Losing him would have been one thing. But they lost ALL their centerhalves, which affected their midfield as well as they had to move players back.
That was different and bigger than just having a few injuries.
Solskjaer's legacy and his future
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran are here to talk about a frustrating 2 points dropped at Crystal Palace. They then discuss the regeneration of Old Trafford. Finally, Nik is joined by special guest Michael Statham from the Football Oranje podcast - who gives us a more in depth look at our EL opposition FC Twente, and then runs through the (many) Dutch connections currently at United.
Losing him would have been one thing. But they lost ALL their centerhalves, which affected their midfield as well as they had to move players back.
That was different and bigger than just having a few injuries.
Whatever manager we get , we will not be winning the league for the next few years..
Pep and Klopp are the best managers in world football right now, so unless u get somebody as good as them, it would be impossible..
Two managers , Simeone and Conte would run these 2 close .
It's true sadly. Their central defensive woes last season were insane by any standards.
They didn't have a fit centre half for months.
They didn't lose all centerbacks. Williams, Philips and Kabak played. Matip played first half of season when Gomez and VanDijk were injuried. It was few times they put a midfielder back there.
It wasn't just VVD that was injured. It was all their CBs and at stages Robertson and TAA to boot. Us losing a player like Martial or Pogba means nothing when they aren't very effective when fit. If we had of lost Bruno for a season then things would be completely different. Without his 28 goals and 18 assists we would of struggled for top 4 and struggled to reach semis/finals. Sometimes it isn't the amount of injuries sustained but the quality of them. Any other player in our team except maybe De Gea was injured and it doesn't mean much. Lose the 2020/21 Bruno then things change. Drastically.
Still, the question is how many games did we win where we weren't the better side? Over 90 mins we were the better side in nearly every win.
If you really think we weren't the better side in that 4-1 vs Newcastle, then I'm not sure there is any thing to talk about. I think Newcastle were incredibly lucky to have kept it 1-1 till almost the 80th minute. I'm quite quite sure even the caf reviews of that game would be quite positive.
And like I said earlier, I've never said we dominated games like City and Pool do, but hardly any of our wins was undeserving barring a couple of them (and on the flip side, we were unlucky in a few other games)
This is where fact matters. Robertson played every Premier League game. Trent missed only 2 Premier League games. And I already said that it wasn't all of their centerbacks. Phillips, Williams, Kabak and Matip shared duties between them during season. 2020-2021 Liverpool if it is true.
We can agree that it is about quality of players who are injuried. But that is not same as saying they missed everyone.
OK. To simplify matters I'll ask a hypothetical question. What if Bruno was out for the season and VVD played for the season? Without mentioning all the other Injuries Pool suffered. What would of been the outcome? While hypothetical I think the answer is obvious unless of course you're a die hard Ole fan where I'm guessing the answer would be, it's impossible to know.
Maybe true but when one player is responsible for almost 50% of our goals and assists and the other is one of the worlds best center backs I think a conclusion can be drawn. My own is we would of struggled to get top 4. Liverpool missed VVD desperately. We would miss Bruno more.
Ofcourse we would be worse team without him. Fernandes is great player. No doubt about that. At same time, we would maybe be better off this year if we hadn't injuries and suspension all the time. Maybe.OK. To simplify matters I'll ask a hypothetical question. What if Bruno was out for the season and VVD played for the season? Without mentioning all the other Injuries Pool suffered. What would of been the outcome? While hypothetical I think the answer is obvious unless of course you're a die hard Ole fan where I'm guessing the answer would be, it's impossible to know.
Maybe true but when one player is responsible for almost 50% of our goals and assists and the other is one of the worlds best center backs I think a conclusion can be drawn. My own is we would of struggled to get top 4. Liverpool missed VVD desperately. We would miss Bruno more.
Even if we put aside Solskjaer quotes when he specifically said that he wanted them; do you want to say that Maguire and Awb were bought by Ed i love shiny new toys Woodward? You want to say that Woodward wanted to overpay for two players more or less unknown outside PL and who have zero marketing value?
Failed Cardiff manager wanted by name (feel free to google his quotes regarding those signings) Maguire, Donny, Awb, Bruno, Varane, Sancho, Cavani (he even gave him extension) and Ronaldo.
To Telles, James and Diallo he could have said no ffs. But still he said yes. No board in PL will not buy a player IF manager says no.
