[The-Mezzala]

Build the team around Amad

 

[siw2007]

Distinctly average performance if that at best. However, 3 points that gives us a bit more control of our European campaign. Only player to play well was Amad. Stunning second goal, he fought hard to get the chance and then a superb finish.

 

[Red in STL]

Onana was so so good tonight. Insane distribution. Deserves his flowers

His distribution was good, but he slows it down too much, he plays it too safe too often, he needs to gamble with quick passes/throws some of the time to keep the opposition off balance

 

[Todd]

Far too impotent in front of goal as usual but 3 points is 3 points.

Really no excuse not to take maximum points from our remaining fixtures as well, so we really should be putting ourselves into a decent position for the knockout round, even as bad as we've been.

 

[Tincanalley]

Garnacho was so wasteful

He didn’t have a good game

 

[Zed 101]

Wow I do not think I have ever seen the man of the match vote so 1 sided, understandably so

Even though the performance was not brilliant, there were some very good spells and we look so much better than we did under ETH, still a million miles from where we want to be, we are playing like an boxer trying to recover from a knockdown, just feeling our way back in, trying to avoid another knockdown but our punches are lacking any real power

 

[UnofficialDevil]

Very happy with our win, but Im glad Ruud is only interim now and not until the end of the season.
The football was pretty bad, reminded me of 90's football but in a bad way.
I'm also sick of these long diagonal balls to Garnacho. Has to stop.

 

[Mockney]

I feel we could swap out all our players for a pack of wild dogs in United shirts whenever we get the near their box and we’d have roughly a similar rate of finding each other or creating a clear opportunity. It’s genuinely quite impressive we haven’t scored more just by sheer luck.

 

[stu_1992]

A win in Europe! Those are hard to come by these days! Horrendous first half, but thankfully we stepped up the intensity a lot in the second half and got the rewards for that.

Amad a clear man of the match. Even first half he was probably the brightest player.

 

[Red Royal]

A lot of negativity on here today, but at least I am looking forward to games again. Can't wait for Sunday's game. We aren't going to turn in to the United of the 90/00's any time soon but it will improve.

 

[Overhaul FC]

Amad is our best winger and should start majority of games.

We need to replace Rashford with another starting calibre left winger, and then Diallo, the new winger and Garnacho should play as the first 3 choices. That should be good enough for the next couple of years.

Give Amorim a starting level LWB, CM, LW and ST in the summer. Dorgu and Gyokeres would be my LWB and ST choices. The recruitment team should be out there to get replacements for Casemiro and Eriksen in the squad too which completes the midfield too.

LW Gyokeres Diallo
Garnacho Hojlund Antony

Dorgu Ugarte Mainoo Mazraoui
Shaw CDM CM Dalot

Martinez De Ligt Yoro
Branthwaite Maguire Evans

Onana
Altay

Surely it's not too much to ask for, to give the new manager 6 summer signings to complete the starting 11 and have a good squad.

 

[Squeaky_Bum_Time]

Up to 15th

Huge. And that’s out of 36 teams. Almost like being 8th in the league

Spoiler: Math

20 * (15/36) ≈ 8

 

[Rodgerzzz]

Amad ran the show tonight, really pleased for him. Especially that second goal, he showed a desire we've been sorely lacking for too long. The rest of the front three not so good, although Bruno had his moments and it appeared Garnacho has been told to actually try and pass the ball in the final third occasionally.

I thought Onana's passing was good and his anticipation bailed us out of a great chance for PAOK. Mazraoui was really impressive again, he's been a great signing so far.

Lindelof stood out but I couldn't tell if that was because he was getting himself into trouble and then having to something impressive looking to dig himself out of it.

A solid enough win, happy for Ruud that he's doing a good job of guiding this team through this period but really looking forward to Amorim's arrival.

 

[wolvored]

Apart from Amad being picked I thought it was TH in the dugout. Typical bad TH type of match. Thank god they didnt make Ruud interim until end of season.
Amad was a delight. He should play every match on this form

 

[Foolsgold21]

Forgettable game but was all just about getting the win - would’ve happily taken that 2-0 beforehand.

Ruud steadying the ship with some results, which is all that’s needed currently

 

[Strangest Tribe]

Casemiro with legs beside him is the way it always should have been, ETH made him look like a wheezy 40 a day man with his bizarre tactics , the guy just fvcking oozes class..

 

[wolvored]

His distribution was good, but he slows it down too much, he plays it too safe too often, he needs to gamble with quick passes/throws some of the time to keep the opposition off balance

Agree. The amount of times in all the matches he allows the opposition to get back, is ridiculous. They should get him to watch Schmeichels games at Utd, for quick distribution.

 

[Pjisared]

Amad is our best winger and should start majority of games.

We need to replace Rashford with another starting calibre left winger, and then Diallo, the new winger and Garnacho should play as the first 3 choices. That should be good enough for the next couple of years.

Give Amorim a starting level LWB, CM, LW and ST in the summer. Dorgu and Gyokeres would be my LWB and ST choices. The recruitment team should be out there to get replacements for Casemiro and Eriksen in the squad too which completes the midfield too.

LW Gyokeres Diallo
Garnacho Hojlund Antony

Dorgu Ugarte Mainoo Mazraoui
Shaw CDM CM Dalot

Martinez De Ligt Yoro
Branthwaite Maguire Evans

Onana
Altay

Surely it's not too much to ask for, to give the new manager 6 summer signings to complete the starting 11 and have a good squad.

That’s about 300 million. With FFP dream on

 

[Theo88]

does garnacho need a small pit stop? he is talented but he is really wasteful it feels. Am i just over-reacting to his performances ?

