[Kopral Jono]

That was a weird one.

We didn't play well but we actually weren't all that bad. I thought we grew into the game quite nicely even after that start and were even rewarded with a goal right in the end. As soon as Villa scored their third all hopes were gone, though. We weren't coming back from that, not with the players we had on the bench as well as some on the pitch.

 

[AdamColeBebe]

Replace Ronaldo. Please. With anyone.

 

[Red the Bear]

why did I make this?

 

[2 man midfield]

Our lack of an attack, and beyond that squad depth is going to cost us. We can’t play 2 games a week for a whole season.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Was always gonna happen. A packed schedule, injuries and an ineffective almost non existent Ronaldo and we were begging for another shit result soon.

We need players back from injury. Clear we still need to make a cull and get better players in for certain positions.

Just need to forget this, recover as best we can and move on. Don't play Donny again unless we're winning by at least 2 goals and he can come on so we rest someone.

One big criticism of ETH today is not playing Fred or even Scott with Casemiro. Donny too lightweight and can't have him and Eriksen together.

Have to assume Ronaldo is playing because of injuries. Surely we won't ruin the whole damn season for him?

Agree. The only thing that surprised me was being away from home that neither Scott or Fred started to add that energy. Also agree surely Ronaldo is only playing due to injuries. The ones who are not at the World Cup are going to a training camp in Spain, playing against Cadiz and Real Betis when out there. Might get the likes of Sancho back up to speed ( cannot see him in England squad).

 

[Sultan]

Without a full-on post-mortem, my take on the game was tiredness from the European game, injuries and Ronaldo caused the defeat.

 

[Loon]

Positive is results like this hurt again rather than being laughable, but the similarities with the lethargic start against City were disturbing.

He’s stuck with this lot until he can bring in more of his own players, and that is likely to be next summer. Tough season ahead, with that bullshit World Cup dumped in the middle.

 

[MinGin]

Well, we will always lose points when Ronaldo on the field like this match, we like playing 10 men vs 11 men when he is on the starting 11, just hope Martial staying fit until Jan window opening.
This is just a progressing season which will up and down in the game

 

[Superunknown]

Our lack of an attack, and beyond that squad depth is going to cost us. We can’t play 2 games a week for a whole season.

An injury to Casemiro and/or Martinez, and that's it, too.

My biggest concern is the lack of goals. It seems to be a real struggle for us.

 

[RedTiger]

At least we'll beat them in the cup next game.

 

[mitchmouse]

He really is.

except for the bits about being able to defend, pass and run

 

[Tigersam]

Have to assume Ronaldo is playing because of injuries. Surely we won't ruin the whole damn season for him?

Or is ETH under orders from 'above'? Even a young lad would be better than Ronaldo at present - there has to be somebody.

 

[SouthMancRed]

Or is ETH under orders from 'above'? Even a young lad would be better than Ronaldo at present - there has to be somebody.

Was just going to post something similar. It's surely better to give someone that might score a chance rather than play someone that isn't.

 

[RopersReturn]

Listening to Goldbridge he reckoned the whole team looked knackered, especially Erikson. It’s understandable after the highly charged midweek game against Sociadad.

 

[Telsim]

Anything but a win here was unacceptable. Instead, it turned into yet another humiliation.

A showing not at all dissimilar to last season. Aimless, ponderous, pathetic. Our performances have caught up to us. Too many people saw barely winning by one goal against the likes Everton, Leicester, Soton, Real Sociedad, Omonia as some sort of Renaissance. Truth is we’ve been incredibly lucky, and it was down to our defense. Against Brentford, City, and now Villa we saw what happens when our defense is lacking. Massacre. What we can hope for is the cretins running the club realize we are not making Top 4 without action in January. And results such as this one will keep happening. Ten Hag also has a lot to think about as questions are now starting to be asked, and not without reason. Ronaldo starting, and as a captain no less, with Rashford on the right was shocking.

So far it seems like yet another false dawn.

 

[Red_Aaron]

Circumstances caught up with us for me.

Tough game Thursday with no time to prepare for this. Fired up villa with a new manager to impress

Key players out and their replacements not up to standard but also speed given he's stuck to his first eleven pretty strictly.

