[Ibi Dreams]

Zlatan saying United is the biggest club he's played for

 

[RedPed]

The best part for me was the grin on Valencia's face when he was given the armband!

Ha ha noticed that too,

 

[TheRedDevil'sAdvocate]

Happy with the win, we are a new team trying to learn how to play under a different manager and with many newcomers still trying to settle in the team. Leicester had one change in their lineup, yet we seemed in complete control of the game and, if it hadn't for Fellaini's mistake, we would have had a clean sheet and a less nervous win against a ready made side.

Other than that, we didn't witness anything unexpected. Get used to it guys, it's going to be a tough ride and some of our wins aren't going to be pretty. Mourinho himself has stated that he needs the fans behind the team at all times because there are going to be times we will be trying to defend a lead with ten men behind the ball and times when we will play for 1-0 wins throughout the season.

We will do better but we're not ready yet. Carrick is still our best choice for the holding midfielder role, it's sad, considering his age, but true. But Carrick can be most effective in a counter attacking side which defends deep and tries to exploit the spaces in the opposition's attacking transition. In order for that to work perfectly, you need forwards who can stretch defenses and create spaces in between the lines. Zlatan and Rooney can't and won't offer you that. And this fact creates a problem for the whole team in terms of executing the manager's plan. The alternative, that is Morgan, is a liability in the role of the deepest CM because of his lack of positional awareness. This is the riddle Mourinho has to solve throughout the season. It's no coincidence that we had our nest 45 minutes in this pre season when Rashford was playing up front and hw was constantly making runs and creating pockets of space.

I wasn't even surprised by the changes in our presumed starting lineup. I had written in a post a few day ago that we have two new play makers in the team (Zlatan and Mkhitaryan) and two others (Rooney and Martial) who must become better without the ball in the attacking half. It will take time for them to link up well with each other but until then Mourinho is going to search for the combinations in the attacking half that will increase our chances of winning our matches.

In the end we won the game with goals from an individual moment of brilliance and a good header from a big personality who scored the crucial goal while he had a bad game overall. Be happy about that and hope that there will be more in the coming weeks because we will sure as hell need them.

 

[UnitedBoy]

Easy to forget how Good Leicester were last season, especially defensively. Even today they looked very threatening. They might be Leicester but a hard a game as we will have this season.

We done well, happy with the result and our togetherness.

Rooney is unbelievable. Just don't understand how any professional footballer can have that firs touch.

 

[BennyBlanco]

You forget how bad football can be in the summer, namely serious B.O. from the crowd today.

 

[Theonas]

I liked what he said about the changes in the team, how last season Valencia might have played a backpass instead of crossing the ball into the box. Its going to take time but so far i'm liking how hes telling his players to play to their strengths.

He's not telling players that. Where did you find that? Surely, you football coaching is not as simple as realising that all you have to do is tell players to play to their strengths? Not a single manager can do that because what are the chances every player's strength will fit in perfectly with the needs of the team?

The main difference between LvG and Mourinho is that the former liked his players to press and win the ball back so as to avoid having to defend. Mourinho likes it more traditional in that you sit off and make sure you don't give up space for your opponent to do damage. This is why his teams tend to be forced to sit deep if the opponent is of a high quality. Attacking wise, LvG likes his teams to pass and pass until a gap opens up which when not performed well, leads to endless boring passes like last season. When done well, it leads to incisive dominant attacking football like Bayern's. Mourinho is more direct, he prefers to let his forwards be creative which is again why when his teams are not in possession as it happens against the good sides, his forwards can be starved off the ball and leads to equally boring football.

Bottom line every style can result in entertaining or boring football depending on how it is performed. The single one biggest advantage Mourinho has over LvG and maybe every other manager working today is his man management. He is a psychological genius in the way he gets his players to play with confidence. Luckily for us, that is very badly needed at our club at the moment.

 

[Lawman]

Happy with the win, we are a new team trying to learn how to play under a different manager and with many newcomers still trying to settle in the team. Leicester had one change in their lineup, yet we seemed in complete control of the game and, if it hadn't for Fellaini's mistake, we would have had a clean sheet and a less nervous win against a ready made side.

