[Manchester Dan]

I thought that it was a bad evening for both sides, not because of the result, but purely because of the performances.

Its a funny sight seeing a United side playing like that. Classic Mourinho though. You can point to a host of injuries but anybody who has watched City play this season will know that if you attack us, there is success waiting. Just look at our home record. This season I've never watched a half of football and been as comfortable as I was in that second that we wouldn't concede.

City on the other hand just had no creativity to break it down. Pass. Pass. Pass. The game was crying out for some energy and it's frustrating that Pep decided the 85th minute was the time to inject it. Very bizarre game management from Pep, none of his substitutions made sense.

 

[predator]

If we do want to win the league and compete for trophies next season our squad needs improving. Taking just two players from the squad (Ibra and Pogba) makes us a bit spineless imo. We shouldn't have to change our game against opposition due to injuries - that isn't in the nature of this club.

We defended brilliantly but I never felt like we'd score on the occasional counter. Rashford can't hold it up and whenever he tried to there was rarely anyone up with him.

With all things considered it was a good point to take from the match.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

I thought that it was a bad evening for both sides, not because of the result, but purely because of the performances.

Its a funny sight seeing a United side playing like that. Classic Mourinho though. You can point to a host of injuries but anybody who has watched City play this season will know that if you attack us, there is success waiting. Just look at our home record. This season I've never watched a half of football and been as comfortable as I was in that second that we wouldn't concede.

City on the other hand just had no creativity to break it down. Pass. Pass. Pass. The game was crying out for some energy and it's frustrating that Pep decided the 85th minute was the time to inject it. Very bizarre game management from Pep, none of his substitutions made sense.

You've conceded 15 games at home all season. That's only 2 more than Chelsea (4 more than United) Your big problem at home this season has been an inability to score, not vulnerability to conceding. You've scored 16 goals fewer than Chelsea at home, the same number as West Brom and Hull; 4 less than Bournemouth!

Interestingly, this is the same problem that we've had at home. So "classic Mourinho" is probably more similar to "Manchester Pep" than you'd like to think.

 

[GM K]

Football fans these days only value attacking. SMH.

Whatever happened to the fine art of defence, the beauty of neutralising the most dangerous attacking threats in the world. The anticipation of through passes, the organisation that thwarts well thought out attacking plans, the alertness, positional nuance, courage and fighting spirit required to play one man down at times to stop the opposition from scoring.

No wonder only attackers win the so called Balloon d'or titles and incredibly gifted defenders and goal keepers are ignored. When we discuss the greatest players ever, we mention the Maradonnas and ignore the Maldinis. We talk about the Ronaldos and don't mention the Zanettis.

Bailly was like the other end of the Messi stick yesterday. But sad world it is that ignores him.

Cryuff's invention is called Tiki Taka, while Jose's master class is called 'parking the bus' a.k.a ugly football.

The world has become sad.

This match should be used for 'How to Defend Intelligently' classes around the world.

 

[Eriku]

We were lucky to draw, and as defensive as Fergie could be at times, I've never seen a single game where we were as pinned back and unadventurous as we were yesterday.

Hopefully that's down to injuries, and we won't be as negative in most big matches next season.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

We were lucky to draw, and as defensive as Fergie could be at times, I've never seen a single game where we were as pinned back and unadventurous as we were yesterday.

Hopefully that's down to injuries, and we won't be as negative in most big matches next season.

Newcastle away, was it in the 96 season? Only the big Dane kept us in it. We should have lost by a ton otherwise and that was with the team we had then. Lucky for us Cantona grabbed a winner.

 

[Mihai]

If we do want to win the league and compete for trophies next season our squad needs improving. Taking just two players from the squad (Ibra and Pogba) makes us a bit spineless imo. We shouldn't have to change our game against opposition due to injuries - that isn't in the nature of this club.

We defended brilliantly but I never felt like we'd score on the occasional counter. Rashford can't hold it up and whenever he tried to there was rarely anyone up with him.

With all things considered it was a good point to take from the match.

I'd say we missed Mata today more than Zlatan.

I still don't understand why Micky was trying to dribble and eventually lose possession than make a simple pass.

Pogba for either Carrick or Fellaini and Mata for Mkhitaryan would've meant different game and different scoreline imo.