ETHs attempts to fashion a side from his available options have robbed us of any cohesion we'd started to build and we looked disjointed

Then there's the ever present poor CF issue

Was also a day where everything went right for villa

Frustrating but perhaps not surprising

 

[SmashedHombre]

Or is ETH under orders from 'above'? Even a young lad would be better than Ronaldo at present - there has to be somebody.

There isn’t. Unfortunately we’ve only produced one striker of world class talent in recent years. Right now there’s nobody in our youth teams who could step up.

The right call would have been building around Rashford up front. He’s not exactly elite either but he’s a hell of a lot better than Ronaldo.

 

[Cro]

We didn't have any real synergies in the team, it all looked a bit isolated and everyone had to do most things themselves. Villa have been laughable clinical today, which played into their hands from the go. When everybody is fit, we have a good starting eleven and we drop off a long way, when some cornerstones of the team (today Varane, Bruno, Antony) are not fit and the schedule is tight. That has to be expected over the season, as we are still miles away from the finished article.

 

[AndyMUFC]

Bad day at the office against a side looking to impress their new manager. We barely ever play well when Ronaldo is up top or when Rashford is on the right and today we had both. Those two and VDB did virtually nothing and there's 3 of our front 4.

We were okay in between both boxes after the shocking start, but we've got too many ineffective forward players and lack of depth.

I still think we can get 4th, the competition isn't amazing by any means but we need to rest players in other competitions and avoid injuries.

 

[lex talionis]

Even though we conceded three goals, it was our front line play that was very poor. No great looks on goal, and our one goal was off a heavy deflection scored by a fullback. Casemiro was fantastic, but Eriksen was clearly knackered and Van De Beek was far too worried about not making a mistake, which is the biggest mistake a footballer can make.

 

[tjb]

The consensus seems to be ten Hag made a few mistakes with selection, in-game management, subs, Ronaldo etc. They're fair criticisms but we should also be fair by saying the squad and the fixture pile-up would make this period difficult to negotiate for any coach. It was a tired performance against a team well up for it, so I don't feel like getting too carried away hammering most of the players or the manager.

I will say though I'm sick of the sight of Ronaldo, when he isn't scoring he's a non-entity leading the line. Donny is so anonymous it's painful to watch.

If we beat Fulham by hook or by crook we're still decently-placed at the break. Let's hope most of our players don't go to the tournament or if they do that their teams all get early baths.

People don't seem to truly appreciate the reason Ronaldo is actually poor for us and part of that has to do with the fact that United hadn't really evolved since Sir Alex left. A major pressing shift happened sometime around 2017, where every team started pressing more extensively, with Ole and Mourinho, we hardly really did this too much, so it wasn't as easy to spot.

It's not that he doesn't provide effort at times, the issue comes by way of his agility. Especially playing from the front, he doesn't have the balance and agility to make those lateral turns that create an avenue to block a path even when the ball can't be reached. As a striker, and more importantly as a lone striker, this task isn't the easiest, which is why a lot of forwards would rather play on the flanks these days. There is also the added lack of understanding from him in how to play as a no.9. Yes, he has been a fantastic forward, but as a 9, he also lacks awareness of when to press, come deep and at the moment he no longer has the quickness to attack the space as he used to.

As a result of all of this, our team loses the ability to pin the opposition back unless they are weak on the ball or choose to sit back; when Ronaldo is starting. Bruno tries so hard to cover for this. He sometimes switches places with Ronaldo, tries to cover heavily in behind as well and has been running himself to the ground to support him. Part of me thinks that this has also affected him in the attacking phase, as the amount of energy expended in patching things up makes him sloppier than he should be. In addition to this, it's also made him a bit less willing and able to provide the dual threat of being an active goalscorer, something which is another vibrant feature of his game. When people were looking for him to get dropped, it was obvious they weren't really watching what was going on. It's why Eriksen cannot play that role here either. Supporting Ronaldo requires a lot defensively for the no.10 and this would be even worse if we played a 433. Playing with Donny has pretty much exposed what that would look like for us. Donny is terrible and his work on the ball and invisibility far exceeds any disadvantage supporting Ronaldo gives us, but it does expose the fact that we can't continue to support him.

