[Devil77]

Incredibly, there were several posters who claimed during the match that we were actually playing quite well. However, it's pretty safe to say that at no point during the game did we have the boot on the necks of Bournemouth, a club whose squad and management had a jolly old time laughing all the way back to the south coast after dismembering us limb by limb at what a joke United have become.

True! But I too found myself thinking we played quite well in the first half and until they scored their second. We played with high tempo, our fullbacks managed to attack the space, we got to the byline several times and should have been able to create some good chances.

Our biggest problem (in attack) is that our final ball most often is sub par. The decisions are mostly wrong or badly executed.

Combine the above with our fragile mentality when trailing (or leading) and we have United anno 2023.

 

[Buster15]

The last ten years has been down to the same thing, the midfield is the most important area of the pitch and its our weakest part of the team. Until we address it nothing will change. We will get overrun by pressure and our defence will be exposed.

We had a declining but still good Casemiro on his own there and it transformed us last season. Now we are back to square one with hopeless players. Even though he's not a 100m player Rice would have made a huge difference.

Yes I completely agree with you about the weakness of the midfield.
Especially when you compare it to one with Keane, Scholes, Butt etc. Midfield is the engine room or any good side and our engine stutters and stops.

 

[Murder on Zidanes Floor]

That’s exactly 10 years back on December 9th. A decade later and we are still in the same predicament.

No style of play. No focus

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Confirmation of what we all thought.

This is what happens when you overpay on transfer fees, overpay on wages so cannot afford to buy an experienced top class striker. As others have said as well our decision making is awful.

 

[freddie the red]

Do we play the dippers on Saturday or Sunday ? I work Saturdays so have an easy way out of having to watch the slaughter, I’ll have to make myself busy if it’s on the Sunday.

Offer to take the other half Christmas shopping, miss the slaughter and get extra brownie points too.
You know it makes sense!

 

[Lentwood]

We performed well midweek against Chelsea but it was widely acknowledged that we could easily have conceded three goals.

We performed well (enough) in the first 30-minutes against Bournemouth...but again, we could have easily conceded two goals, if not more.

It's madness to play football this way. I have always maintained that the easiest way to play football is to sit deep and counter. Now, I acknowledge United can't play that way against half the league, certainly not at home...but we're literally playing into the hands of teams like Bournemouth, Wolves and Palace by being so open and kamikaze.

 

[redmanx]

A dysfunctional club and a dysfunctional team. Who can honestly be surprised at what's happening this season, after what we have watched over the last ten years? I'm genuinely grateful I lived during Ferguson's time here. Good times will always mean more than the bad times.

I used to think that being relegated after the 73/74 season was our lowest point but the dire state of Manchester United today is far worse because there seems to be no end in sight to the run of pathetic performances we have witnessed for several seasons and no sign the team is improving. While I think Ten Hag must take his share of blame he cannot be held responsible for players not performing and, worst of all, not caring. Its all very well him saying its his responsibility to ensure the players are "ready" and up for it, but when a player is paid 375.000 a week, as in the case of Martial, should that player not be responsible for being ready? Martial though is only one of a whole group of selfish, greedy, uncommitted and uncaring players some of whome, including Shaw and Rashford have, to date, seen off 4 managers, Van Gaal, Mourinho, OGS and Rangnick and are likely now to see off Ten Hag. I was no fan of Van Gaal but it does seem to me that, just as with his successors, certain players failed to perform, or worse, couldnt be bothered to, and the same thing is still been happening. Some of our players seem to think that if they dont like their manager then they dont have to perform, though they continue of course to take their over inflated wages, so I think its time for a complete overhaul; Martial, Shaw, Rashford, McTominay, Lindelof, Dalot, Onana, Anthony, Eriksen, Casemiro, Varane, Van De Beek, Amrabat, Evans and Sancho should all be released as soon as possible. Not all of these players are guilty of having poor attitudes and not being committed, some are simply not good enough or past their prime, but as a group they all share responsibility for each others performances and as a group they simply do not have the quality and attitude to be Manchester United players.

 

[sugar_kane]

Weirdly not too fussed by the game yesterday, as the fixes are obvious (drop McTominay and Onana) and our players are working hard, even if the quality isn’t always there.

The rollercoaster of being a United fan is too tiring, to go from the full on crisis to the afterglow of Chelsea and then back again is really draining.