 

[Mihai]

We were lucky to draw, and as defensive as Fergie could be at times, I've never seen a single game where we were as pinned back and unadventurous as we were yesterday.

Hopefully that's down to injuries, and we won't be as negative in most big matches next season.

People don't seem to remember, but we've had plenty of games under SAF when we played as negative and defensive as today.

 

[Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber]

We were lucky to draw, and as defensive as Fergie could be at times, I've never seen a single game where we were as pinned back and unadventurous as we were yesterday.

Hopefully that's down to injuries, and we won't be as negative in most big matches next season.

We were actually unlucky not to win
Herrera missed by far the best chance of the night. It could have been a master class in smash and grab football.

 

[Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber]

People don't seem to remember, but we've had plenty of games under SAF when we played as negative and defensive as today.

Exactly. With CR7 here we did it at Anfield.

 

[efraim]

If people keep comparing Mourinho to Sir Alex Ferguson they'll never be happy.

 

[el3mel]

We played very well and balanced games against Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool ( home ) and Chelsea game. We defended heavily only twice against Liverpool (away) and City (away) and everyone lose their mind.

I think even if SAF returned to manage the team people will call him out after the first loss or dire performance.

 

[Robertd0803]

Newcastle away, was it in the 96 season? Only the big Dane kept us in it. We should have lost by a ton otherwise and that was with the team we had then. Lucky for us Cantona grabbed a winner.

Anfield 2007 also springs to mind.

Anyway happy with the result on the night, pretty obvious our game plan was to exploit the lack of pace in Citys defence and catch them on the break. However City won that battle physically. Some fairly cynical fouls went unpunished irritatingly and we didn't get a lot of 50/50s in the first half.

Our defence was brilliant. Midfield we were all over the place for most of the game which shows how much we miss Pogba.
Couldn't wait for the game to end, I had the feeling we would somehow grab a late winner but not to be. Couldn't even react to Jesus's goal until I heard Martin Tyler saying it was offside. And that was pretty funny watching him still celebrating afterwards and that women in the crowd

Fosu-Mensahs injury sucks. Fellaini fell for Agueros tricks but he left the ref no choice, stupid decision to go head to head with him, its only looking for trouble.

Draw will do once everything is taken in to context.

 

[Mihai]

Exactly. With CR7 here we did it at Anfield.

We did it several times, with way better players on the pitch than today. People just seem to be very selective when they think about the way we played under SAF. Not all the games were "free flow, high energy", far from it.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Anfield 2007 also springs to mind.

Anyway happy with the result on the night, pretty obvious our game plan was to exploit the lack of pace in Citys defence and catch them on the break. However City won that battle physically. Some fairly cynical fouls went unpunished irritatingly and we didn't get a lot of 50/50s in the first half.

Our defence was brilliant. Midfield we were all over the place for most of the game which shows how much we miss Pogba.
Couldn't wait for the game to end, I had the feeling we would somehow grab a late winner but not to be. Couldn't even react to Jesus's goal until I heard Martin Tyler saying it was offside. And that was pretty funny watching him still celebrating afterwards and that women in the crowd

Fosu-Mensahs injury sucks. Fellaini fell for Agueros tricks but he left the ref no choice, stupid decision to go head to head with him, its only looking for trouble.

Draw will do once everything is taken in to context.

Our midfield of Herrera/Pogba and even when you add Fellaini in, has built up a good understanding. Take Pogba out and add Carrick in, for all his calmness and passing, becomes really slow and apart from Herrera, lacking in movement. I think people will really appreciate what Pogba brings to the team.

 

[King.of.Red]

not really happy with the result but I can understand Jose tactic and accept 1 point from this difficult match.
what makes me truly unhappy is only Fellaini and his red card. I dont know, when he got red card, I was so disappointed with him. that was very stupid. luckily Pep and his team were clueless and couldnt score against our 10 players. Rojo is the best to avoid red card, Fellaini has to learn from him.
well, let's move on and focus on Swansea. let's beat them! I'm still sure we can get top 4.

 

[Manchester Dan]

You've conceded 15 games at home all season. That's only 2 more than Chelsea (4 more than United) Your big problem at home this season has been an inability to score, not vulnerability to conceding. You've scored 16 goals fewer than Chelsea at home, the same number as West Brom and Hull; 4 less than Bournemouth!