Other than that, we didn't witness anything unexpected. Get used to it guys, it's going to be a tough ride and some of our wins aren't going to be pretty. Mourinho himself has stated that he needs the fans behind the team at all times because there are going to be times we will be trying to defend a lead with ten men behind the ball and times when we will play for 1-0 wins throughout the season.

We will do better but we're not ready yet. Carrick is still our best choice for the holding midfielder role, it's sad, considering his age, but true. But Carrick can be most effective in a counter attacking side which defends deep and tries to exploit the spaces in the opposition's attacking transition. In order for that to work perfectly, you need forwards who can stretch defenses and create spaces in between the lines. Zlatan and Rooney can't and won't offer you that. And this fact creates a problem for the whole team in terms of executing the manager's plan. The alternative, that is Morgan, is a liability in the role of the deepest CM because of his lack of positional awareness. This is the riddle Mourinho has to solve throughout the season. It's no coincidence that we had our nest 45 minutes in this pre season when Rashford was playing up front and hw was constantly making runs and creating pockets of space.

I wasn't even surprised by the changes in our presumed starting lineup. I had written in a post a few day ago that we have two new play makers in the team (Zlatan and Mkhitaryan) and two others (Rooney and Martial) who must become better without the ball in the attacking half. It will take time for them to link up well with each other but until then Mourinho is going to search for the combinations in the attacking half that will increase our chances of winning our matches.

In the end we won the game with goals from an individual moment of brilliance and a good header from a big personality who scored the crucial goal while he had a bad game overall. Be happy about that and hope that there will be more in the coming weeks because we will sure as hell need them.

Agree wished we signed Mane for his pace in behind. (Thought Zlatan was decent) Jose touched on a decent point about getting us closer to goal for Zlatan to be more effective!

 

[Ixion]

He's not telling players that. Where did you find that? Surely, you football coaching is not as simple as realising that all you have to do is tell players to play to their strengths? Not a single manager can do that because what are the chances every player's strength will fit in perfectly with the needs of the team?

He said after the game previously the wingers in those positions would be expected to pass the ball back and he is trying to change that as we saw today.

 

[Theonas]

He said after the game previously the wingers in those positions would be expected to pass the ball back and he is trying to change that as we saw today.

I know. That doesn't mean he is telling them to play to their strengths if you put what he said in context. What is telling players to play to their strength even mean? It's a cliché thrown around that really can't exist in football coaching.

 

[Shimo]

On cloud 9 - what a game to make my first game and on #pogback day too. Zlatan scoring almost in front of my face. Hearing all the songs in person - not sure if those were the regular match goers but, was they made it memorable.

We definitely need more directness and Mou said it - need to get out of our old habit of recirculating the ball and start just getting a few more crosses in. The lack of match fitness I think showed and probably clouded by the euphoria of the day but, could see some real promising signs all across the pitch.

Valencia and Shaw are going to be critical though because of how much everyone else likes to come inside.

 

[noodlehair]

Rooney didn't look anywhere near fit. Carrick didn't look anywhere near fit. It is the same with these two every single year and it is a fecking embarassment. If it's so hard to get back to full fitness, don't spend the summer letting yourself get unfit in the first place. What DOES Rooney do when he's not playing football? He's always so unfit when he goes more than a week without a game.

Fellaini is so bad he almost makes you want football to go away again. I wanted him to get sent off.

I thought it was a pretty scrappy/rusty looking game but I liked Bailly's maniac performance. Blind was pretty good. Valencia was pretty good and Shaw had a good 45 minutes before forgetting what team he was on and also suddenly looking like he'd run a marathon.

Martial's been taking first touch advice from Rooney and needs to not do that.

Leicester were flat. We sat off and took their counter attack tactic away and they had nothing else to offer. I think this will happen to them a lot this season now teams take them seriously and it'll be interesting to see if they have an answer.

Can't decide if Lingard's goall was some piece of Messi-esque brilliance or Leicester's defence haviing a collective brain spasm. Looked like the sort of thing that would happen when I play Fifa and panic and start mashing the tackle button.


Enjoyed BT's coverage. Particularly when a picture of a random empty goal appeared obscurring part of the screen for about 10 seconds...and their interesting idea of making the camera brightness greater than staring directly at the sun.

 

[Ramshock]

Jose blamed Fellainis mess up on the pitch I bet that had a few on here spitting dunmies

 

[Artimities]

Not a bad match. Liked his tactics and his desire. Rooney was not great but it's a long season. Ibra was great.