As is Ten Hag getting manager of the month and us having the best form in the league, performances improving, squad unity etc to worst manager in the league he just be sacked!

Life’s too short for such needless drama, I’m just trying to remain zen.

 

[Orange Tree]

We concede chances for fun and sometimes teams will take these chances and we see scores like this.

So much possession and yet we never looked in control.

 

[Buster15]

What was so clearly evident yesterday was that one team:
Played as a team, meaning they functioned as a unit. Passed as a unit.
Moved as a unit.
Worked hard as a unit.
The unit knew exactly what they needed to do and did it repeatedly and consistently throughout the match.
That team was Bournemouth.

Manchester United operated completely opposite to that.
They played like they didn't know what they were supposed to do and like they didn't know how to play as a unit.

Worst of all, they looked like playing a side like Bournemouth at Old Trafford was beneath them. Martial was a perfect example. Don't need to run. Don't need to work. Don't need to sprint. Don't need to tackle back to try and win the ball.
And as a result of this lack of effort and disinterest, we got what we deserved. A spanking at home.

 

[Dr Fink]

We tried to play a high line yesterday. We had a back 3 for a lot of the game with Reguilon as a winger. As ever, we just don’t move the ball quick enough.

Bournemouth were simply a unit, playing together. We are like Utd from the 80s…

I feel sorry for Hojlund; we have two “wingers” who cannot provide quality balls in to the box. He gets nothing.

Lots of possession yesterday but so disjointed and a huge lack of quality, seemingly from a lack of belief.

Poor Amrabat has been left badly exposed by McT in both this and the Chelsea game - lots of chances for the opposition. Simply ill-discipline from a player who I’m not sure where they fit in.

 

[Strelok]

So at that level of clinical from opposition. We conceded that amount of clear chances, and other openings; even with a decent functioning attack with 2 goal per game rate, we would have still lost these type of game.

The system is clearly an issue. We have no control and no ability to actually defend (preventing shot inside our box, closing shot angle, blocking shot...) . We have been relying on opposition poor finish rather than true defensive solidity. Which means it would have been bad against other clinical teams, let alone extreme clinical team.

So disagree on your point about we're not that bad yesterday. Fixing our attack (difficult task) alone at best can mask us some games, but unsustainable in the long run in unforgiving league like PL at the moment.

Edit: I used 2 goal per game rate as benchmark (38 matches would be 76 goals), because 76 goal per season is a decent scoring rate. In some of recent seasons, 76 goals could have landed that team as the second, or third highest scoring in the league. 70+ goals on top of a decent defensive record likely gives you top 4 finish.

Let's agree to disagree I think. For me that bad is like the match against Newcastle. Where we should have lost 3-0 in the first half. We could not keep the ball, could not progress it, could not even get out of our own half let alone create chance or score. Nothing was acceptable in that match.

Last match at least we were able to keep the majority of possession. We managed to progress it, to get it into Bournemouth final third. Problem is we could score feck all with all that possession.

If you want to play possession & high pressing football it's very likely to concede chances when opponent counter attack. Because you'll have to play with a high line. Even City had the same issue when they played us. We had many opportunities/chances to counter attack. We even created some very good chances. The only difference was we could not score with all those chances. And they had that dodgy pen.

Last match if we managed to score only one goal in the first half it'd be very different. Goals change game. Problem is we couldn't. Of course we didn't play well but I still keep my opinion that we didn't play that bad. And our biggest issue is we don't have even one good goal scorer.

 

[astracrazy]

Poor Amrabat has been left badly exposed by McT in both this and the Chelsea game - lots of chances for the opposition. Simply ill-discipline from a player who I’m not sure where they fit in.

Not just exposed, he has been shafted by him. McT is the one that gives the ball away nearly 50% of the time. I've never seen a player give away so many simple passes.

 

[Salus Populi Suprema Lex]

Lucky it was only 0-3 at home to Bournemouth. It’s difficult to believe that we have arrived at this point. I don’t where we go from here; we have lost almost half our games this season and have a negative goal difference. This week has the potential to deliver the killer blow, with two incredibly difficult games. It’s impossible to say where all this will end; it just feels like there is nobody to lead us out of this. I guess will just let it play it and watch the car crash happen. It’s a damn shame things have unravelled in this way.

