The only constant about United's tactics/formation under SAF is that it consistently changed.
Ruben Amorim - Manchester United Head Coach
- Thread starter sewey89
- Start date
The only constant about United's tactics/formation under SAF is that it consistently changed.
I think the CB options look fine with both Yoro and de Ligt. Yoro will hopefully develop and and get better because the potential is there. And de Ligt isn't a easy player to out-duel in space because for one he isn't slow and he knows how to use his strength to out muscle a quick opponent. I think one more CB should be bought and maybe that CB should be left footed. A player who is strong in defensive duels, especially across the ground and has the ability to carry a threat in possession by way of passing vertically and carrying the ball forward.
The big issue imo is the midfield and having a strong base in midfield with the pace, power and technical ability is the key to having a fluid system of play. It doesn't matter what formation it is, the main thing is to have high caliber players in the team to play a more expansive brand of football. And with the way many teams are playing a expansive game in the present day, it's absolutely imperative to have CBs and deeper midfielders who have the ability to win duels in a higher line when the high press gets bypassed and also have the ability in-possession to get the ball forward at a good level whilst retaining a good level of ball retention. If you as a team cannot do the aforementioned tasks within the areas mentioned above, then the system of play will not function and it will severely limit the teams capabilities. And that's the problem with our team and it needs addressing quickly, and if that happens I can see a quick turnaround where a system of play would be visible for all to see and we'd then be on the road to creating a well oiled machine that would have the potential to send us on a upward trajectory.
Right now the team is over reliant on the backline to progress the ball with Bruno also being utilised deeper in midfield to progress the ball forward. The issue here is that the backline end up going direct due to inefficient support in midfield and Bruno dropping deeper doesn't solve the problem either because as good as he is with passing the ball long he doesn't have the ability to evade the press, or have the physicality to halt transitions in larger spaces against the counter.
Right on. We are worse and less entertaining.
Last season’s chaos showed we could go either way: do well (top four) or piss poor.
Everything about SAF is disrespected these days, it's infuriating.
Don't forget the notion that he was only good because he was given time, thus any manager will be just as good if given enough time.
Don't get me started on that!
0.5 Cleansing - the removal of shite players and bad attitudes
The irony of Shitcliffe saying that then hiring Amorim
I’m saying there playing at championship level mate. Every single team in the championship have actually scored more goals than us.
Completely agree with all of that. I was really hoping Mainoo and Ugarte would give us what we need. Mainoo looked like he could do everything we needed last season but this year he has been so cautious on the ball. A Dembele type midfielder is what we need beside Ugarte. Please Kobbie, be that player!
I think the CB your describing plays for sporting. Inacio is the one we should be going for if we target a left footed ball playing CB.
I completely agree that inexplicable errors, such as the Onana parry straight to Maddison and the Garnacho miss from point blank, have plagued us all season. At the highest level of football that mistakes of this nature boggle the mind, but they have been happening all season. Our keeping is suboptimal and our finishing has been appalling.
But we're also not creating as many chances as we should be, and our set piece defending has not been yet given an adjective to describe how bad it's been, and we struggle with some other aspects of play. But individual mistakes, defensively and offensively, have butchered us all season. I can't blame tactics for schoolboy mistakes, but it may be that the tactics are so mentally demanding of the players that perhaps they lose confidence in themselves for not executing tactically that their collapse in confidence results in ridiculous misses on goal, missed assignments on set pieces and horrendous keeper performance.
Just a theory.
I guess we will have to cause every manager is different etc..
It's fair to say they are winging it and I know they are getting criticism lately but I think they are just trying to figure it out.
We will get there, eventually. Sounding like Liverpool fans from 8 years ago
If you start from the unshakeable premise that Amorim is a genius manager and 3-4-3 is a superior formation to others, this is the sort of thing you have to bend your facts around. That and that every team we face/struggle against has better players than us.
To be fair to Amorim, the above could be true, as could the possibility that he's actually not very good. It's very hard to tell but not I'm not seeing any evidence to support the former.
I think that's something now many of us are actually considering. The problem is, under the circumstances - all these problems have more to do with the level of quality the players have and too many signings from too many different managers and styles.
I don't blame Ruben for sticking to his guns - he was given an ultimatum to come straight away and why hire a manager who is going to bend over. There would be no need for a manger if they do bend over and go against their principles.
Its the most ridiculous revision of his legacy that annoys me. He constantly changed shape to suit the situation at hand. If anything, his ability to adapt to just about any situation was one of the hallmarks of his greatness. We were just as effective playing 4-3-3, 4-5-1 and 4-4-2 whenever we needed to. And his two greatest teams played two different base formations.
Yep. He actually tried 5-3-2 earlier that season in preperation for Europe. I think we played that way in a 1:1 draw at Derby Country that season, and he figured out we need more time to work on it so he went to that Juve game with the formation you mentioned (and we barely got a kick
).He is left footed and ticks the boxes as far as what he can provide in possession but I think in the current EPL we need more. A CB with pace and power along with the ability to thread the lines should be targeted imo. And eventhough Ousmane Diomande is right footed, I'd personally target him ahead of Inacio from SCP for the reasons mentioned. Someone like Castello Lukeba would also be a interesting option to play on the left hand side of the backline.