I think this season goes well beyond injuries tbh. Whatever happened just before the start of the season has left a big imprint on us up to the present time. The players have downed tools and from that there's no coming back unless ETH has the ability to win them over. If he can't then before looking at another manager it may finally sink in with our hierarchy that the players are to blame and the whole thing needs ripping up and started again.
I was actually one of those that thought a new manager would have this team rocking but that was without realising how gutless and weak minded our players really are. I've never felt so unemotionally detached from a group of players as this one which is why I couldn't care less if the whole squad was decimated. This cultural reboot has been one big massive failure and personally I think we'll need at least another 3 years before we're challenging for the big titles again which is my biggest, major gripe I have with Oles tenure since it was him that put the squad together and no amount of hearing about our successive top 4 finishes will diminish that. So round and round we go.
Ed was too trigger happy and no other club was chasing Ole. It was clear at the end of Ole's first season that he had no vision and no strategy. Losing at home to Huddersfield was the final proof. Still Ed gave him huge funds to buy players for positions that are still not resolved: RB, RW, CB, CM. Nice guy mediocre manager.
I would love to see those quotes where he specifically said " I don't want Mbappe, give me Sancho. Or whatever player you want.
Do you seriously think that a manager would say something like: "No, he was our fifth choice"? I explained to you how it usually works when it comes to football. You can either listen to me or not. Do I agree with clubs transfer policy and some players being bought in? No. But that is how it works.
Your agenda is clearly shown when you put failed Cardiff manager in the beginning of a sentence. Why not praised Molde manager?
For me it was clear that this is not about managers and I didn't have any reason to believe that we would be better with new manager. You hoped for miracle that a new voice would somehow turn it around but it just made it more obvious where problems are.
When he was at United the journalist wanted to keep him there… now it’s a criminal offence to link him to the Burnley job?
The lies keep running and running in this thread
Praise Molde manager? For what? Two titles in 6 years in European tier 4 league. Wow, that is something.
No man, things in football doesn't work like that. It is like saying; "We failed with buying tier A players, lets start buying players from Division 1".
Manager is at least 50% of success. So club must always try to hire best possible manager (in our case tier A manager). If he fails, you go for another and another and another.
Did they owners put a huge bet for them going down ?
Looks like he is very offended
. Anyhow I will eat my shoe if any PL teams in the next 3 years hired him. No sane board will touch him with a barge pole.I would assume that you don't know where Molde was prior Solskjaer and how he turned around the club. Not only as a team but as club. But that is okey. I don't expect people to know everything. What I expect is not to undermine what he did just because you are not familiar with the situation.
No, it dosen't work like that. You try to hire the one the is most right for a club. We have been trough best possible in vanGaal and Mourinho and neither couldn't get our team going the way we want. This is not to blame those managers.
On his second stint (3 seasons) he failed to win the league and the season after he left they immediately won the league under the new manager
This is such an dishonest way of discussion. You and me are both from scandinavia and what we know that people outside scandinavia dont know is that when Ole came back to Norway and joined this project, because that what it was, a superhyped, multimillion project with Oles face to it, there'd only be one way this would end, gold to Molde.
The hype around this project brought Molde better players than should play in norway, everyone was in on the hype.
Ole is by far the biggest ever star in a small country like Norway and this project was MASSIVE.
Both you and me know that everyone would have been more surprised if he DIDNT win the league then if he'd win. Everything fell it to his lap. Molde is also the richest club in Norway.
Norwegians like to hype up that achievement but it really wasnt anything special. Ill say it again, with all the resources and hype around this project, it wasnt that impressive. And that is the truth.
I get you bro, you are norwegian, he is norwegian and he is your biggest idol, but keep to the truth.
Huh? Orny is just asking not to spread fake news in his name and he is right there
It is still Norway league ffs. Not to mention that in his second reign he won nothing.
Ok, give me straight answer; for you, is it normal/logical that club big as United hires a manager whos CV is winning two titles in Norway 8 years before and complete debacle in Cardiff (just to remind you, he didn't just relegated Cardiff. His start of next season in championship was disaster too.)
If, by some miracle, he becomes Burnley manager, there is no bloody way that he would manage to win a single game. Draw yes, but win (for which you must score a goal) no fecking way.Did they owners put a huge bet for them going down ?
Looks like he is very offended
While the question wasn’t posed at. I don’t object to the CV, plenty of manager’s have gone to top clubs with relatively unimpressive CV’s and done well.