 

[davidmichael]

Offer to take the other half Christmas shopping, miss the slaughter and get extra brownie points too.
You know it makes sense!

Ha ha clearly you know my missus

 

[Denis79]

 

[Superunknown]

We tried to play a high line yesterday. We had a back 3 for a lot of the game with Reguilon as a winger. As ever, we just don’t move the ball quick enough.

Bournemouth were simply a unit, playing together. We are like Utd from the 80s…

I feel sorry for Hojlund; we have two “wingers” who cannot provide quality balls in to the box. He gets nothing.

Lots of possession yesterday but so disjointed and a huge lack of quality, seemingly from a lack of belief.

Poor Amrabat has been left badly exposed by McT in both this and the Chelsea game - lots of chances for the opposition. Simply ill-discipline from a player who I’m not sure where they fit in.

I do wonder if we'll see something like Amrabat and Mainoo as a two, with McTominay playing the more advanced role next week.

The creativity through the middle is going to be a huge problem, though. We seem to see a lot of the ball without actually doing anything with it.

 

[Handsome Devil]

I think the future looks brighter over Christmas for most turkeys compared to us fans.

 

[AndySmith1990]

We lost 3-0 and as it stands Harry Maguire has been voted man of the match. That's a pretty damning indictment of our performance

 

[Maticmaker]

Bournemouth did their homework on us, but we didn't do it on them... that's it in a nutshell.

Whoever did the 'scouting' on Bournemouth for us needs to walk around in 'sackcloth and ashes' for at least a week.

Bournemouth knew our fears and weaknesses down to a tee. After their early score, they let us play around and dance around outside their defensive block and when on occasions we broke through they just shut us down as we were about to pull the trigger (which wasn't that often).

After 70 or so minutes they suddenly realised they could up the score and promptly did just that.

I've seen us take a 'showing up' from a number of top teams at OT in recent years, but from AFC Bournemouth? Something that was almost unimaginable, has become unbelievable reality.

Behind the scenes, is anything really working properly at OT/Carrington etc.?

 

[mitchmouse]

Only two words needed: f*cking disgraceful

 

[mruptight]

Today my immutable belief in supporting the team was challenged by my 5 year old. When I expressed my disappointment at our loss, she asked me what support meant. I tried explaining it by using her school team as an example. She said "but they are not your friends". The best I could reply to that was "I like the players", which was a lie since I don't particularly like any of them and I struggled to point to any other qualities of the team.

 

[fps]

You are flattering the club here. We're by no standards performing variably. Variably suggests we're decent one game, crap the next, excellent the third, mediocre the fourth....

That's not our situation. On the contrary, EVERY one of our league games bar the Chelsea and maybe Everton one, has been consistently below standard. Consistently showing fear, playing safe, struggling to finish off games we're leading, coming slowly into the game, returning from half time even more lethargic as if ETH just injected valium into their veins etc.

I wish we were performing in variable ways....

Yes fair enough I was thinking more about last season and this as a whole. Right now the club terrifies me. It's done everything over a decade to create the hollow outer appearance of a top club, and inside it's just rot.

 

[freddie the red]

Ha ha clearly you know my missus

Mate, I reckon that's most blokes' missus

 

[sugar_kane]

The hysteria over this result has been wearying.

We’ve been shite for about a decade, it’s hardly earth shattering that a below average team comes to Old Trafford and gets a result.

Just a few days ago the press and fans were praising the team and the manager after the Chelsea result, now it’s talk of rock bottom.

It’s somewhere in between - mediocrity. But it’s nothing new. The club is rotten. Hitting reset on the manager again does nothing - we need a whole new footballing set up, we’re in limbo until that happens.

 

[TwoSheds]

The hysteria over this result has been wearying.

We’ve been shite for about a decade, it’s hardly earth shattering that a below average team comes to Old Trafford and gets a result.

Just a few days ago the press and fans were praising the team and the manager after the Chelsea result, now it’s talk of rock bottom.

It’s somewhere in between - mediocrity. But it’s nothing new. The club is rotten. Hitting reset on the manager again does nothing - we need a whole new footballing set up, we’re in limbo until that happens.

Unfortunately I think we've shot our load with very average transfers (again) so we need new owners to get the finances in order as well as the footballing structure. I wouldn't mind shopping in the bargain bin tbh, Villa put their midfield unit together for £17m. It can be done.

