and especially xGA, so it eventually evened itself out and our results post WC fell off a cliff. If anything early Poch period is the polar opposite to the early Potter period. We’re playing well without the results and the metrics suggests we’ll eventually start getting into form, just like the metrics in the early Potter period correctly forecast our results falling off a cliff.

I’m not sure what you mean by Tuchel, are you just referring to the 6 games last season before he was sacked?
 
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I thought United had a sh*t start to the campaign. Chelsea are like "Hold my beer".

Looking at goals against, they have let in six which is very good, if you take the freak which is City out of the equation they are well up there. Arsenal and Liverpool have let in 4, Spurs and Chelsea 5. By comparison United have somehow let in 10 already.

They just need someone that can put the ball in the back of the net. They have scored 5 goals, on par with Wolves, Sheffield and Fulham, terrible for how much money has been spent.