 

[Robertd0803]

Bailly was very good. Valencia was very good and I think Darmian is facing a struggle to get back in the team. Fantastic goal by Lingard. And yesssssss Ibra!!!!

Didnt think Fellaini was that bad besides the back pass, anyone else think that Jose is protecting him by blaming the pitch?

Cant see Leicester falling apart as quickly as some people are saying, they still look pretty solid.

Happy with the result, we still have work to do but important to win today to build confidence and start as we mean to go on.

 

[noodlehair]

Jose blamed Fellainis mess up on the pitch I bet that had a few on here spitting dunmies

Fellaini being in the team doesn't say much for Schneiderlin. That's all I'd take from it.

His passing was comical. Also pretty sure we kept or gained possession more times when he went for a header and missed it than when he actually made contact with the ball. He has the odd game where he looks oddly effective but when he doesn't he's just baffling.

The Pogba fee looks a lot less ridiculous when you think of it as a playing Fellaini less fee.

At least he kind of had a position today. Unlike last season where half the fun was trying to figure out where on the pitch Fellaini was supposed to be playing.

 

[royboy16]

Wasnt a great match as some of the football we played at times reminded me of LVG's football.
Happy with the win,JM is right when he said we have alot of work to do.

 

[Ramshock]

Fellaini being in the team doesn't say much for Schneiderlin. That's all I'd take from it.

His passing was comical. Also pretty sure we kept or gained possession more times when he went for a header and missed it than when he actually made contact with the ball. He has the odd game where he looks oddly effective but when he doesn't he's just baffling.

The Pogba fee looks a lot less ridiculous when you think of it as a playing Fellaini less fee.

Morgan only just back lad

 

[noodlehair]

Morgan only just back lad

So's Martial.

 

[Tincanalley]

He's not telling players that. Where did you find that? Surely, you football coaching is not as simple as realising that all you have to do is tell players to play to their strengths? Not a single manager can do that because what are the chances every player's strength will fit in perfectly with the needs of the team?

The main difference between LvG and Mourinho is that the former liked his players to press and win the ball back so as to avoid having to defend. Mourinho likes it more traditional in that you sit off and make sure you don't give up space for your opponent to do damage. This is why his teams tend to be forced to sit deep if the opponent is of a high quality. Attacking wise, LvG likes his teams to pass and pass until a gap opens up which when not performed well, leads to endless boring passes like last season. When done well, it leads to incisive dominant attacking football like Bayern's. Mourinho is more direct, he prefers to let his forwards be creative which is again why when his teams are not in possession as it happens against the good sides, his forwards can be starved off the ball and leads to equally boring football.

Bottom line every style can result in entertaining or boring football depending on how it is performed. The single one biggest advantage Mourinho has over LvG and maybe every other manager working today is his man management. He is a psychological genius in the way he gets his players to play with confidence. Luckily for us, that is very badly needed at our club at the moment.

Enjoyable post.

 

[Billy Blaggs]

QUOTE="Shimo, post: 19632934, member: 47413"]On cloud 9 - what a game to make my first game and on #pogback day too. Zlatan scoring almost in front of my face. Hearing all the songs in person - not sure if those were the regular match goers but, was they made it memorable.

We definitely need more directness and Mou said it - need to get out of our old habit of recirculating the ball and start just getting a few more crosses in. The lack of match fitness I think showed and probably clouded by the euphoria of the day but, could see some real promising signs all across the pitch.

Valencia and Shaw are going to be critical though because of how much everyone else likes to come inside.[/QUOTE]
Congrats. Glad you enjoyed it!

 

[Ramshock]

So's Martial.

True.

 

[Red Dreams]

when is our first Europa League fixtures lads?

 

[::sonny::]

For some strange reason Rooney is untouchable.

 

[hubbuh]

Rooney didn't look anywhere near fit. Carrick didn't look anywhere near fit. It is the same with these two every single year and it is a fecking embarassment. If it's so hard to get back to full fitness, don't spend the summer letting yourself get unfit in the first place. What DOES Rooney do when he's not playing football? He's always so unfit when he goes more than a week without a game.

Fellaini is so bad he almost makes you want football to go away again. I wanted him to get sent off.