ETH may need to take an even harder line on the CR7 situation. It may require him to do more than just dropping him as his presence affects the team in so many ways. He doesn't even offer goals anymore. United need to supplement Martial. He's not reliable enough to be our main striker alone. At the very least we need to find him competition, not just for us to get goals, but for our team to function effectively.

 

[Livewire1974]

First 30 mins was almost as bad as against Brentford. Giving away the 3rd goal after half time finished us off.

VDB was awful. Ronaldo is past it.

Only positives today were Casemiro and Martinez.

There were always going to be blips, let's hope today was just one of those.

 

[RedDevil@84]

That was quite a disaster. Seems like yet another game where we saw the opponent and lowered our concentration levels. It is obvious that we need more quality players, even in the backup department. The drop from Varane to Lindelof/Maguire is too much at the back. And our attacking prowess is toothless.
However, it is a new season in the new system/tactics. So ups and downs all season is expected. Will be nice to see players doing a proper comeback next week before the WC break.

 

[Shimo]

Only managed to catch the first half. It was incredible how we had no idea how to press them when their keeper had the ball. It was so easy for them to just pick and choose when to spring on us and get our center backs out of position like for the first goal.

The second goal, where Shaw slid in and made the ball was a good 3-4 years from where the ball was placed. You could see the mark clearly, not sure why no one was calling for it to be pulled back and back of my mind, was bet this goes in.

We never really got a handle of them being able to suck us in playing out the back and then getting at us quickly. The VDB start was a shock to me, with how well both Fred and McT have played, why would they not come in and at the very worst have Eriksen push ups.

Can take a bad game but, the inability to score more than 1 now is becoming very concerning. Really hope that changes when Martial/Antony/Sancho are all fit and we can drop Ronaldo as a starter, be a bit dynamic up front with more threats in behind.

 

[El Jefe]

You can't win high intensity and physical games with Lindelof, Ronaldo, VDB and Eriksen playing. They are so weak and slow and will contribute to us getting overrun and bullied physically.

I blame this on EtH because he seriously has to get better at rotating players. Made no sense why he didn't start Fred or Mctominay and Maguire too. Garnacho getting a start today was pretty silly especially as it resulted in having to play Rashford on the right.

 

[TheRedDevil'sAdvocate]

A bad result for us, especially during a weekend when some of our rivals for top-four are expected to drop points. The problem, though, was not the defeat itself, but the fact that you could see it coming from miles away.

Although the absentees, combined with the lack of depth in terms of quality, is a more than valid excuse, focusing solely on that, we would be missing the forest for the trees.

There's a serious problem up front, besides the rather obvious predicament with Ronaldo's antics and Martial's injuries. People are banging about the chances we're missing, but the stats keep warning us that we have scored as many goals as we deserved to have scored. We create very little off the dribble and we can't rely on combination plays when the spaces become tight and the and the time to act on the ball minimal. Come next spring, Ronaldo will be gone, but United will still have an overpaid and underachieving frontline. Don't forget that, even in games we played well (Spurs and Chelsea), we showed very little in the final third. At the Bridge, we should have been out of sight after half an hour.

Until now, we've been getting by on our solid defensive displays. Even today, the xG (Understat) was 0.58vs0.52. We usually scrape narrow victories. What change today was that Emery was smart and he also got a bit lucky: He identified Lindelof as the weak link in our backline, he targeted him with pace and physicality and he reaped the rewards. He got lucky because the first and third goals came at very crucial points in the game.

Of course, this should not be an excuse for the team and the manager. We need to do better, although i disagree with some on how we are going to do that (and i think i agree with ETH). There were shouts for Fred and/or McT because we "needed" to match AV's physicality in the midfield. There will also be people who will blame it all on Lindelof for basically being who he is as a player. Well, i don't agree. In the long term, we don't need more physicality, more grafters and more water carriers in the midfield. The barometer for keeping the opposition at bay and controlling games must be the ability of the team to move the ball from point A to point B without much fuss. When that happens, we'll also be able to accommodate a problematic defender (call him Lindelof or Maguire) without allowing the opposition to make the most of it.

