[hodgey123]

Hope everyone trying to tee Ronaldo up was only because he was on 699 club goals rather than sign of things to come. Either way, we could definitely do without it and I don't want him anywhere near the starting lineup now Rashford is in form and Martial is back. Sancho has regressed as well and lacks any intensity so should lose his place, and Malacia has had two poor games now and could do with being dropped for Shaw.

 

[DSG]

Ronaldo’s quest get his 700th club goal is holding us hostage a bit. Rashford, Dalot turning down sure goals to try and put one on a plate for Ronaldo. To make it worse, he’s in his own head a bit. Had at least 3 chances that 6 months ago he would have buried.

Imperative to start Rashford / Martial / Antony this weekend.

 

[Swedish_Plumber]

But if we beat them by two goals then we don't need gd, right?

It’s all ifs and maybes tbh with you. Just seems a wasted opportunity of boosting our GD and confidence in front of goal.

Beating sociedad in Spain is a tough ask anyways

 

[McGrathsipan]

Enjoyed that

Observations..

Rashford looks sharp and hungry. Encouraging
Martial too looking more interesting.
Martinez is a good player.

Bruno going off helped the team. He's not that good.

Malacia had a mare.

Sancho beginning to worry me. He just doesn't look good.

Antony needs to calm down but he looks promising

Linda is shite.
Dalot is not great
Ronaldo

 

[12OunceEpilogue]

@GifLord could you dig up Ten Hag wearing a skullcap at 57:10 of the match please?

 

[Irrational.]

We almost dropped points to a team that sounds like a poisonous gas FFS.

 

[Gordon S]

Will we be a coherent, well organized team ever again?
Players just takes turns giving a proper feck out there, constantly giving away space for oppos to pass in to. Our defense as a team is a brutal watch.
We desperately need to keep Varane fit. At least he can bring a touch of stability to our back 4.

Rashford with a touch of giving a feck tonight, was good to see. I actually saw him winning the ball back with a tackle!
Big question is why these games are so far apart for him. Hopefully he can get on a good run. We need that as well.

I like Martinez, he really isn`t that special, but he is fairly consistent with his performances, almost always above average.

Breaks my heart to go from ”no player is bigger than the club” to this, we must try what we can to please Ronaldo. To make him happy is almost as important as winning games.

 

[Glorio]

3-2 win against the fourth best team in Cyprus, and that with our strongest side. Beyond dog shit and just so disheartening. At least we avoided the disgrace of dropping points.

I'm at a loss at this point, it's just bizarre.

Wasn't our strongest side - Ronaldo is our 3rd choice CF

 

[swissgenius]

Rashford very good minus that pass to Ronaldo when he should have gone for the hat trick.

Good to see Martial with another goal. Would have liked to see Ronaldo get a goal as his overall game was decent it just wasn't going his way.

Really like Martinez as always and think the 80 minutes for Casemiro was much needed

Agree on all points but Ronaldo. He was not decent, being involved against that side shouldn't be a plus.
He was awful, missed some sitters, couldn't control the ball when it mattered and didn't see his teammates.
We'd all be working on a fail compilation right now if it was D. Nuñez.

 

[The Irish Connection]

Incredibly frustrating watch.

 

[bosskeano]

That front 4 would not see a ball whole game with Casemiro alone in midfield

Sancho would defend more than Bruno does....Casemiro and Scott would be a solid pairing in the holding roles

 

[Robertd0803]

Get in there.

Seems like we have gone back to our old habit of only playing in the second half.

 

[Zetrio2002]

Great performance by Rashford and Martial.

 

[Leftback99]

We'll get beat by Everton on Sunday playing like this. Not good enough.

 

[Telsim]

Shocking stuff. No edge and no intensity to our game. Sloppy, wasteful, and ponderous offensively, and woeful defensively. Amateurish is the word. Didn’t give up at least, but I’m not going to congratulate the players for not giving up against fecking Omonia Nicosia, sorry. Should be winning this by 4 or 5 to nil. Instead, we were quite lucky to win at all. I have yet to see a notable change since last season.

We desperately need someone like Leao, Gakpo, Osimhen, or Lautaro Martinez to bring that energy forward, wreak havoc in the final third, and generally make things happen. Also need a CM.

 

[Hughes35]

@GifLord could you dig up Ten Hag wearing a skullcap at 57:10 of the match please?

I noticed this too !! So glad someone else did

 

[Tibs]

Anyone got a link to highlights? Missed the game

 

[Fully Fledged]

We almost dropped points to a team that sounds like a poisonous gas FFS.

The smell of urine no less.
We won end of story. I remember us losing to MK Dons in the past. Anything can happen on the day. We've got to remember the Real Sociedad only beat them 2-1 in Spain so they're playing with belief under Lennon.

 

[bosskeano]

if we put away some of the chances that we should have....this was easily a 5 goal game and a walk in the park

 

[CloneMC16]

We almost dropped points to a team that sounds like a poisonous gas FFS.

 

[Fully Fledged]

Anyone got a link to highlights? Missed the game

 

[The White Pele]

Really sloppy from us tonight and should have wrapped the game up comfortably several times, even in the first half.

Luckily we were not punished on this occasion and hopefully we can become more clinical.

I think the building Ronaldo frustration didn’t help the situation as sometimes our final pass felt a little bit too considered and forced rather than instinctive.