Interestingly, this is the same problem that we've had at home. So "classic Mourinho" is probably more similar to "Manchester Pep" than you'd like to think.

Alternatively, we had only kept 3 clean sheets at home all season (Bournemouth, Stoke and Watford). United being our 4th, and perhaps the most comfortable. That's not a great record in 16 games.

You can spin stats all day, one look at comments on this forum throughout the season tells you we aren't very good at defending. United didn't attempt to exploit that at any stage in the game. That's very different from trying to score and just not being very good at it (City).

Either way, a poor game from both sides and any fan of either who was happy with last night given the amount of money both sides and managers have spent last summer is seeing different things from me. Both sides still need to spend millions, again.

 

[Dex_Utd]

I am happy we got a point, it can make a huge difference at the end of the season to our top-4 goal. Too many people complaining about the performance, but football is tactical too. In these circumstances (last few games of season, too many injuries, tiring run of games, a critical away game against one of our toughest rivals) when a point is very vital, it makes total sense to go tactical. The tactics was clearly to defend deep and let the home team take the initiative, hoping to catch them on the counter. I am very sure if we conceded a goal, the tactics would have changed and we would have come out much more. However the tactics was absolutely fine. If we had shown more composure in possession and the midfield was a bit more synchronized, we should have had more opportunities at the counter. In my opinion we had 2 out of the best 3 opportunities to score.

I think it was the occasion that made our performance nervy, otherwise there was nothing wrong with the tactics. If this game took place any other time (when lets say we could risk losing the game and afford to lose the point in search of all three) I am sure we would have had more composure and would have had more possession and chances.

The point we gained puts extra pressure on Liverpool, it also keeps us well in the mix for top-4. We can possibly even make it by losing 1-more game (assuming Liverpool draw one of their games). Yes our performance could have been better, but at the same time City didn't really have too many clear cut chances and even until the end (when we were down to 10) they didn't throw everyone forward. They also knew that a point for them was not too bad compared to risking getting a zero.

 

[Kostur]

We were lucky to draw, and as defensive as Fergie could be at times, I've never seen a single game where we were as pinned back and unadventurous as we were yesterday.

Hopefully that's down to injuries, and we won't be as negative in most big matches next season.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/17810224

While you (not particularly you mate) can be discontent with the match yesterday, I don't really understand the constant need to rewrite the history about how heroic we'd been under Ferguson at all times. We haven't.

 

[Roger777]

Football fans these days only value attacking. SMH.

Whatever happened to the fine art of defence, the beauty of neutralising the most dangerous attacking threats in the world. The anticipation of through passes, the organisation that thwarts well thought out attacking plans, the alertness, positional nuance, courage and fighting spirit to required to play one man down at times to stop the opposition from scoring.

No wonder only attackers win the so called Balloon d'or titles and incredibly gifted defenders and goal keepers are ignored. When we discuss the greatest players ever, we mention the Maradonnas and ignore the Maldinis. We talk about the Ronaldos and don't mention the Zanettis.

Bailly was like the other end of the Messi stick yesterday. But sad world it is that ignores him.

Cryuff's invention is called Ticky Tacka, while Jose's masterclass is called 'parking the bus' a.k.a ugly football.

The world has become sad.

This match should be used for 'How to Defend Intelligently' classes around the world.

Totally agree mate.

 

[FCBarca]

Totally agree mate.

Absolutely sad, as I have said before, every kid grows up dreaming to set up shop & defend in numbers rather than score & play some freeflowing football

 

[TheReligion]

Absolutely sad, as I have said before, every kid grows up dreaming to set up shop & defend in numbers rather than score & play some freeflowing football

Maybe if your academy listened to the teachings of Professor Mourinho the first team wouldn't leak like the Spanish Armada.

 

[TheReligion]

Alternatively, we had only kept 3 clean sheets at home all season (Bournemouth, Stoke and Watford). United being our 4th, and perhaps the most comfortable. That's not a great record in 16 games.

You can spin stats all day, one look at comments on this forum throughout the season tells you we aren't very good at defending. United didn't attempt to exploit that at any stage in the game. That's very different from trying to score and just not being very good at it (City).

