Ole, is that you?
What a ridiculous thread
Well, yes & no. Seeing as we've picked up a fair few injuries in the last week alone suggests that the gruelling schedule is taking it's toll. The original premise of the thread (looking at PL minutes only) is a very narrow way of evaluating it.
I’m not sure those stats are all that helpful. It includes Irish League players and the like. I don’t think he’s had huge amount of choice at times but you obviously play less minutes if you’ve got injured. Now that could just be bad luck but there’s no doubt that we’ve relied heavily on Rashford and he’s definitely played games when not 100%.
Well Aarons and Bellingham aren’t PL players so there’s a few you can remove. Ten Hag has no influence over minutes played on International duty and ultimately it’s about the number of minutes that individual is capable of. If Rashford is playing through knocks, which I think he is, then it’s possible he’s played more minutes than he should. Like I said though. I don’t think Ten Hag has had much choice.
Found another thread on the subject where you're top. Impressive.
You seem to love dismissing the notion that fatigue and tiredness exists. Which is ironic because you have no problem putting losses on being tired and the other team having more rest. Whatever fits your narrative I guess.
But that's not what you were arguing. You were arguing that the PL minutes aren't anything out of the ordinary for our players. When you do a like for like comparison (i.e. all minutes played for PL players) you'll realise that the United crop have a lot more minutes at this stage of the season. Seeing as >90% of our games will be with PL players in the PL and domestic cups, it's undoubtedly a factor.
Fair dos - I think the level of competition in the PL means that the PL based players are at a disadvantage when considering minutes played (no easy games etc...).
I think the 'no easy games' thing is a myth, basically marketing fluff. City have a goal difference of +50 with 8 games to go because they had plenty of easy games where they pretty much destroyed the opposition. The top teams routinely get well over 90 points every year now. Of course for teams below the title challengers there are very few easy games - but that's true in pretty much every league. Real Sociedad, 4th in La Liga, had to fight bloody hard for almost every single win they got. You can hype up the competition in the Premier League but Serie A, for example, is no less competitive and generally probably more so, even if the overall level is lower.
I bet there's some obscure Twitter account with three hundred followers that specialises in exactly this.
Well City can cope with it better than anyone else considering their squad depth, and the fact that their isn't a huge downgrade in quality from 1st teamer to 2nd teamer.
Agreed. And when you factor in the consistent midweek games, there is very little recovery time. At some point, just stacking up minutes played becomes meaningless without considering a lengthy period over which players are constantly pushing with zero recovery time.
We're lucky in the sense that perennially injured Martial has come into full fitness at literally the same time that Rashford has sustained an injury, and the fact that Eriksen is back when Sabitzer, and McTominay are picking up injuries. It all feels a bit 'one in one out'.
My impression of ETH is that he never makes wholesale changes but will often rotate 3-4 even in cup competitions where we are ahead. I don't mind it, we see way too many disjointed performances under past managers whenever over half the team is changed. Players coming in have more of a structure to play from.