I thought it was a pretty scrappy/rusty looking game but I liked Bailly's maniac performance. Blind was pretty good. Valencia was pretty good and Shaw had a good 45 minutes before forgetting what team he was on and also suddenly looking like he'd run a marathon.

Martial's been taking first touch advice from Rooney and needs to not do that.

Leicester were flat. We sat off and took their counter attack tactic away and they had nothing else to offer. I think this will happen to them a lot this season now teams take them seriously and it'll be interesting to see if they have an answer.

Can't decide if Lingard's goall was some piece of Messi-esque brilliance or Leicester's defence haviing a collective brain spasm. Looked like the sort of thing that would happen when I play Fifa and panic and start mashing the tackle button.


Enjoyed BT's coverage. Particularly when a picture of a random empty goal appeared obscurring part of the screen for about 10 seconds...and their interesting idea of making the camera brightness greater than staring directly at the sun.

This is pretty much right on the money.

I suddenly have quite a lot more faith in our defence. Stats-wise (yawn) we were quite formidable last season, but when it mattered most (see West Ham away) they folded like a futon. There's much more to them with Shaw back and Eric Bailly's introduction, who I've already decided is our signing of the season.

 

[Offside]

Rooney didn't look anywhere near fit. Carrick didn't look anywhere near fit. It is the same with these two every single year and it is a fecking embarassment. If it's so hard to get back to full fitness, don't spend the summer letting yourself get unfit in the first place. What DOES Rooney do when he's not playing football? He's always so unfit when he goes more than a week without a game.

Fellaini is so bad he almost makes you want football to go away again. I wanted him to get sent off.

I thought it was a pretty scrappy/rusty looking game but I liked Bailly's maniac performance. Blind was pretty good. Valencia was pretty good and Shaw had a good 45 minutes before forgetting what team he was on and also suddenly looking like he'd run a marathon.

Martial's been taking first touch advice from Rooney and needs to not do that.

Leicester were flat. We sat off and took their counter attack tactic away and they had nothing else to offer. I think this will happen to them a lot this season now teams take them seriously and it'll be interesting to see if they have an answer.

Can't decide if Lingard's goall was some piece of Messi-esque brilliance or Leicester's defence haviing a collective brain spasm. Looked like the sort of thing that would happen when I play Fifa and panic and start mashing the tackle button.


Enjoyed BT's coverage. Particularly when a picture of a random empty goal appeared obscurring part of the screen for about 10 seconds...and their interesting idea of making the camera brightness greater than staring directly at the sun.

I feel the same about Rooney. He doesn't look after himself. I bet he goes on holiday and just drinks beer and stops any exercise, doesn't even go for a run in the morning or do some proper swimming. His failure to stay fit is a joke. He looks fat as feck and about a million miles off the pace.

 

[T00lsh3d]

I feel the same about Rooney. He doesn't look after himself. I bet he goes on holiday and just drinks beer and stops any exercise, doesn't even go for a run in the morning or do some proper swimming. His failure to stay fit is a joke. He looks fat as feck and about a million miles off the pace.

If only we could get him to start banging hookers again, he might get enough exercise in to stay in shape

 

[Nakhon Phanom]

A fairly even game which could have gone either way.In truth,United didn't look too much different than last season under Van Gaal.
I thought Bailly did well,although he is prone to rash challenges and should be a good addition to the team.
Ibramhovic was fairly quiet but showed some nice touches and headed the winner 10 minutes from time.I think he would benefit from playing alongside a more mobile striker in Rashford for the future.
The two biggest disappointments were Martial and,especially,Rooney.For nearly two years now Rooney has been poor.Surely the management can see that his time as a top player is up ? 300k per week for mediocrity (which is being kind to him)......ship him off to China and get a new striker in.
Lingard scored a lovely individual goal for the opener,although the bounce ran kindly for him.A shame he was injured after a poor challenge by King who was rightly booked.
One thing I didn't like was substituting Mata near the end when he had been brought on as a sub 30 minutes earlier.Very humiliating for the player who had done OK.....sadly it looks like he has no future at Old Trafford,the same as at Stamford Bridge.Why not take off Fellani to ensure he cant play another through ball like the one he gave Vardy for Leicesters equalizer ?