Either way, a poor game from both sides and any fan of either who was happy with last night given the amount of money both sides and managers have spent last summer is seeing different things from me. Both sides still need to spend millions, again.

Undoubtedly a better result for United given the circumstances but I agree in part.

 

[Stacks]

Given all our injuries and the red card we did all we could.


Take away any teams best ST, best attacking mid, central mid, and three center backs and see what they look like.

Our Best CB was playing so theoretically we were missing one 1st choice CB from the team, unless we were gonna play 6 at the back

 

[FCBarca]

Maybe if your academy listened to the teachings of Professor Mourinho the first team wouldn't leak like the Spanish Armada.

If having thus far given up the 3rd least amount of goals this season, and the least over the last several seasons + winning titles, by all means leak away

 

[Yorkeontop]

City will have a more clinical #9 next season, I am certain

How much Kun Aguero do you watch? Dude is like the deadliest (goals per minute) striker in EPL history.
http://www.skysports.com/football/n...s-per-minute-record-in-premier-league-history
(ignore Kelechi;small sample)

Who's this #9 City are going replace Sergio with? I'm sure he'd cost a fortune.

PS: I come in peace. I'm not trying to put you on the spot or anything.

 

[FCBarca]

How much Kun Aguero do you watch? Dude is like the deadliest (goals per minute) striker in EPL history.
http://www.skysports.com/football/n...s-per-minute-record-in-premier-league-history
(ignore Kelechi;small sample)

Who's this #9 City are going replace Sergio with? I'm sure he'd cost a fortune.

PS: I come in peace. I'm not trying to put you on the spot or anything.

Because his conversion rate has been poor and that's not isolated to City but even with Los Albicelestes. He's working harder (And covering more ground) than any other season I've seen him and I have watched him since he was at Atletico - credit to Pep there. Guardiola has praised this effort but it's also why he sat the player on many occasions and preferred Gabriel Jesus ahead of him when healthy.

No idea who they will pursue for a #9 but there's no question that City's biggest weaknesses are fullbacks & a scoring forward. I have no doubt they will attempt to fill those needs this summer

 

[GailSpaceWynand]

If having thus far given up the 3rd least amount of goals this season, and the least over the last several seasons + winning titles, by all means leak away

In a two-team league.

 

[Ramshock]

Anyone read the responses to Smalling tweet wishing the team good luck before the match? Scumbags

 

[Ramshock]

In a two-team league.

Tbf 3 teams occasionally

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Alternatively, we had only kept 3 clean sheets at home all season (Bournemouth, Stoke and Watford). United being our 4th, and perhaps the most comfortable. That's not a great record in 16 games.

You can spin stats all day, one look at comments on this forum throughout the season tells you we aren't very good at defending. United didn't attempt to exploit that at any stage in the game. That's very different from trying to score and just not being very good at it (City).

Either way, a poor game from both sides and any fan of either who was happy with last night given the amount of money both sides and managers have spent last summer is seeing different things from me. Both sides still need to spend millions, again.

Well considering our most expensive player sat the game out and we've known all season that our highest goal-scorer (who also missed the game) would need upgrading in the summer then I'm not quite as depressed by how things panned out as you seem to be.

 

[Oldyella]

Anyone read the responses to Smalling tweet wishing the team good luck before the match? Scumbags

No, but imagine it was similar to some of the comments here tbh.

 

[FCBarca]

In a two-team league.

A third team has been in the CL Finals twice in recent years, a fourth won the Europa league back to back recently, a 5th easily ousted United from the Europa before that, a 6th face United in the Semis of Europa coming up and most with miniscule budgets compared to those in the Premiership...but sure, a two-team league

 

[Ramshock]

No, but imagine it was similar to some of the comments here tbh.

Exactly. Fellaini obviously getting abuse too

 

[Ramshock]

A third team has been in the CL Finals twice in recent years, a fourth won the Europa league back to back recently, a 5th easily ousted United from the Europa before that, a 6th face United in the Semis of Europa coming up and most with miniscule budgets compared to those in the Premiership...but sure, a two-team league

Calm down precious. The PL in its current inception has had 6 different winners how many different winners has la liga had in the same 25 years?

 

[Ash_G]

Football fans these days only value attacking. SMH.