 

[Gopher Brown]

Today my immutable belief in supporting the team was challenged by my 5 year old. When I expressed my disappointment at our loss, she asked me what support meant. I tried explaining it by using her school team as an example. She said "but they are not your friends". The best I could reply to that was "I like the players", which was a lie since I don't particularly like any of them and I struggled to point to any other qualities of the team.

It's all arbitrary at the end of the day. Gives you something to talk about and some entertainment now and again. Best not to think about it too much.

 

[red woppit]

I think I'm finally accepting that we are pants at football. Every glimmer of hope is now a false dawn and is followed by an abject performance. While not to blame entirely, EtH will take the hit for this and I suspect he will get his P45 for Christmas. Going to the Bayern game on Tuesday and although they got humped today, I can't summon up any hope of a win, never mind a miracle and get through to the next round.

There is no semblance of a team playing good well constructed football, there appears to be no 'plan' of how we play. All we seem to do is play the ball to everyone's feet, when those players are standing still, very little movement.
Another gripe I have is that when we do break the press, the ball inevitably goes back to a back four player after we have bypassed the pressing players, so we have to start again. That, to me, is down to Ten Hag, I believe he is out of his depth, and appears not to know what to do.
What annoyed me with the players yesterday, is the fact that by wearing a Manchester United shirt that somehow entitled them to stroll through the game.

 

[ehizario]

#TenHagOut now. He is a miserable fellow and has added nothing to the club. He is petulant and clueless, too vindictive for a Utd manager. He's made good players average, and average players worse. He's go no tactics, he's got to go. Give me Carrick on the interim with defined targets for the rest of the season.

 

[ehizario]

True! But I too found myself thinking we played quite well in the first half and until they scored their second. We played with high tempo, our fullbacks managed to attack the space, we got to the byline several times and should have been able to create some good chances.

Our biggest problem (in attack) is that our final ball most often is sub par. The decisions are mostly wrong or badly executed.

Combine the above with our fragile mentality when trailing (or leading) and we have United anno 2023.

We kept running running running without a distinct gameplan. Bournemouth simply picked us apart when they got the ball. This running running play confirms there's truly an issue in the dressing room, the leak was that players were disillusioned with the running around and that's very reasonable to me. TenHagOut

 

[ti vu]

Let's agree to disagree.

Newcastle game was into disastrous zone. We were lucky to only lost by 0-1 scoreline.

Stringing a handful of such performance, and any clubs would drop the manager like dumpster fire.

The calibre of opposition and home/away settings counted too. There is a host of scale than just black and white: good vs bad to rate performance. You don't have to wait until disastrous performance equivalent of Newcastle game by the hand of a lower mid table at home, to see a bad performance. You can produce bad performance by being clueless in attacking, defending transition, and actually defending from opposition attack, which we did in this game despite improvement in possession stats.

You can't be serious comparing us in position of City in Manchester derby?! How many clear cut chances we created in that game? Bournemouth created similar chances. City did just that. Haaland goal was exactly like at least 2 chances they created in that first half. That Haaland goal was coming. Man marking was poor at far post. No solution to stop cross to far post. They scored similar goal in their 1-2 defeat at Old Trafford last season. In comparison, what two chances did we created similar to one another in these two games? We were lucky again that City didn't score more. On evidence of other games under ETH against City, whatever excuses you want to make about the stupid penalty, City didn't need penalty to score against us when they can execute similar attacking pattern all game.

Let's agree to disagree I think. For me that bad is like the match against Newcastle. Where we should have lost 3-0 in the first half. We could not keep the ball, could not progress it, could not even get out of our own half let alone create chance or score. Nothing was acceptable in that match.

Last match at least we were able to keep the majority of possession. We managed to progress it, to get it into Bournemouth final third. Problem is we could score feck all with all that possession.

If you want to play possession & high pressing football it's very likely to concede chances when opponent counter attack. Because you'll have to play with a high line. Even City had the same issue when they played us. We had many opportunities/chances to counter attack. We even created some very good chances. The only difference was we could not score with all those chances. And they had that dodgy pen.

Last match if we managed to score only one goal in the first half it'd be very different. Goals change game. Problem is we couldn't. Of course we didn't play well but I still keep my opinion that we didn't play that bad. And our biggest issue is we don't have even one good goal scorer.