 

[HaliRed]

I really enjoyed watching Martial in the Bruno role for a few minutes until Antony got substituted.

Might be a an option against weaker teams who park the bus to have Rashford-Martial-Antony behind Ronaldo. And yes, I would prefer a replacement for Ronaldo, but there should be enough chances created with that frontline to counteract his decline.

 

[CloneMC16]

I think I overlooked the pass Bruno played to Rashford for our first. Brilliant pass. Martinez's pass through the lines also made Martial's goal. Excellent.

 

[Tibs]

Thanks

 

[Red00012]

Ronaldo needs to retire

Embarassing post

 

[Wilt]

Worrying conceding 2 goals to absolute cannon fodder

 

[Red00012]

cant see Sancho keeping his place after that first half

He doesn’t deserve to start Sunday
Get Rashford left and Martial up top

 

[SilentWitness]

I’m surprised you went so strong tonight. Not sure if that bodes well for Sunday or not!

 

[The Brown Bull]

Meh! If we were serious we would have beat them by 3 or 4 and not given them a sniff.
With our 2nd 11.
As it was with close to our strongest team we struggled to beat them 3-2.
I don’t blame the manager .

 

[Lost bear]

The key to this season is keeping Rashford and Martial fit and motivated, Eriksen used correctly, Varane as fit as he can be and Fernandes being able to get into his natural positions without Ronaldo on the pitch and then we stand a chance of getting top four in the league and maybe depending on who goes out in the CL maybe winning Europa.

Yeah, agree with more or less all that.

 

[Hammondo]

Great performance by Rashford and Martial.

Don't exaggerate, they did ok against a very poor side.

 

[justsomebloke]

That was a fun game, with lots to think about!

Malacia. He brought much-needed intensity and aggressiveness when he came into the team from Liverpool onwards, but I think we're starting to get an outline of his limitations - above all, he's really not very good at all on the ball. Has a lot less to offer than Shaw in that department.

Dalot. Actually thought he was really good today. I was arguing on another thread that praise of his passing this season was a bit overboard, but if he continues like today, I'll come around to the opposing view.

Casemiro. Love watching how he's everything McT isn't - always available for a pass, calm, efficient and smart in his distribution. I think he could be a very important catalyst for this team.

Rashford/Shaw/Martial. There were moments here that took me back to when we were good, in 2020. Martial with 3 goals in two appearances as a sub - who'd have thought that! And I think Rashford must now officially be considered to be back in form.

Antony. Looking more and more integrated. Good.

Ronaldo. You've got to feel for the guy, that was painful to watch. Especially as he actually didn't play badly. Outside of spurning a plethora of great chances, that is. Contributed a good deal especially in the first half.

Notable pattern: Precise long balls, again and again. Mostly well executed too. Will be interesting to see if that continues.

 

[RedOrange]

 

[Bastian]

What a pick-me-up

 

[GifLord]

@GifLord could you dig up Ten Hag wearing a skullcap at 57:10 of the match please?

 

[TheLittleOne]

@GifLord
Cant say it enough thank you so much for your effort you are a fecking legend. Its so super convenient to just come into the match day thread and see all of your video clips. Much appreciated!

 

[Boondog]

This team can't build the play for shit. On the build we are ineffective and when high we are basically waiting for a counterstrike when the mistake inevitably gets made.

Also if you're going to move the ball to Malacia on the edge and get him a 1v1 with the RB he has to be able to take it. Otherwise put someone else there. I love Malacia but he is all defense. And I have no problem with them trying to improve him on offense, because if/when that happens he'll be a world class starter, but for now you're wasting time if he's not willing to take it.

Same with Antony. He has been too dependent on the one move, that being the inside turn and shot to the far post. I know it's a comfort zone thing with him and yes he scored but teams are going to play that so he has to diversify on the attack. On the flip side he did at least look like he was a cut above these guys. His agility is impressive and I think he's going to be a great player for us but he needs to start playing more off of Dalot as well, who is willing and present up there. Don't be predictable.

There's a big difference in this team the moment you break up the Martinez/Varane duo. Remove either one of those two and this team is completely different defensively. That's a problem and almost as big a problem as our forwards when Martial isn't in there.

We have a long way to go. This team completely lacks the comfort level required to possess the ball for success and there's going to be a lot of subpar outings before they get even close to where they need to be without changing out key pieces.

 

[Abraxas]

I'm not sure we were as bad as some are saying. This has to be prefaced with saying Omonia are an awful side, and therefore the defending especially was a matter of concern.

But we had 28 shots and numerous guilt edge chances on top of the 3 we scored. So that's not too bad in terms of possession and creation.

There were some good and poor individual performances.

 

[Member 125288]

What separates teams? Gd or head to head?

1. Results between the two teams
2. Goal difference in the games between the two teams
3. Goals scored in the games between the two teams
4. Away goals scored in the games between the two teams.

In the highly unlikely event the teams are still tied after all that, they go back to 2 through 4 again but for all games in the group. So basically, assuming nobody drops any more points, if we beat them by 2 goals, we win the group, if we beat them 1-0 but put a load past Nicosia next week and Sociedad don’t versus sheriff, we win the group, if we beat Sociedad by 1 goal but they score, we win the group on away goals versus them.