Whatever happened to the fine art of defence, the beauty of neutralising the most dangerous attacking threats in the world. The anticipation of through passes, the organisation that thwarts well thought out attacking plans, the alertness, positional nuance, courage and fighting spirit to required to play one man down at times to stop the opposition from scoring.

No wonder only attackers win the so called Balloon d'or titles and incredibly gifted defenders and goal keepers are ignored. When we discuss the greatest players ever, we mention the Maradonnas and ignore the Maldinis. We talk about the Ronaldos and don't mention the Zanettis.

Bailly was like the other end of the Messi stick yesterday. But sad world it is that ignores him.

Cryuff's invention is called Ticky Tacka, while Jose's masterclass is called 'parking the bus' a.k.a ugly football.

The world has become sad.

This match should be used for 'How to Defend Intelligently' classes around the world.

I mean it's fair to praise the defending but when you sacrifice so much of your attack to do so, how impressive is it particularly when they had some good opportunities to score which we were fortunate to get away with. In fairness do agree that Bailly was good and general principal that defending can go unappreciated.

I felt that we got the balance wrong, it's fine to set up to counter but we went too far to the point where we just didn't have any way out. I know it's popular to bash Fellaini but and it's not particularly his fault more his use, but I think the way he was deployed was questionable. He was allowed to be the most advanced again but he simply isn't good enough on the ball meaning we couldn't get the ball to the attackers. We needed him to sit deeper and maybe have Herrera be the one to be further up the pitch or even if we wanted to be bold let Mikhi play centrally in place of him although he was quite poor as well. However the danger with him deeper is that he's not great at marking/covering his ground and seems to be more effective as the spare man in defence.

Big shame is that Martial/Rashford clearly could have caused them problems and we didn't try to change anything to make it happen. A draw is an ok result in the end, especially with the injuries but did feel we were overly cautious. As I said it's one thing to defend with 11 men and offer little threat for most the game, another to be defensively sound but have the ability to hit the counter hard.

 

[Manchester Dan]

Well considering our most expensive player sat the game out and we've known all season that our highest goal-scorer (who also missed the game) would need upgrading in the summer then I'm not quite as depressed by how things panned out as you seem to be.

That's fair enough, its natural to begin to normalise to that style of football over time. Reading the forum you've managed to do that quicker than most.

My personal frustration is that we still need to spend a fortune to be a top side, because last night was further evidence that we've got a long way to go. A good side would have comfortably beaten you on that showing. We could still be playing now and it'd still be 0-0.

 

[GailSpaceWynand]

A third team has been in the CL Finals twice in recent years, a fourth won the Europa league back to back recently, a 5th easily ousted United from the Europa before that, a 6th face United in the Semis of Europa coming up and most with miniscule budgets compared to those in the Premiership...but sure, a two-team league

It is exactly those miniscule budgets that make it difficult for any other Spanish team to have a chance at the title run-in where squad depth matters most unlike knock-out competitions. It was the individual brilliance of the coaches who managed the teams you named (Simeone, Emery) and the fact that they could get the team to do that with a small budget is creditable. La Liga still remains a two-team league; Atletico won in 13/14, Valencia before that in 04/05 - hardly an advert for competition is it?

 

[Mihai]

That's fair enough, its natural to begin to normalise to that style of football over time. Reading the forum you've managed to do that quicker than most.

My personal frustration is that we still need to spend a fortune to be a top side, because last night was further evidence that we've got a long way to go. A good side would have comfortably beaten you on that showing. We could still be playing now and it'd still be 0-0.

A good side like Chelsea, Spurs, Liverpool or Arsenal recently? In recent games against these teams in the League, we've been beaten zero times Are these teams not deemed "good" by you?

 

[roonster09]

That's fair enough, its natural to begin to normalise to that style of football over time. Reading the forum you've managed to do that quicker than most.

My personal frustration is that we still need to spend a fortune to be a top side, because last night was further evidence that we've got a long way to go. A good side would have comfortably beaten you on that showing. We could still be playing now and it'd still be 0-0.

Same thing was repeated after every big game but still we are undefeated in 26 games and this run includes games against City, Chelsea, Liverpool twice, Spurs, Arsenal, Everton twice.