[Mmm-Qatarian]

I completely agree with you. We were the better of two poor looking teams for the majority of the game, and in flashes I can see exactly how it might look with more physically blessed players in key positions.

I still maintain that it is in midfield that we must invest most heavily. We need two strong and athletic midfielders who can carry the ball forward. I watched Brighton yesterday and they seemed to have found exactly this yet again for good transfer fees.

Completely agree. I'd further add that I believe our lack of width hurt us again yesterday. I think Dalot, Mazraoui, Zirkzee and Eriksen all made positive contributions in ways but none of them can put a full-back on the back foot (well, I think Dalot can to some extent when he's on the right) and this hindered us going forward.

It's why I think that, even though he was quite wasteful in the final third, we still played better when Garnacho came on. I also think we'd have had a better time of it, and could well even have won the match, had Dorgu not been suspended.

 

[justsomebloke]

My exceedingly unpopular take here is that we actually weren't that crap yesterday, or at least in the second half and in extra time we weren't.

Of course, going out of the FA Cup to Fulham at home is massively disappointing. With that said, that was the first game in a while where I'd say that more of our players played well than badly. There were some moments of genuine quality in transition, and aside from a goal conceded that has become far too typical for this United side the defensive performance was resolute too.

There's a mountain to climb before this team is even close to where it should be but that was the first game in a long time where I saw some encouraging signs.

We're in a very dark place, and so people lash out and some over the top things get written. Yours is an uncommonly level-headed look at it. I don't think we're getting worse and worse, I think we're rather getting incrementally a little bit better lately. Not very much, but a little.

That said, mainly we are performing at a very consistent level, and that level is frighteningly low. I'm not sure we can really say that losing at home to Fulham is "massively disappointing", at least not in the sense of being in any way surprising, or against the odds. They are a significantly better team than we are, and we generally get worse results at home than we do away this season.

 

[Rockets Redglare]

My exceedingly unpopular take here is that we actually weren't that crap yesterday, or at least in the second half and in extra time we weren't.

Of course, going out of the FA Cup to Fulham at home is massively disappointing. With that said, that was the first game in a while where I'd say that more of our players played well than badly. There were some moments of genuine quality in transition, and aside from a goal conceded that has become far too typical for this United side the defensive performance was resolute too.

There's a mountain to climb before this team is even close to where it should be but that was the first game in a long time where I saw some encouraging signs.

I actually thought we were the better team yesterday, and without the mistake at the back and a better player up top we could’ve won comfortably.

 

[fergiewherearethou]

We're in a very dark place, and so people lash out and some over the top things get written. Yours is an uncommonly level-headed look at it. I don't think we're getting worse and worse, I think we're rather getting incrementally a little bit better lately. Not very much, but a little.

That said, mainly we are performing at a very consistent level, and that level is frighteningly low. I'm not sure we can really say that losing at home to Fulham is "massively disappointing", at least not in the sense of being in any way surprising, or against the odds. They are a significantly better team than we are, and we generally get worse results at home than we do away this season.

I honestly wonder how many players from their squad would you put in our starting 11 at the start of the season.

 

[Betson]

They are 9 pts ahead of us in the league and come to OT and knocked us out of the cup , we are now the minnows in these game against the likes of Fulham , Brighton , Forest etc etc , that is the reality of where we are right now as a club.

 

[KStandBarmyArmy1993]

I honestly wonder how many players from their squad would you put in our starting 11 at the start of the season.

8/9 of them potentially but I always think we look at this incorrectly.

If you swapped the squads, the result probably stays the same. Zirkzee and Hojlund are probably competent footballers (or at least 10-12 league goals a season strikers) without the pressure. You could probably argue similar for others.

 

[Livewire1974]

So you want Ruben out then

I do, he is a Portuguese Ten Hag

 

[hellhunter]

I do, he is a Portuguese Ten Hag

At this point, he wishes he'd be that

 

[IRELANDUNITED]

More of the same. We are regressing each match the manager stays around.

Yeah that’s it, keep sacking the manager, that’ll work.

 

[Livewire1974]

Yeah that’s it, keep sacking the manager, that’ll work.

All the owners need to be gone first.

 

[Rockets Redglare]

All the owners need to be gone first.

So who would own and run the club?

 

[ThanksBoss26]

There is no 1 reason for the club progressively getting worse year on year.

It is a bit of everything, today’s match was not drastically different from any other match in the past year.

The blame for the situation should be spread equally between the players, coach, board and owners.

