Why do you think that would hugely reinvigorate young supporter interest?
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Why do you think that would hugely reinvigorate young supporter interest?
Just a hunch. More identification with the players. Anyway, thought I'd throw it in there to make it even more unpopular.
Agreed.
The exact opposite would happen in my opinion. With the popularity of things like the Fifa games, Football Manager, and the amount of foreign football shown on TV, I think it'd just drive more kids to support foreign clubs because that's who the best players are playing for.
Kids (well everybody really) like seeing the best players, it's why there's a market for foreign shirts in the first place. There's a reason why you've got loads of people who aren't actually Madrid or Barca supporters with Ronaldo and Messi shirts. Being English or British doesn't factor in for most young supporters. Young United fans want Di Maria, Falcao and van Persie on their shirts, not Jones, Carrick and Young. The likes of Rooney, Gerrard and Terry have only had a look in because they've been amongst the world's best, not because they're English. If you take foreign players out of it, the overall quality drops because there are fewer top class players in the division. Eventually, the few top class players that come from England leave, and you're left with a situation similar to Scotland and Wales where none of the nation's top talents actually play in that country because the overall quality is so dire.
I hate this thread but may as well join in the doom and gloom.
De Gea's gone in the summer, Di Maria will turn out a Torres level flop, we'll win nothing under Van Gaal and spend at least 3 or 4 more years scrapping with Liverpool and Spurs for fourth place while City, Chelsea and Arsenal dominate the PL.
De Gea's gone in the summer, Di Maria will turn out a Torres level flop, we'll win nothing under Van Gaal and spend at least 3 or 4 more years scrapping with Liverpool and Spurs for fourth place while City, Chelsea and Arsenal dominate the PL.
Think you'll have De Gea for one or two more seasons. I think he'll end up signing a new contract, but will still end up leaving.
Don't think Di Maria will be a flop.
Even the most optimistic Arsenal supporter wouldn't think they would dominate the league.
This belongs in a doom and gloom be as negative as you can thread.
Agreed.
He didn't work hard to maintain his place in the starting 11, he probably felt he was a sure thing when we prematurely gave him Giggs' shirt. In Ronaldo's first season he played 29 times and scored 4 goals, Januzaj played 27 times last season and scored 4 goals - the difference is Ronaldo didn't lose his place in the team after his first season as he kept on improving.
If you think about it, there are other differences between those two seasons and these last two.
I get what you mean but there are also a lot of similarities - from the shortage of wingers in the teams to the fact that we got knocked off our perch during both first seasons 3rd and 7th respectively. it did take Ronaldo 4 seasons to hit double digit goals though - but the point is from the moment he made his breakthrough he kept on improving.
How did you deduce that ?
Read above.
Ronaldo wasn't competing with the like of Van Persie, Rooney, Mata, Di Maria, Falcao and co. for places in the starting XI. He wasn't coming into a United team that finished out of European qualifying spots. He didn't have a change of manager after the first season at United. He wasn't facing the task of being incompatible with a 3-5-2 that excludes wider attacking players. Could you seriously envision him as a wingback ?
Their respective situations considering the relative circumstances of United 2003 vs United 2014 are worlds apart.
Great measuring stick BTW. Comparing Januzaj to a player who might go down as the Top 7-10 players to jugadores of all time. Not as good as Ronaldo ? Well the player must be overrated then..
Footballers don't always have a linear trajectory.
Lol people on here really know how to blow things out of proportion don't they? Jesus Christ. All i did was highlight certain similarities , forgive me for not spelling it out that Januzaj and Ronaldo aren't the same person and are not expected to have the same type of Career as if it wasn't obvious enough, all i did was compare their 1st seasons together - which i don't think is a problem since Januzaj is still a developing player whose career can go either way - he did extremely well in his first season hence the expectation during his 2nd season would be higher - i mean it is only natural.
You are absolutely right in pointing out the fact that Ronaldo wasn't competing with a host of talent , although i feel his biggest problem is the Devilish 3-5-2 formation which makes him incompatible - we did witness 41 injuries occur during the first half of the season however, He has managed to rack up 10 appearances and hasn't exactly done anything to suggest an improvement albeit within a small window of opportunity i.e playing only 10-15 minutes - so perhaps a loan move would be ideal.
