The media-pedalled notion that we should drop Ronaldo

I think OP is speaking from sentiment, which we are all guilty for sometimes. Nobody was wanting Ronaldo back before we went in for him. I agree with the assessment that he can still deliver goals. Even if he’s 50 years old he could still bag goals given the opportunity but the problem is he doesn’t offer anything else on the pitch.

It’s not just about pressing, he physically can’t run past people anymore and his reactions are not always there. Of course we have to drop him sometimes, he cannot recover between every game, never mind intense games. We just don’t have a good enough team to carry him as our talisman so in that respect we don’t deserve him. It’s not Ronnie fault for this situation of course.

I can’t believe we are trying to build a team around a 37 year old. It’s all way too late for that, personally I wanted him to come back when he was younger with something still to offer us, not like this. I won’t stop cheering him though.
 
A lot of posters since last night pointing the performance out as evidence that there was no difference to when Ronaldo plays with one even saying we have a “fear factor” when he plays? Are you serious- when Watford, Norwich,Newcastle and Wolves play you off the park and are not afraid to play out from the back you think we have a fear factor?

last night we looked more dangerous than when Ronaldo plays, the XG was pretty good considering it’s a front line that hasnt played together before this season or in that formation, in the first half we won the ball back up high on a number of occasions, I thought we did ok going forward.

midfield is a shambles but nothing in last nights attacking performance suggested we missed Ronaldo and you would expect that forward line to get better the more they play. Making arguements that a one off performance is evidence that we need Ronaldo is silly. Give Sancho, Cavani and Greenwood a decent run of games...if it doesn’t work, the we can assess it. We have tried different formations with Ronny...none have worked to be fair. If you want to fairly assess the team without him it takes more than one game.
 
Ronaldo will go in the summer. Job done by United, we prevented City getting one of our legends.

I'd hope the next striker bought would be better thought out.
 
Whatever problems Ronaldo's transfer might have caused or not at all, the Villa game clearly showed that all of the problems do not land at his feet. There are so many issues that Ralf must address.
 
It was another win without Ronaldo in the team. Didn’t play well, struggle with him, don’t look amazing without him. That’s not great when you spend £400k wages on one of the best strikers in the world. He should be making the team better when he plays given his reputation.
 
KeanoMagicHat said:
It was another win without Ronaldo in the team. Didn’t play well, struggle with him, don’t look amazing without him. That’s not great when you spend £400k wages on one of the best strikers in the world. He should be making the team better when he plays given his reputation.
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Hes not worth £400 oer week never mind £485,000 it's scandolous! He doesn't need the money so why pay it him?
 
pedgon said:
Hes not worth £400 oer week never mind £485,000 it's scandolous! He doesn't need the money so why pay it him?
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Cause thats the contract. He's definitely worth more than 400 pounds pr week. He's just not the best in the world anymore.
 
captaincantona said:
A lot of posters since last night pointing the performance out as evidence that there was no difference to when Ronaldo plays with one even saying we have a “fear factor” when he plays? Are you serious- when Watford, Norwich,Newcastle and Wolves play you off the park and are not afraid to play out from the back you think we have a fear factor?

last night we looked more dangerous than when Ronaldo plays, the XG was pretty good considering it’s a front line that hasnt played together before this season or in that formation, in the first half we won the ball back up high on a number of occasions, I thought we did ok going forward.

midfield is a shambles but nothing in last nights attacking performance suggested we missed Ronaldo and you would expect that forward line to get better the more they play. Making arguements that a one off performance is evidence that we need Ronaldo is silly. Give Sancho, Cavani and Greenwood a decent run of games...if it doesn’t work, the we can assess it. We have tried different formations with Ronny...none have worked to be fair. If you want to fairly assess the team without him it takes more than one game.
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Imo we don't even need more game to see the difference.

For me it's really clear because tbh I don't recall us having more than one good chance a match against Norwich, Newcastle, Watford, Wolves. They played us off the park and if was not for DDG we could easily lose all those matches. But last match we should have scored three goals in the first half alone. DDG had one good save against McGin's longshot I think.

But tbh I'm far from happy with the pressing. The intensity was good, the pressing was ok but sometime we pressed and managed to push the ball to where someone else must be there to intercept or get the ball. Sadly that someone else was not there in time. It's not like they didn't bother to or didn't want to. They simply couldn't read or follow the situation fast enough. Hope that will work one day given more time.
 
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Ronaldo isnt the problem, never has been. The problems are the lack of quality in midfield for the donkey work. The lack of motivation and desire to do the basics throughout this squad and unrealistic expectations from us all post fergie.