So with so much going wrong, it’s easier to just focus on the small list of things that were pleasing from the match.

List (1/1)
De Ligt played well.

I’m with you on who’s to shoulder the responsibility - all of them are culpable in my view.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

So who would own and run the club?

Give it Giggseh.

 

[justsomebloke]

I honestly wonder how many players from their squad would you put in our starting 11 at the start of the season.

Makes no difference. They're 9 points ahead of us.

 

[IRN-BRUno]

Yet another game where we just didn't get going. In Amorim's first two matches we scored in the 2nd and 1st minutes, I can't recall starting well in a game since let alone getting an early goal. It would be nice to see the opposition put under some pressure straight away rather than being allowed to settle.

 

[always_hoping]

We're in a very dark place, and so people lash out and some over the top things get written. Yours is an uncommonly level-headed look at it. I don't think we're getting worse and worse, I think we're rather getting incrementally a little bit better lately. Not very much, but a little.

That said, mainly we are performing at a very consistent level, and that level is frighteningly low. I'm not sure we can really say that losing at home to Fulham is "massively disappointing", at least not in the sense of being in any way surprising, or against the odds. They are a significantly better team than we are, and we generally get worse results at home than we do away this season.

They weren't significantly better than United in three times they played against United this season. Progressed via a shootout yesterday against a what was a threadbare United team who was forced to throw in untried teens lets not forget.

 

[justsomebloke]

They weren't significantly better than United in three times they played against United this season. Progressed via a shootout yesterday against a what was a threadbare United team who was forced to throw in untried teens lets not forget.

...and they're 9 points ahead of us, let's not forget that. It's not like this question is decided by how we fare in our internal games. If it was, we'd be as good as City.

 

[Irishman]

Nonsense. No big club in England would have done more than what we have to try and get them out.

That aside, what more do you want us to do?
We had a game called off.
We had large scale protests.
We even had fans form their own club.
There was effigies of them in the ground when they took over.

 

[Irishman]

Nonsense. No big club in England would have done more than what we have to try and get them

That aside, what more do you want us to do?
We had a game called off.
We had large scale protests.
We even had fans form their own club.
There was effigies of them in the ground when they took over.

Liverpool would have certainly done more. Celtic as well.

Match abandoned was over Super League.

 

[VictoriaRed]

Surely Martin gets more of a look in now. He grew into the game and will bang in the goals if he gets more playing time. His positioning around the box is miles ahead of Rasmus.

 

[always_hoping]

...and they're 9 points ahead of us, let's not forget that. It's not like this question is decided by how we fare in our internal games. If it was, we'd be as good as City.

It's been a league season with three managers and much disorder on and off the field. Play Man City in one off games United will lose more often than they'll win it's the opposite with Fulham because they are not significantly better.

 

[KStandBarmyArmy1993]

Liverpool would have certainly done more. Celtic as well.

Match abandoned was over Super League.

Liverpool didn't do more though when they were going through similar with their previous owner.

Celtic, I'll give you tbf.

 

[lex talionis]

Why is this suddenly being said after Fulham beat us on penalties? Yes, they didn't play particularly well for part of the first half, however this is a Fulham side that is doing really well in the league. They are sitting 1 point behind Brighton and Bournemouth who are being heaped with praise at the moment.

This season they have beaten Newcastle twice, Nottingham Forest twice, Chelsea, Brighton and drawn with Arsenal and Liverpool.

They are a solid, well organised and well coached team. Yes, Fulham are a team we should be beating however they are not a poor side.

I wrote that Fulham were not a great side, a claim you appear to agree with, but then argue that they are not a poor side, a claim which I never made.

We’re all saying the same thing on this thread, which is that we should have been beaten this Fulham side. We should be able to beat good teams but we cannot do so. We even struggle against relegation bound sides, and we rightly moan when we scrape by such clubs.

 

[justsomebloke]

It's been a league season with three managers and much disorder on and off the field. Play Man City in one off games United will lose more often than they'll win it's the opposite with Fulham because they are not significantly better.

Then why do they have 9 pts more than we do?

To be clear, I'm not advocating some primitive "the table never lies" view here. But 9 points is rather a lot. If you pro-rate it for the whole season, that's 13 points. Which happens to be the exact amount of points we finished ahead of them last season. Sometimes teams points-wise overperform or underperform their underlying performance significantly, but with that margin, you'd be looking at two teams who are at opposite extreme ends of the spectrum in that regard, and I don't see how that'd be the case here.