Where did you get the "not as good as Ronaldo from"? can you quote me on that? The only stat i used to compare him to ronaldo was his goals in a certain number of appearances record which was BETTER than Ronaldo's record - i never even mentioned the word "overrated" in my comment - how about you read carefully next time.
Uhh.. This statement certainly alluded to that from a work ethic related viewpoint :
An implication of how Ronaldo kept improving and Januzaj isn't replicating that hence him being dropped from the team. Also previously stated baseless arguments of him not working hard enough and assuming he's the sure thing just because he got #11. Neither of those can be proven factually and are predicated solely upon some obscure notion of them somehow parlaying into his lack of playing time.
The overrated bit wasn't specifically meant for you, but an increasingly popular albeit reductive observation of most Januzaj discussions these days - and the general undertone of rewriting and downplaying his performances from last season just because he's struggled a bit in recent months.
Well he hasnt improved in his ability to beat his man for one, which my be a little harsh given his lack of playing time. We can't really accuse him of being overrated when we were the ones who rated him so highly in the first place, he was certainly a shining light in a dark and gloomy season, i don't think he is overrated just needs to be in a situation to prove himself - he turns 20 in a week so he still has a lot of time - perhaps the fans who call him overrated have been swayed by fans of other clubs especially as Sterling continues to impress.
Januzaj under Moyes and Van Gaal and why people think he's gone backwards this year.
Finishing
Moyes 26% on target (4 goals), Van Gaal 7% on target (0 goals)
Dribbling
Moyes 54%, Van Gaal 41%
Crossing
Moyes 32%, Van Gaal 21%
Tackling
Moyes 35%, Van Gaal 25%
Has all the makings of a player overperforming with sky high confidence and absolute free rein to try whatever he wanted without criticism, being worked out by the league. It's the push on from now that matters.
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Yeah, your stats tend to be a bit skewed when you've only fecking completed 3 out of the 4 odd games you've started, and subbed in for the last half hour for half of the other 7 you've been subbed into.
Constantly played out of position with the new 3-5-2 formation, influx of new talent (Di Maria,Falcao,Herrera) - our best attacking XI this year being far more superior to that of last season, playing time reduced from 1055 minutes alone at this stage last season to 450 minutes this season - putting all these into consideration it should come as no surprise that his stats took a hit this year especially for a 20 year old winger in a team that doesn't play wingers.
But i guess only united fans would actually take all those into consideration, since we actually watch our games and all.
Conversely league stats under both managers :
Minutes played :
Moyes : 1050 (including 10 starts)
Van Gaal : 450 minutes (including just 4 starts - 2 of them vs Chelsea and City)
Chances created per 90 mins :
Moyes : 1.69
Van Gaal : 1.80
Key Passes per 90 mins :
Moyes : 1.54
Van Gaal : 1.82
Anyway why is tackling so important for a primarily attacking player ?
Also dribbling and crossing stats are skewed because under Moyes he was primarily a winger, whereas under Van Gaal he has also played as a part of a midfield 3 and as a wingback, hence lesser freedom to express himself in an offensive fashion.
Minutes played :
Moyes : 1050 (including 10 starts)
Van Gaal : 450 minutes (including just 4 starts - 2 of them vs Chelsea and City)
Chances created per 90 mins :
Moyes : 1.69
Van Gaal : 1.80
Key Passes per 90 mins :
Moyes : 1.54
Van Gaal : 1.82
Anyway why is tackling so important for a primarily attacking player ?
Also dribbling and crossing stats are skewed because under Moyes he was primarily a winger, whereas under Van Gaal he has also played as a part of a midfield 3 and as a wingback, hence lesser freedom to express himself in an offensive fashion.
This post is very cynical but wouldn't actually surprise me if it ended up true. But god I hope more then anything it doesn't turn out that way.
RVP will leave for Serie A at the end of the season.
Valdes will leave before De Gea.
Victor Valdes is about the same level as Anders Lindegaard.