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Wasn’t that partly because of the squad restrictions in the 90’s though? Having to limit our ‘foreign’ players etc?
He’s not got the stamina for that, plus people have figured out that he doesn’t have pace either.
He’s good enough technically to adapt so we’ll just have to wait and see but being part of a two and struggling isn’t helping.
There is a tactical issue with our CMs though. The gap between Bruno and Casemiro vs Spurs, and Bruno coming out to the right. That and now there's no room to collect the ball off the CBs as a #6 or #8. The CMs are basically just runners only.
Where is the irony? Perhaps they wanted the style of football Amorim plays?
I think the reason for that has been explained by the pundits and others a lot. He didn’t want a repeat of Zirkzee vs Newcastle and asked Bruno to cover for him, but it just created more problems. He did seem to sort it out to some extent during the game, but the crux of that whole issue was having to play Zirkzee in that role due to injuries. Otherwise I don’t think he’s going to be doing that again.
So because we’re wedded to this system, Kobbie is forever gonna be a square peg in a round hole.
Don’t expect an upturn in form from him any time soon.
And can't players play 10 yards further forward or 10 yards further to the right or whatever ?
Why is this system so difficult ? I don't buy that - nor do I buy that the system is some sort of magic that when played correctly makes a team invincible.
There are quite a few things that don't pass the reasonableness test.
My theory is when they say “style of football” they were not talking about systems or tactical formations. It was more things like possession based, built from the back, attack via the flanks for example. So Amorim may play whatever tactics he wants but ultimately the base style should be something the club agrees on. I think this is what Amorim also has alluded to multiple times in interviews where he tells journalists not to focus so much on the formation but rather how the team plays (build up, attacking, pressing etc)
People are conflating formation and tactics/style too much here.
Pep and Mourinho both like 4-3-3. Their football couldnt be more different.
Pep and Mourinho both like 4-3-3. Their football couldnt be more different.
Spot on. This is something I don't understand either.
An elite coach surely must have a plan B and at least be able to get some results with what he has.
Amorim may well become that elite coach. But for me, until his results are an improvement on Ten Hag, there has to be questions.
Said it few times already, even if his formation begin to work.. once managers cracks it, what then?
Well your post didn't read like that but fair enough mate. They are woeful at the minute, as is the majority of the team.
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Yep. He actually tried 5-3-2 earlier that season in preperation for Europe. I think we played that way in a 1:1 draw at Derby Country that season, and he figured out we need more time to work on it so he went to that Juve game with the formation you mentioned (and we barely got a kick
Yeah I remember it didn't work out well. 96-97 seen a lot of experimentation with formations, I can remember 352 vs Sunderland with Phil Neville man marking Michael Gray. And 433 away to Arsenal off the top of my head.
No that was abolished in 1996. He experimentated with a lot of different formations during the 96-97 season.
Ferguson was very tactically flexible, more than most people give him credit for.
''is playing'' and ''has played'' currently, perhaps. But there is a big difference between that and saying a player is Championship level.
Which Championship striker would come into this team United tomorrow and start banging goals in?
Makes sense but I still think tactically there's something off in general. Someone somewhere on the opposition has too much time on the ball. Against Southampton they could switch the ball and the full backs had acres of space. Against Leicester their deep CM had 10 yards of space. Basically we have an extra man in the backline as we play a genuine back 5 off the ball and haven't figured out how to close the gap/extra man further forward in the opponent build up.
Given that he adapts the 'one formation' in the same way that managers do with their tactics, I'm not sure why people make such a fuss.
Yes 3 centre backs isn't the norm in England (outside of a centreback playing fullback), but you can clearly see that the tactics are somewhat flexible in shape and similar to other modern teams in the league.
Defending we see both 5-4-1 and 4-4-2, just like other teams.
Attacking it's normally 3-2-5 but sometimes 2-3-5 with a centreback pushed into midfield, just like other teams.
The difference is the starting positions and the profiles, the coaches need to drill the press and structure into them so we don't get these big gaps with opponents in them, while we have defenders marking space. It's going to take time to get and build confidence to do smoothly.
Yeah it all stems from that rigid back line instead of pushing the wing backs forward or having a CB step into midfield. It’s causing us to be outnumbered in other areas. I don’t think we commit enough men to the press either. It’s quite annoying because we were doing, or trying to do, these things when he first came in. I remember games where Mount played (can’t remember the opposition) but press was really effective, we played aggressive etc. Now he really has ended up with a flat back 5 and they’re often picking up 3 men.
To me the solutions are obvious and Amorim knows what’s changed. So the question is, why? Did he feel too exposed with these players playing that way? If so, we’re not much better with the 5 so let’s go out on our sword and be more aggressive.
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Sure Glenn Hoddle already summed up in 5 mins how you play against us in the system we are playing last weekend in punditry fir Spurs game. He hasn't managed in years.
Basically all other teams need to do is play their 2 wingers high and wide and that pushes us in to a back 5, that leaves our 2 CM isolated and we get out numbered and gaps to play around us. To easy to do it.
Kobbie will always be a square peg in a round hole in Premiere League unless he improves his stamina and strength. He is always gassed at the 60-70 min. That has nothing to do with any system at all.
Its not that simple... they can play their wingers high and wide meaning our CB's can jump and push, win the ball back and attack. Its not really that simple to break down.