Holjund needs to get going or i have a feeling we will see a Forward coming in very soon.
ZZ has good passing in him but that's pretty much it for now.

 

[Crostien]

I was sat directly across from their fans. When I got to my seat, there was about twenty PAOK fans (later peacefully moved) having the time of their lives.

Thought we were terrible. Bruno needs a break, Garna and Dalot are off, Ugarte's leaden and I hope to never see 4231/433 ever again.

Really impressed with Amad. Really, really impressed.

 

[always_hoping]

Just two pages on this thread after a comfortable 2-0 win. Can't help thinking would be double the amount of pages had PAOk avoided defeat.

 

[SalfordRed18]

I still cannot understand why Amad got benched by ETH. I assume Rashford, Bruno and others looks fantastic during training but Amad sucks. Good ridden to ETH else Amad would be on the bench again.

He wasn't. He was quite clearly under rotation this season under ten hag and if anything, has played less minutes under van nistelrooy.

 

[SalfordRed18]

Amad is our best winger and should start majority of games.

We need to replace Rashford with another starting calibre left winger, and then Diallo, the new winger and Garnacho should play as the first 3 choices. That should be good enough for the next couple of years.

Give Amorim a starting level LWB, CM, LW and ST in the summer. Dorgu and Gyokeres would be my LWB and ST choices. The recruitment team should be out there to get replacements for Casemiro and Eriksen in the squad too which completes the midfield too.

LW Gyokeres Diallo
Garnacho Hojlund Antony

Dorgu Ugarte Mainoo Mazraoui
Shaw CDM CM Dalot

Martinez De Ligt Yoro
Branthwaite Maguire Evans

Onana
Altay

Surely it's not too much to ask for, to give the new manager 6 summer signings to complete the starting 11 and have a good squad.

Name checks out.

 

[Fitchett]

Amad was absolutely superb, easily the best player on the pitch. It was criminal that Ten Hag barely gave him a chance, instead picking Antony and Rashford ahead of him.

The rest of the players were meh, but let's celebrate our first win in Europe for a year!

 

[Nogbadthebad]

While I still think swapping managers was the right move, I note that once again, we sat back after scoring.

Thats under 3 different managers these players have done this, and I refuse to beleive all of them have instructed them to do it.

There are big issues with this dressing room, and a lot of it wasn't the manager.

Also, not playing amad in favour of antony should have been enough to get the manager sacked on its own.

 

[Djemba-Djemba]

Just two pages on this thread after a comfortable 2-0 win. Can't help thinking would be double the amount of pages had PAOk avoided defeat.

I get your point but there's not really much to say.

I don't think it was a particularly good performance, it was the usual sloppy dull stuff we usually see. Amad was very good , took both his goals well and should have won a penalty too, he dragged us to the win.

It's nice to get a win though, they've been rare the last year or so.

 

[Nobby style]

Amad had goid game, the rest not so much. This team will struggle to finish top 8 in Europa, even if Amorim is some kind of miracle maker.

Too many bang average players, that also lack desire and heart and with PSR funds low, I am not expecting these players to be anything other than midtable plodders.

Well he did turn Ugarte into a player that’s PSG paid handsomely for so there is that

 

[tenpoless]

PAO KFC is not a good test

 

[Oranges038]

Really really poor game truth be told. They were poor, but Utd were fairly poor all over the pitch, too slow at moving the ball and then going 100mph when it could be slowed down or a better option taken. Some decent moments but overall it was littered with sloppy passing, bad touches and poor decision making in the final third.

Amad was the main bright spot, Casemiro, Ugarte and Mazraoui were decent enough. But you can't really judge players properly on these games when the opposition is so bad.

PAO KFC is not a good test

Is that Chinese KFC?

 

[Strachan8]

Fair play to Ruud for using the back up CBs tonight to manage game time. Could have played Casimero and Fletcher (Darren) as CBs and PAOK would still not have scored tonight.

 

[Banana Republic]

Must have been emotional for Shola.
A reminder of all that unfulfilled youthful hope, coming up through the youth ranks and appearing as our youngest ever player in a European match.

 

[Robertd0803]

Get in there.

Great showing by Amad, other than that on to the next game.

 

[AndyMUFC]

Job done, all thanks to Amad. Massive work to be done though and Amorim can't come soon enough.

 

[Blood Mage]

No new manager bounce to be seen, starting to think this is just the level of the players.

 

[AmarilloMike]

No new manager bounce to be seen, starting to think this is just the level of the players.

It's slim pickings, sure, but two wins and a draw against a Chelsea team that's flying probably counts as a new manager bounce a little bit... Given our previous results anyway. Particularly in Europe. Win again on Sunday and we'll be happy with Ruud's little spell and looking forward to a proper new manager bounce after the international break.

It's the hope that kills you! But it's the hope that keeps me going!

 

[Gonçalo Motta]

A win is a win but this performance wouldn't be enough against any decent side.
We need to do better

 

[Cantonagotmehere]

So happy that Ruud has had a good run.

No clue why people bring ETH up in a thread like this. Let it go.

 

[Tincanalley]

Just two pages on this thread after a comfortable 2-0 win. Can't help thinking would be double the amount of pages had PAOk avoided defeat.

For certain

 

[Tincanalley]

PAO KFC is not a good test

I saw what you did

 

[ManchesterMats]

Yesterday was one of the better performances I’ve seen United achieve in the last year. Solid at the back. Dominant in the midfield. Ugarte impressed on me. Evans is a true leader. Onana is starting to look like the keeper se payed for. Bruno needs to step up his game.