Odd statement. If he isnt a goal scoring, assist making, attacking midfielder then i dont know what is.
If that isnt confusing - saying we needed one is even more confusing? What is Mata?
Di Maria is exactly what we needed. With his pace and attitude he's possibly the closest thing we have to a "proper united player". Given half the chance.....fergie would have has him in a heart beat.
We are talking about a player who doesnt score more than 7 goals in a season ? Di Maria has never been a goal scorer his style of play and stats even when he was in Benfica would suggest this, Mata is an attacking midfielder who plays to score not create, while Di Maria plays to create.
He offers way more to the team than just pace and attitude with his creative style of play but his lack of goalscoring is detrimental to us especially this season seeing as we don't spend so much time in the box - just like Arsenal, only they have Sanchez.
He hasn't played a game for over a year so I'm not sure how anyone can rate him
I just find the whole idea of "not needing" Di Maria bizaare. If he chips in 6, Mata the same, Herrera the same, Fellaini a few and Rooney 12......all from midfield then i stongly oppose the theory that we "need" a goal scoring midfielder. We have lots of them.
To say we dont need Di Maria is puzzling. If you ask any striker in world footballer if they would like Di Maria in their team they would all say (in the words of fergie) "abserwutley".
Need or want aside, Di Maria becomes available - you buy him. He's an instant upgrade on what we have had for a very long time.
If Darren Fletcher was available for the Champions league final against Barcelona - it wouldn't have made any difference to the result.
Always thought that was a popular opinion, while the unpopular was that 'we would have won if he didn't got sent off against Arsenal'.
I completely agree with you though, he would have been chasing the ball without getting near it for the entire match. Similar to how all our other players did.
It always felt like one of Fergie's many "if's",he said something about it in his book,but Fletcher surely couldn't have been a game changer against such a great Barca side.
Maybe we should have kept Welbeck instead of buying Di Maria...
You could have played with twelve players and you still would have lost.
Maybe but at least with Fletcher in place of our recently departed Brazilian friend it would have been 11 v 11.
Dont go retard.
Probably, though I think that in both finals Fergie was tactically wrong. Maybe we wouldn't have won the game even if he started with other lineups but who knows.
It looked pretty weird to play Anderson when we had Paul Scholes in the bench. I also think that Tevez should have started cause after a bad start of the season, he was good on the second part of the season. Also, swapping the positions of Rooney and Ronaldo didn't work at all. I think that we had a good chance of winning on 2009. On 2011 though, it was different and Barca just toyed with us.
Not if the 12th player was a player like Gattuso or Makelele. Just saying.
We were probably a bit overconfident in 2009 but, after all, we were the defending champions with a superb defence and Ronaldo while Barcelona had yet to attain greatness. I still think we could have won had our early chances resulted in a goal or we not conceded a soft goal from their first meaningful attack. But trying to chase the game against that side from the tenth (?) minute was a totally different story.
2011 on the other hand was a lost cause given the disparities in the two squads. 3-1 was almost flattering.
Well I hear a lot of people saying 'if only Fletch had played it would have been a different story' etc, etc. perhaps it's just the people I speak to! But either way, yeah , what you said is exactly my thoughts on it.
I know that it's not nice, that it's not how we want the club to be run, but Van gaal probably needs to be sacked.
United is in a period of transition, and need a manager who makes real decisions, who doesn't shoehorn players because of their names and who can use his best players effectively (Mata, Rooney, Di Maria). The club can't lose more time or more occasions to fill the gap with Chelsea or City.
I feel that LVG is lacking the energy, the drive, the enthusiasm, the personal ambition, at the moment he looks like a shop manager.
Obviously the sacking is based a lot on what we are witnessing, maybe he has totally different plans for next season.
United is in a period of transition, and need a manager who makes real decisions, who doesn't shoehorn players because of their names and who can use his best players effectively (Mata, Rooney, Di Maria). The club can't lose more time or more occasions to fill the gap with Chelsea or City.
I feel that LVG is lacking the energy, the drive, the enthusiasm, the personal ambition, at the moment he looks like a shop manager.
Obviously the sacking is based a lot on what we are witnessing, maybe he has totally different plans for next season.
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