[Dobba]

Third in December with more injuries than The Cooper's Hill Cheese-Rolling Event.

Couldn't give a feck about performances at the moment, it's all about getting as many points on the board as possible until we have a squad back.

 

[RooneyLegend]

Never seen us play that badly and win a match, we created nothing throughout the match in open play.

 

[saivet]

Rooney, mata, Herrera and fellaini all poor.

Carrick good.

Rojo excellent.

Van Persie Magic.

Excellent?? Come one.

 

[MkPaul]

Amazing 3 points considering how we performed. Up to third which is great.

 

[mu4c_20le]

Efficiency.

 

[Wednesday at Stoke]

Big balls and all that.

Definitely, which is why she's coming back for more.

 

[Cal?]

I don't understand why people are saying we didn't deserve to win, if they're going to play a Gerrard-esque backpass and not mark Van Persie for a freekick, it's certainly Soton's fault.

 

[VivaJanuzaj]

Shitty performance. We look like Stoke United.
I'm obviously glad with the win but we're not performing like Manchester United should.

 

[The Mitcher]

That lot could of lost to Accrington. The basics were all gone. Shocking touches, shocking passes. They looked like kids in the park.

Who's Accrington Stanley?

 

[Red Stone]

Oh, forgot to mention, I would willingly provide sexual favours to De Gea for free after every match. He's quickly becoming a candidate for one of Fergie's greatest ever buys, and that's saying something. Can he topple Schmikes if he stays here long enough, performing like he has been?

 

[All 3 United]

We look like Liverpool last season. Lucky.

 

[Mrs Smoker]

Yeah, people make it sound like they destroyed us. All they did was hoof it pretty much and hardly created anything. We weren't great but they weren't very good either.

Yeah, they were only dangerous after our givaway passes. Problem is, there were a lot of them...

 

[Roboc7]

That formation is a disaster but somehow we have won two away games using it, other than RVP, Young and De Gea no one comes away with much credit.

 

[Brwned]

I don't think winning while not playing well is "the mark of champions" but scraping out a win against a top 8 team with our best player injured and our next best player just coming back from injury is a great sign. We really do lack an awful lot of fluidity and urgency without Di Maria though.

 

[stu_1992]

Not sure how we won that after that first half performance. Didn't even improve that much in the second half, but we somehow got it. I'm happy, but slightly concerned too. At least the momentum is kept up. Smalling injury is a blow.

 

[The Mitcher]

Definitely, which is why she's coming back for more.

Lady luck licking Van Gaal's big balls

 

[Someone]

They're Southampton coming off 2 defeats in a row. We're Man United.

They had more possession and more chances. If they had Robin Van Persie, we'd have got buried. They gifted us our first goal too!

It's not our fault we have better players, top players always make the difference.

 

[Trizy]

Every time we're pressed we look shocking, is it really that simple to beat us?

 

[OnlyTwoDaSilvas]

We grinded out a win for sure but it was hardly disgusting

We couldn't put more than 5 passes together, and according to Sky our lowest ever tally of shots at goal since Opta started collating stats (11 years). Pretty tumescent performance, first half especially where we could have been 3 or 4 down.

Gary Neville echoing that too on Sky just now too.

 

[Vooon]

Like I said in the title thread, winning a match like that despite a shitty performance, is how titles are won. Not that I actually believe we'll win, but we're looking set for 3rd or 4th place at the moment.

My notes:
- Van Persie MoM, De Gea second.
- Rooney was one of our weakest players, would definitely have been subbed if he wasn't our captain and our two early subs. I'm seriously wondering if he's a good choice for captain, he doesn't seem to inspire his team mates on bad days, like a true captain would. Dunno who else we could have picked though.
- Fellaini should not play the next match, at least not in today's role, he's a massive liability in defense.
- Herrera seemed to have a very positive impact on the team after he came on, should start.
- Hopefully Smalling's back against pool, and we play 4-3-3'ish or whatever we play.

 

[olesmyhero]

Good that we got the win but I have no idea what the rest of the team decides to do when the defense has the ball. Instead of showing for it and attempting to build, they just run to the goal and wait for the defense to boot it up field.

 

[Sir A1ex]

Who's Accrington Stanley?

Exactly.