The screw up with Solskjaer was that it became very obvious that he wasn’t the elite level coach of a Pep or even half decent or one with potential like Arteta or Viera. Not only that but they had his stint at Cardiff as a warning.. ok maybe he learnt his from that experience , Klopp got relegated, I think Enrique got sacked in Italy etc. But again very quickly it became very obvious that he hadn’t learnt anything and was the same manager that he was at Cardiff.
The main question no one knows the answer: who were the alternatives to all the above mentioned names? Was Ole presented better alternatives? If not… which choice did he have? We were desperate for a new CB, RB and LB, and I think Ole trusted the United system regarding those transfers.
The only transfers I remember Ole engaged heavily in was Bruno and Sancho. Those transfers were very important for him personally.
I think that giving Maguire captain armband after 3 months in club, tells everything how much he wanted exactly him.
https://www.manutd.com/en/news/deta...ry-maguire-was-his-number-one-transfer-target
Awb
https://www.manutd.com/en/news/detail/aaron-wan-bissaka-signs-for-manchester-united
Donny:
https://www.manutd.com/en/news/deta...he-expects-from-new-signing-donny-van-de-beek
Cavani:
https://www.si.com/soccer/mancheste...skjaer-conversation-encouraged-to-join-united
https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/solskjaer-cavani-man-utd-contract-24079641
No words needed.
Edit: quote from Donny's first interview:
“Last week I spoke to Solskjaer. It was about private things, but also about football. He said he’s been following me for a very long while. He said he knew exactly what my biggest strengths are and told me that he wants me to be in and around the 16 [yard] box at Man United too.”
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I have to laugh seeing the same people who argued Ole assembled a great squad saying now these players weren't wanted by him.
If we look what he did as interim manager I can’t say that managment did wrong thing to hire him. Were there managers with better CV? Yes. On other hand, just because you got great CV doesn’t mean it will go well. We can just look at managers before Solskjaer. That is why I say that having right manager is more important.
You can try to undermine Solskjaer with Cardiff but we know the facts when he took them and in what state they were. But sure, keep blaming Solskjaer for that.
While you have exact quote which says: "He was my no1 target"
Serious? I’ve already said to you that no manager would say we couldn’t get (player) so we bought this. Ofcourse they will say that every player is wanted and that we watched him since he was young kid. It works like that.
And again…. Who was a better alternative at that time? DDG was probably the only alternative. I think it was reasonable not to go for a GK, and especially Mr Silent DDG.
What irritates me the most is we didn’t buy 1-2 defensive/central midfielders, and second that we wasted money on DVB.
AWB, Telles, Maguire, Cavani, Bruno have all been descent signings until the whole team collapsed this season.
Was posted in the Rangnick thread, but also relevant to the conversation going on here?
Should Ole have been sacked when we was? Yes, maybe even a little bit sooner.
Did he deserve to start this season even though we lost the EL final on pens, yes imho.
It'll be interesting to see after the summer how many of his signings remain, and how many of the past ones move on. And then see how we kick it on under the new manager (from the summer).
That said, I was a fan of Rangnick as a caretaker when it was clear Ole had to go. But at this point I wonder if we wouldn't have been better off letting him stay the season and then hand it over.
Should Ole have been sacked when we was? Yes, maybe even a little bit sooner.
Did he deserve to start this season even though we lost the EL final on pens, yes imho.
It'll be interesting to see after the summer how many of his signings remain, and how many of the past ones move on. And then see how we kick it on under the new manager (from the summer).
That said, I was a fan of Rangnick as a caretaker when it was clear Ole had to go. But at this point I wonder if we wouldn't have been better off letting him stay the season and then hand it over.
At least they won some trophies apart from Moyes who was sacked in his first year. Ole won git all. Was an also ran in everything.
He was 17th in the championship with relegation form when he was sacked and they finished the season on 11th place under Russell Slade (currently working as consultant for League 2 club Stevenage). The next season under Slade they finish 8th. Under Ole they would be fighting for promotion in League One. Explain that
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I used to put him as the main reason why the team failed. But now I realized he was also in a situation where he was surounded by dickhead crybaby players and Ole himself was always supportive of them. If he was not being nice I reckon the same players that moaned about Ralf/ETH would have done the same thing to Ole. Snakes the lof of them. Snakes with no trophy. Should have been sacked regardless as he was given plenty of time to sort it out.
Undermine him with Cardiff? The cult of OgS has to be the strangest thing in footballing history. Now he’s not to blame for relegating Cardiff then leading them to mighty 17th in the Championship before getting sacked.