Of course that 2nd place was flattering (like the one with José), but we showed we can still finish near the top regardless. We could've easily fluttered away with everyone else that year like this year but didn't, and that counts for something.
Ten Hag; “the real reason I’m here? high potential”
- Thread starter TheReligion
- Start date
Oh hi. are you here to tell us how well Arteta is doing again and how much better Arsenal are than United? Funny how that theory vanished quicker than their top 4 hopes..
Einstein indeed
Like I said, even if they miss out on top 4, their improvement is obvious. Whilst clearing out bigger names and overpaid players plus introducing youngsters. Bury your head in the sand all you like. Nobody had them for top 4 this season and they came close. Had some good wins against bigger teams too.
I can't take you seriously when you're the guy who tries to tell everyone that everything is fine at United and won't accept any criticism, no matter how obvious to everybody else. You're basically that meme of the dog in the burning building when it comes to takes on football.
I’ve been thinking that for the last 10 years but I’m less and less convinced. The oil clubs have completely rewritten what is and isn’t a “big club”. City have won the league four times out of the last five seasons. Liverpool are the only club coming anywhere near to them because they have a manager who is streets ahead of all the rest and almost uniquely brilliant at his job. According to the Swiss Ramble bloke Newcastle could easily spunk £600m on new signings without falling foul of any rules, so they’re the next big fish in the PL pond. It’s hard to have much hope that historical status or fanbase matters all that much when you’re competing against the richest nation states on the planet.
If Liverpool can get it right after being absolutely terrible for 30 years then there’s no reason why United can’t.
So he did have time for a schmoke and a pancake?
I think it's more the financial part of it that matters of course. United have enough spending power to break into the top pretty quickly, while Arsenal and Spurs are forever limited with what they can achieve IMO. For the truly giant clubs though, Barca, Madrid, United... I really don't think it takes much to bounce out of a rut. You get the right manager in, and the spending power will eventually make its mark. Just because PSG/Newcastle/City can spend so much doesn't mean that United also can't spend a stupid amount. For everything about City's spending over the past 10 years, the biggest difference with United has been we've just spent it poorly.
I wouldn't take City winning 4 out of 5 as a reflection of their spending dominance. Their spending power put them in a position to be one of the best, but it's Pep that has made them what they are. They were good with Mancini, a top manager, mediocre despite the squad with Pellegrini. Like you said, Liverpool with Klopp have closed that gap and broken in their because of how good he is, but they had to overcome a lot more than United do as their size when Klopp took over was not what United is. That just shows that you can only really become one of the elite teams if you have an elite manager. PSG have tried for ages and have truly spent like mad and signed Neymar, Mbappe and Messi for insane sums ... Yet have still failed to do anything remotely interesting in Europe. The closest they came was when they had Tuchel.
You seem to think you've stumbled on the Eldorado of football analysis while it's just EtH stating the blindingly obvious which we all know and believe.
This club is a sleeping behemoth waiting for a Klopp-like figure to propel us to success or at the very least challenging season in, season out which is our rightful place given our resources and fanbase.
This club is a sleeping behemoth waiting for a Klopp-like figure to propel us to success or at the very least challenging season in, season out which is our rightful place given our resources and fanbase.
As great a manager as Klopp is, I don't think Liverpool would be where they are without the backroom team they have. While we would struggle to name one unqualified transfer success in almost a decade (Bruno our closest thing), their analytics guys have struck gold time after time. Virtually every signing has been a slam dunk apart from where injuries are concerned. Worse still, they have Fergie's old knack of selling on their deadwood for big fees (Ings, Brewster, Sakho, Ibe, Benteke, Solanke even Lovren). This is also in stark contrast to us and has limited our transfer ambitions.
He misspoke "fat paycheck"
He's right about the potential, we're still one of the biggest clubs so as long as we back him with the right signings he's confident with his management we can turn things round
This is spot on imo, and obviously there's the owner John Henry who performed a pretty similar trick with the Boston Red Sox.
It really is sad when you realise we've spent well over half a billion during the last decade, and Bruno is probably literally our only transfer that can be considered 'excellent' taking performances, quality and price tag into account. Maybe Shaw was pretty decent too, only in hindsight though, with transfer fees inlating so much. Though at the time we made an unproven teenager one of the most expensive defenders in the whole history of the game. And Liverpool paid about as much for Mané or Salah as we did for him, a teenage left back.
Liverpool had an almost bizarre (and hopefully unsustainable) success rate when it came to transfers during Klopp's rebuild, compared to a lot of other clubs in the world. And Klopp himself even admitted he wasn't fully convinced someone like Salah was fully ready for them yet, but their scouting department was 100% sure he was and convinced him.
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