 

[Strelok]

Let's agree to disagree.

Newcastle game was into disastrous zone. We were lucky to only lost by 0-1 scoreline.

Stringing a handful of such performance, and any clubs would drop the manager like dumpster fire.

The calibre of opposition and home/away settings counted too. There is a host of scale than just black and white: good vs bad to rate performance. You don't have to wait until disastrous performance equivalent of Newcastle game by the hand of a lower mid table at home, to see a bad performance. You can produce bad performance by being clueless in attacking, defending transition, and actually defending from opposition attack, which we did in this game despite improvement in possession stats.

You can't be serious comparing us in position of City in Manchester derby?! How many clear cut chances we created in that game? Bournemouth created similar chances. City did just that. Haaland goal was exactly like at least 2 chances they created in that first half. That Haaland goal was coming. Man marking was poor at far post. No solution to stop cross to far post. They scored similar goal in their 1-2 defeat at Old Trafford last season. In comparison, what two chances did we created similar to one another in these two games? We were lucky again that City didn't score more. On evidence of other games under ETH against City, whatever excuses you want to make about the stupid penalty, City didn't need penalty to score against us when they can execute similar attacking pattern all game.

Come on mate. I'm not saying we're not bad. We're of course bad. But not 'that' bad like the score might suggest.

And regarding the City match they didn't look like they'd score until that very dodgy pen. And even after the pen in the first half we had plenty chances to counter we're just so fecking bad at it. It's only in the second half when ETH decided to stop sitting back and go at them that they started to look more dangerous and scored.

Anyway let's agree to disagree then.

 

[justsomebloke]

The hysteria over this result has been wearying.

We’ve been shite for about a decade, it’s hardly earth shattering that a below average team comes to Old Trafford and gets a result.

Just a few days ago the press and fans were praising the team and the manager after the Chelsea result, now it’s talk of rock bottom.

It’s somewhere in between - mediocrity. But it’s nothing new. The club is rotten. Hitting reset on the manager again does nothing - we need a whole new footballing set up, we’re in limbo until that happens.

Yes. It was just Everton in reverse - we weren't nearly as good as some people thought that 3-0 result implied, and we weren't as bad as that 0-3 loss implied either.

Reading now that we're "inconsistent". I think that's rubbish - on the contrary, we've been abnormally consistent, performance-wise. It's just that what we bring is enough to scrape a win against some opponents, while against others it just isn't.

I'm leaning in the direction that the problem (or at least one of them) is McTominay - not in the sense he's been performing badly, but in the sense that we now seem to be building our whole setup around maximising his impact as a scoring threat in the box. And though he's scored a few, that's just not worth it. It's not a sustainable way to beat good teams. Amrabat is neither defensively solid enough or creative enough in his passing to fill the gaps that leaves.

 

[sugar_kane]

I'm leaning in the direction that the problem (or at least one of them) is McTominay - not in the sense he's been performing badly, but in the sense that we now seem to be building our whole setup around maximising his impact as a scoring threat in the box. And though he's scored a few, that's just not worth it. It's not a sustainable way to beat good teams. Amrabat is neither defensively solid enough or creative enough in his passing to fill the gaps that leaves.

Yeah totally agreed and this is the biggest black mark against Ten Hag for me because it is so clearly not working.

As a Plan B, it's not a bad one, but to play that way for 90 minutes is suicidal. We'll get destroyed against Bayern and Liverpool if we do this, I find it incomprehensible that Ten Hag can't see this when any fool can.

Even when it wasn't McTominay we had the same problem with Mount & Bruno and Casemiro getting overwhelmed, it's not a new problem - just the players have changed. Any improvement with Amrabat being more athletic is lost from McTominay's lack of game sense and an even greater propensity to get in the box. Even prime Kante would struggle in that DM spot with the other two midfielders nowhere to be seen.

The set-up is worsened with McTominay though because Mount is a more intelligent player and has decent attributes for a midfielder, McTominay doesn't he's just a goal threat. Some may say he works hard, I'm not sold on this, but if he does it certainly isn't in an efficient way.

One other thing I've not seen flagged is that I actually think McTominay is hurting Hojlund's chances of scoring, since he's getting in his zone a lot more now.