 

[RedTiger]

If only we could get him to start banging hookers again, he might get enough exercise in to stay in shape

Specifically the older ones though, their delicate touch seemed to rub of on him. I'm sure that after all the shit he put Coleen through she probably uses a barge pole for her touch which is also how far the ball ends up after Rooney's tried to stop it.

 

[Nakhon Phanom]

fairly even game which could have gone either way.In truth,United didn't look too much different than last season under Van Gaal.
I thought Bailly did well,although he is prone to rash challenges and should be a good addition to the team.
Ibramhovic was fairly quiet but showed some nice touches and headed the winner 10 minutes from time.I think he would benefit from playing alongside a more mobile striker in Rashford for the future.
The two biggest disappointments were Martial and,especially,Rooney.For nearly two years now Rooney has been poor.Surely the management can see that his time as a top player is up ? 300k per week for mediocrity (which is being kind to him)......ship him off to China and get a new striker in.
Lingard scored a lovely individual goal for the opener,although the bounce ran kindly for him.A shame he was injured after a poor challenge by King who was rightly booked.
One thing I didn't like was substituting Mata near the end when he had been brought on as a sub 30 minutes earlier.Very humiliating for the player who had done OK.....sadly it looks like he has no future at Old Trafford,the same as at Stamford Bridge.Why not take off Fellani to ensure he cant play another through ball like the one he gave Vardy for Leicesters equalizer ?

 

[T00lsh3d]

Specifically the older ones though, their delicate touch seemed to rub of on him. I'm sure that after all the shit he put Coleen through she probably uses a barge pole for her touch which is also how far the ball ends up after Rooney's tried to stop it.

That is a good, if worryingly in-depth analysis

 

[RedTiger]

That is a good, if worryingly in-depth analysis

I know surprisingly there are many more analogies we can make for our Wazza as to why he went to shit.

 

[ash_86]

I liked the fact that we never looked shaky throughout the game. Players knew exactly what to do on and off the ball. Also under LVG we would take the foot off the pedal after 2 mins. That never happened today and

 

[T00lsh3d]

I know surprisingly there are many more analogies we can make for our Wazza as to why he went to shit.

Mourinho likes making excuses for his players, God I would love it if he came out and told the media Rooney played poorly due to "insufficient whoring"

 

[Macern]

Bailly and Smalling will probably be the best CB partnership in the league by far this season.

 

[top1whoisman]

Would be nice to hear @Jimmy Skitz ’s view of the match, always interested how the opponent fans see the events compared to the more red view of mine. Shaw kept Mahrez pretty quiet, Vardy as dangerous as always. I was relieved Ranieri went with Okazaki instead of Musa in the starting XI. Not that Okazaki would be bad, but Musa’s pace will kill some PL defenses. Morgan struggled with Zlatan, didn’t really see anyone bully the big man last season. How did you see United’s goals, something Leicester players could’ve done better?

 

[CS@SG]

If was worrying that there was only 1 defender on the bench.

 

[Gasolin]

Oh I actually like that he admitted what he did was wrong but he fixed it with Mata. And that he confirms LVG was right about the defensive duties and the gaps between lines, he did teach that to the team. Probably the reason why Mata has a different feel for Mourinho now, he defends more. But now as the new manager he wants to change the behavior in the final third. Well, makes sense. So far so good.

 

[Sean_RedDevil]

It was a nice day at Wembley........always nice to win the Community Shield

 

[Coops73]

The game itself was OKish, the first ten minutes or so I thought Van Gaal was still in charge with the amount of back passing going on but I guess we were easing into the game and it was good to see someone in our technical area acting like he gives a shit.

Bailey was class, I thought he handled rat boy Vardy very well and deservedly got MOTM.

Zlatan was pretty quite but like all the best strikers he was there when you needed him unlike Rooney who hasn't been anywhere for the last couple of seasons and in my opinion needs to be moved on so the club can properly move on, I can only assume he has some compromising photos of Woody and the Glazers because how he can keep getting picked is a fecking mystery but hey! What do I know, I thought he was very poor yesterday.

Looking forward to the season ahead, something I couldn't have said with LVG in charge.

 

[suheilsworld]

Trying to accommodate Rooney is robbing us of so much creativity. Change Fellaini and Rooney for Pogba and Mata and we might see so more fluent football. Rashford to be Martial / Ibra back up and Mkhatariyan for Lingard or they can keep alternating depending on games and fitness level.