The problem today is that we were relying on a teenager to take defenders on, and on long diagonals that the defence could easily read.

 

[pierrethesnack]

People don't seem to truly appreciate the reason Ronaldo is actually poor for us and part of that has to do with the fact that United hadn't really evolved since Sir Alex left. A major pressing shift happened sometime around 2017, where every team started pressing more extensively, with Ole and Mourinho, we hardly really did this too much, so it wasn't as easy to spot.

It's not that he doesn't provide effort at times, the issue comes by way of his agility. Especially playing from the front, he doesn't have the balance and agility to make those lateral turns that create an avenue to block a path even when the ball can't be reached. As a striker, and more importantly as a lone striker, this task isn't the easiest, which is why a lot of forwards would rather play on the flanks these days. There is also the added lack of understanding from him in how to play as a no.9. Yes, he has been a fantastic forward, but as a 9, he also lacks awareness of when to press, come deep and at the moment he no longer has the quickness to attack the space as he used to.

As a result of all of this, our team loses the ability to pin the opposition back unless they are weak on the ball or choose to sit back; when Ronaldo is starting. Bruno tries so hard to cover for this. He sometimes switches places with Ronaldo, tries to cover heavily in behind as well and has been running himself to the ground to support him. Part of me thinks that this has also affected him in the attacking phase, as the amount of energy expended in patching things up makes him sloppier than he should be. In addition to this, it's also made him a bit less willing and able to provide the dual threat of being an active goalscorer, something which is another vibrant feature of his game. When people were looking for him to get dropped, it was obvious they weren't really watching what was going on. It's why Eriksen cannot play that role here either. Supporting Ronaldo requires a lot defensively for the no.10 and this would be even worse if we played a 433. Playing with Donny has pretty much exposed what that would look like for us. Donny is terrible and his work on the ball and invisibility far exceeds any disadvantage supporting Ronaldo gives us, but it does expose the fact that we can't continue to support him.

ETH may need to take an even harder line on the CR7 situation. It may require him to do more than just dropping him as his presence affects the team in so many ways. He doesn't even offer goals anymore. United need to supplement Martial. He's not reliable enough to be our main striker alone. At the very least we need to find him competition, not just for us to get goals, but for our team to function effectively.

Quality post.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Ajax are losing to PSV at home, so they aren't looking great now we took their manager and a couple of their better players.

 

[Orange Tree]

Of course, the new manager bounce and all, had to happened against us.

Frontline isn't working and has never clicked yet this season. Drop Ronaldo and we will look a bit better, but I think the problem is deeper.

 

[ken11]

why did I make this?

I don't know what this is but it's funny.

 

[Ralph1386]

Let’s not underestimate the role that fatigue is playing. They had a week to rest and came off the blocks full of energy. While we are playing Thursday ma and having to play mainly the same players because of injuries/drop in quality on the bench.

 

[Guapa]

The lads need a rest.Need a striker in January,must.

 

[freddie the red]

I’ve been saying that to my son, and even though I’ve explained it, he’s still looking at me like I’m a twat

Burst a ball, a berry good ebening!

 

[TheNewEra]

The lads need a rest.Need a striker in January,must.

Find a striker in January we must

 

[sammyhol]

Today’s conclusions:

- need to start games (and halves!) quicker

- my god Ronaldo is finished. Not even PL standard at this point

- Rashford should be competing for a LW space, on an emergency ST…. But never anywhere near RW… so poor.

- VDB makes intelligent runs, but unfortunately has the technical ability of a League 1 player. Nowhere near good enough

- Bruno gets some potentially fair stick for his casual use of the ball, but my god we miss him when he isn’t playing

- Eriksen on the whole has been decent for us, but we have to design the whole team around his limitations. Doesn’t have the legs to play as an 8 so we have to play a double pivot. Would like to see a run of games with casemiro 6, with Bruno and Fred as 8s in a proper 433

- Martinez has won me over big time… but had a hand in all their goals today… but those games happen.