Actually, both teams have underperformed their xPts, they even slightly more than we have. They've also underperformed both their xG and their xGA, while we have actually allowed a fair few less goals than our xGA. Which means that by the basic main metrics of underlying performance, the points gap if anything understates the difference.

And things like manager changes and disorder are reasons that help explain why you're bad, not something that means you're not really bad.

 

[croadyman]

Horrific football all around. Negative and uninspired. Mostly down to shit players especially up front and these never fit sicknotes like Shaw that should have been fecked off ages ago.

Unfortunately won't be as the dumbos who run this club put him on ridiculous wages

 

[ManRed]

I don't know man, they've spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the last couple of years and won a Super Bowl a few years ago, this is a crew of losers, ran by losers administratively, coached by a loser.

Throwing money at the wall is never the solution. They needed to build a structure which they failed to do at the club. I know this is the darkest times but i feel more confident if we can pull out of this we can be a consistent top team again.

 

[GueRed]

de Ligt MOTM for me gets 7/10
Bruno 6
Maguire 6
Yoro 6

The rest get 5's

Didnt do enough to win the game. Expected these days.

 

[Maticmaker]

Losing the game especially via penalties was disappointing; however there were a lot of mini-type gains.

Even Rasmus who has been suffering badly, a few times last night got on the right side of his opponent, was able to shield/fight for the ball and come out of it with a positive movement, not all the match but in particular in the first half.

Cannot say anybody had a really bad game, Bruno and Casemiro when he came on showed their quality and the back three put in a tremendous shift. Ugarte again lifted the crowd when he won balls he had no right to win, his battling ways remind me so much of one Norbet Stiles of years gone by and Garnacho, all though still below his best form, did not let his head go down.

Bruno's after match comments very appropriate, " they were more efficient than us in the penalty shoot-out"... and in many ways that was the real difference.

 

[Brand Nubian]

Two things were for certain (and not even with hinsight). That Victor would miss, and that Onana would save feck all.

Other than that, the attacking "patterns" of play and defending set-pieces is a loads of bollix, and its on the manager. You dont need a hundred training sessions to teach your guys the basics. But its what it is.

 

[pocco]

My exceedingly unpopular take here is that we actually weren't that crap yesterday, or at least in the second half and in extra time we weren't.

Of course, going out of the FA Cup to Fulham at home is massively disappointing. With that said, that was the first game in a while where I'd say that more of our players played well than badly. There were some moments of genuine quality in transition, and aside from a goal conceded that has become far too typical for this United side the defensive performance was resolute too.

There's a mountain to climb before this team is even close to where it should be but that was the first game in a long time where I saw some encouraging signs.

I said in the unpopular opinions thread that I felt like there have been some small improvements in areas in the Everton and Ipswich games. I saw some of this against Fulham too but by the end of the 90 the players looked knackered and we sat back and allowed them the ball too much.

But I feel like the build up has been better, but it’s been undone countless times by wastefulness in the final third when he do manage to obey through the lines. I think we’ve been more aggressive off the ball too, and De Ligt has pushed forward to press with better effect. I also feel like the team has been fighting more and upped their efforts, but unfortunately it’s come during an injury crisis (and after playing 60 mins with 10 men) and they’re out on their feet.

I think we desperately need some numbers back and hopefully they keep putting the effort in. We need a positive end to the season.

 

[pocco]

Two things were for certain (and not even with hinsight). That Victor would miss, and that Onana would save feck all.

Other than that, the attacking "patterns" of play and defending set-pieces is a loads of bollix, and its on the manager. You dont need a hundred training sessions to teach your guys the basics. But its what it is.

You also can’t build attacks when the players give the ball away cheaply in dangerous positions. Doesn’t matter how well drilled they are in patterns of play or whatever, it will always fail when we make the mistakes we do on an individual level.

 

[JBG]

Two things were for certain (and not even with hinsight). That Victor would miss, and that Onana would save feck all.

Other than that, the attacking "patterns" of play and defending set-pieces is a loads of bollix, and its on the manager. You dont need a hundred training sessions to teach your guys the basics. But its what it is.

As soon as I saw Lindelof walk up, I said 2 things to my wife: "WTF is he doing taking a pen? And he's going to miss it".

Also I actually thought Onana would save a pen, considering he doesn't have the worst pen save percentage for us so far.

Also 100% agree with your last paragraph and what Pocco wrote just above.