Said it before, the owners only care about CL qualification every season so they can get their dividends. If they wanted to win trophies they would have hired Conte. Then anyone lacking in motivation, desire or following the managers instructions would be out of the door. But the owners dont need a manager who pushes the club to win trophies. Better to tread water and get 4th in PL every year.
 
copen1945 said:
Whatever problems Ronaldo's transfer might have caused or not at all, the Villa game clearly showed that all of the problems do not land at his feet. There are so many issues that Ralf must address.
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We were vulnerable to the counter but we created good chances though - even with a misfiring frontline, we managed to carve out more opportunities than we've typically done
 
Us dropping Ronaldo would generate lots of clicks and paper sales, hence they peddle the idea that we need to.
 
Oldyella said:
Us dropping Ronaldo would generate lots of clicks and paper sales, hence they peddle the idea that we need to.
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Media doesnt really do that when a player is playing well. Any media talking about dropping lewa, haaland, mpabbe, salah, benzema?
 
Gehrman said:
Media doesnt really do that when a player is playing well. Any media talking about dropping lewa, haaland, mpabbe, salah, benzema?
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They would do with those players, if they played in our team with the midfield we have
 
Oldyella said:
Us dropping Ronaldo would generate lots of clicks and paper sales, hence they peddle the idea that we need to.
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I doubt that is the reason, in fact I see probably more fans than media saying he should be dropped tbh.
 
Oldyella said:
Us dropping Ronaldo would generate lots of clicks and paper sales, hence they peddle the idea that we need to.
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Nonsense. There's a perfectly reasonable conversation to be had about dropping any of our players bar De Gea at the moment.
 
The media/rival fans always attack our best players. Rivals just want us to sell Ronaldo as quickly as possible.
 
Still ill said:
Nonsense. There's a perfectly reasonable conversation to be had about dropping any of our players bar De Gea at the moment.
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Exactly, and which would be the biggest story for the papers? Pogba would be a huge story too if he wasn't on his winter break. Personally even De Gea shouldn't be safe imo.
 
Ronaldo may often score when he's played but we score less as a team overall.

Our goals per game this season in the PL is 1.58, last season it was 1.92 (highest level since Fergie's last season)

Thus far its our worst GPG since Jose's first season.
 
sugar_kane said:
Ronaldo may often score when he's played but we score less as a team overall.

Our goals per game this season in the PL is 1.58, last season it was 1.92 (highest level since Fergie's last season)

Thus far its our worst GPG since Jose's first season.
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It's a silly comparison IMO. Us getting Ronaldo isn't the only variable that has changed. Our opponents could be better this season or players like Fernandes are playing far worse this season.
 
I agree that the media is a bit lazy in just putting everything on Ronaldo. It's not like the entire team is pressing like mad and Ronaldo is just walking about.
 
redIndianDevil said:
It's a silly comparison IMO. Us getting Ronaldo isn't the only variable that has changed. Our opponents could be better this season or players like Fernandes are playing far worse this season.
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And how much of that is down to Ronaldo occupying areas of the field Fernandes would?
 
They blame Ronaldo because they will never point out that Maguire, an £85m signing, has been atrocious this season as both a CB and has always been a pretty poor captain.

There is a discussion that Ronaldo shouldn’t start every match and the whole fluid thing, but a fluid 3 like Liverpool, City or Chelsea sans Lukaku only works when the team plays tactically well and is technically proficient. Everything Man Utd are not.

IMHO, Ronaldo isn’t the biggest problem, he’s an asset that needs to be managed. We have liabilities that the media are not calling out because they refuse to criticise England internationals.
 
DWelbz19 said:
And how much of that is down to Ronaldo occupying areas of the field Fernandes would?
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Not sure if Fernandes is occupying same area of Ronaldo most of the time. Mostly under RR, he was on the wing more that in the middle where he pulls the strings mostly for the United. Not that he played a lot better with Cavani in the last game though he created a couple of clear chances because he started from central area.

Don't care too much about how they play for Portugal.
 
Ronaldo = more clicks

If he’s in the team they want him out so they can write bs about it. Once he’s out they will want him back in to write even more bs about it.
 
Glorio said:
We were vulnerable to the counter but we created good chances though - even with a misfiring frontline, we managed to carve out more opportunities than we've typically done
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That is the conundrum. Without Ronaldo, the play is more fluid, but the attack lacks any bite. With Ronaldo, even though things are disjointed, a chance might actually be converted. United really need to commit to either the positional play or the counter attack philosophy. Any half measure, which is the current state, is just pointless.
 
copen1945 said:
That is the conundrum. Without Ronaldo, the play is more fluid, but the attack lacks any bite. With Ronaldo, even though things are disjointed, a chance might actually be converted. United really need to commit to either the positional play or the counter attack philosophy. Any half measure, which is the current state, is just pointless.
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I was thinking Greenwood's rebound would have been a goal if Ronaldo was in the game. I personally think that we can still play 4 - 3 - 3 with speedy winger/wingers to open up.

It was not like the front two of Cavani and Bruno had a great hold up play or great speed in that game to contribute much to the fluid there.
 
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