 

[Ixion]

Fewest attempts on goal by a side in the league this season and the fewest we've managed in over 11 years. So bad.

 

[Member 39557]

It's not our fault we have better players, top players always make the difference.

We had 3 shots!

3 shots.

 

[Cal?]

Every time we're pressed we look shocking, is it really that simple to beat us?

Obviously not, Arsenal and Soton both did it and lost.

 

[DevilRed]

Get rid of the back three and we might not have conceded! So many mishit passes and giveaways in or own third. When will lvg realise we don't have the players at the back to make it work. Nor is the prem the right league for it.

Much better second half performance and obviously rvp saved us. Great holdup play and was clinical with his chances.

Even Fellaini improved in the second half. Would have liked to see more from him and mata though. They seem to wilt a bit when the opposition press hard.

 

[gooDevil]

Outplayed us, i woulda bitten your hand off for a draw before our second.

 

[Dobba]

We had 3 shots!

3 shots.

Fewest attempts on goal by a side in the league this season and the fewest we've managed in over 11 years. So bad.

Shall we give the points back?

 

[Cal?]

We had 3 shots!

3 shots.

3 shots for 2 goals, we only needed 1 at the Emirates.

 

[Ole'sbodyguard]

Why were we so nervous? Totally baffling.

We have played like this several times away from home this season. The difference in the last two away games is we have managed to get two wins while seriously riding our luck.

Total contrast from the home displays where we look a good side.

 

[Sir A1ex]

Good that we got the win but I have no idea what the rest of the team decides to do when the defense has the ball. Instead of showing for it and attempting to build, they just run to the goal and wait for the defense to boot it up field.

Which wouldn't be quite so bad if the defence didn't decide that they don't want to boot it upfield, and instead run around in tighter and tighter circles until eventually passing it to a Soton player who is clear through on goal.

 

[CLARiiON]

It was a game which showed which team was less crap. Not to sound insulting, it was terrible to watch as a neutral. I was hoping for some good football, but this was seriously bad. How can both teams make so many mistakes?

At the end, I felt irritated by both sets of players. It's safe to say Mata is non-existent. And your midfield and defence is in a terrible state. I don't think LVG made proper investment, far from convinced. The results are coming like against Arsenal. But in reality these wins/points is simply masking the bad performance the team has been putting.

15 shots vs 3. This is not a game against Madrid or Bayern. This is just a Southampton (no offence). The team should much much better. Many people might say win is a win. Well, you are likely to get stung badly if this continues.

 

[SkeppyRed]

Excellent?? Come one.

I actually think he was.

Yes he got caught in possession a few times but he made so many important tackles.

 

[Will Singh]

We just couldn't pass tonight, attacking wise we were poor but 3 points in the bag up to 3rd and players coming back from injury!

R O L L
O N
S U N D A Y

 

[saivet]

We had 3 shots!

3 shots.

I don't even recall that 3rd shot.

 

[Get In Scholesy]

Again we didn't play particularly well but we got the job done. Normally those type of performances are allowed during the Christmas fixtures but still a bit early for that type of discomfort. However, credit to Koeman and Southampton, he made it very difficult for us by pressing our back three. But we also deserve a bit of credit for losing our best centre back and still showing enough grit to win the game.

I shouldn't really complain about the 3 points, although there were some poor pieces of play from us tonight that was difficult to watch.

 

[caid]

Think one of the main things that pissed me off tonight was our defenders
attempting to dribble past players so often.
I semi understand why with our midfield being as poor as it was but you'd think they'd lay it off after beating one / two players

Edit:
Also dont get how smalling is being called our best cb and in great form etc.
Hes been fit for 3 matches or something - granted he was good in them but still.

 

[Dirty Schwein]

feck sake. I went to watch the Hobbit and recorded the match on Sky+ but accidentally recorded HD, which I dont have

 

[Member 39557]

3 shots for 2 goals, we only needed 1 at the Emirates.

We were fortunate there too.

I'm pleased we're grinding out results. These are the sort of games we would have lost last year, but I'm not going to pretend we weren't awful.

 

[Yorkeontop]

352 is surely a solution to having no fit full backs, against teams who can actually attack.

In theory,yes. All I know is the last 2 games we've played it, we've looked terrible. So how effective has it been?

 

[carlosp]

RvP MOTM, De Gea a very close second.