- Shaw been brilliant for a period, but a shocker today…. Hopefully doesn’t do a usual and go off form for 3 months now.

 

[wolvored]

Im glad I missed it today, was out. Think it just shows we have a decent 8/9 players, but no real depth. Dont buy the tiredness argument as Arsenal can do it with virtually the same side. It should be obvious to the board we need at least a cf in jan

 

[city-puma]

We lost due to lack of intensity. It’s as simple as that.

 

[Havak]

We'll probably all be overreacting really, but it does feel like a substantial loss and too reminiscent of how we've been in much of the 'post-Fergie' era (though I wish I/we could stop using this phrase by now).

It's so dampening because it creates the fear that we still have a lack of winning mentality when an opportunity presents itself. Spurs look set to lose and Chelsea lost, we should have capitalized as we knew that teams around us / where we want to be would drop points today. It was a fact that they would and yet we still couldn't equip ourselves to pounce.

It's only one loss, albeit at an inconvenient time, but it feels like so much more right now. I just can't stop looking at what's going on around us. We should be looking at moving to third place if we win our game in hand against Leeds. Then you have to think that Arsenal & Man City play each other twice and we still have to play them. With the right attitude and some January business, this side could have become unlikely title contenders by virtue of games that have to happen at good periods for us. Instead, it feels like we get dragged back into that pit of uncertainty in a top 4 race yet again. Liverpool will climb back as some point, we are all expecting it.

On the other hand, maybe we are just expecting a bit too much too soon. It's a bit of a reality check that we always have a performance like this in us every 7-8 games and we are just too far from the finished article to go on the kind of runs Arsenal & Man City have managed (and Liverpool in recent years).

Top 4 and hopefully a trophy is probably our realistic aim and even that will be extremely difficult to achieve in this league.

We absolutely need to make changes for the League Cup game to ensure we are fresh for Fulham. Cannot be failing to win that one.

 

[Teja]

Perhaps understandably the team seemed tired, with two tough away games in 3 days. Martinez was noticeably affected, with mistakes for all their goals and his worst match since the initial games of the season.

Beyond that though a huge part of the blame for the defeat has to go to ten Hag. Maybe he still has distant memories of VDB being useful at Ajax, but he's beyond redemption at Utd and a waste of a shirt.The win should have been more important than his desire to give VDB yet another undeserved try. The obvious choice to start the game would have been Fred or McT alongside Casemiro, with Eriksen pushed up. No way would Villa have had it so easy with that. He must learn from this.

Shifting an in form Rashford out of position to accommodate a still raw Garnacho was also a mistake; if he wanted to give Garnacho more minutes he should have been on the right instead.

Ronaldo also was a waste again, but with Martial still not fully fut and the squad lacking in depth there wasn't much else to pick.

Ten Hag was also too slow in rectifying what obviously wasn't working - the subs needed to happen at half time when Utd were still in the match.

Overall a difficult game for a team struggling with so many fixtures on top of a thin squad.

This basically. I'd attribute more to fatigue / lack of intensity than the other issues you rightly point out.

Just a total lack of squad depth. Eriksen at #10 isn't super obvious either, don't think he's done that for us this season and it's clear ten hag values his on the ball ability deeper.

Going to be a long season.

 

[UpWithRivers]

Im sick of all these excuses - we're tired and have a sht squad. Well Arsenal are playing Europa and have a worse squad and are doing ok. Lots of the teams are playing loads of games. It sucks but we cant keep using that as an excuse.

We lost because we make the same mistake as always - putting players out of position and getting overrun in midfield. I love Ten Haag but I have to say it as I see it. He fkd up. I know there are injuries but putting Rashford on the right is pointless. Yeah every now and again he will get a goal but basically you are taking our most in form attacker out of the game. Then he has persisted with Ronaldo and VDB. They have done fk all over the last few games. Thats 3 players down. How can you win? Then we have Eriksen and Casimero holding the midfield. All Villa did was push extra bodies into midfield and overrun us. Simple and predictable. Fred or McTominay for VDB and we would not have lost 3-1.