And he never will if he continues to be an unispiring manager who fails to motivate and get the best out of his players. Bit of a Catch 22 situaton for our Dave really. Part of the makeup of any succesful manager is surely that players want to win for you and LVG would appear to have that.
Unpopular Opinions Thread
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And he never will if he continues to be an unispiring manager who fails to motivate and get the best out of his players. Bit of a Catch 22 situaton for our Dave really. Part of the makeup of any succesful manager is surely that players want to win for you and LVG would appear to have that.
How often do you watch United games?
Valencia is a better option than Rafael, his pace and power is firstly worldclass, but he also seems to be a great tackler and slider of the ball and positions himself quite well 1 vs 1. I think attackingly Rafa is better but Valencia too is very composed, keeps width, his crossing is starting to improve and when he gets the chance he can drift inside with some dribbles. Other than that he isnt rash and stays fit for long periods, I fully trust him in the coming matches.
You're welcome to Evans in the summer if you'd like.
Valencia is atrocious defensively. His positioning in particular is awful, and he's basically got by on being very athletic, less injury prone, and sightly better going forward than Rafael. He'd be nowhere near the side if we had a decent right-back.
Valencia has improved dramatically defensively this season.
He's alright at tracking back and sticking a leg in, but it's almost a certainty that he'll be stood in the wrong place if a cross comes in from the far side.
That's an area to improve on, certainly, but it would be harsh not to recognise the progress he's making. He rarely, if ever, gets beaten by his opponent, wins plenty of duels and our right side is seldom exposed like it was when he played there last season.
I'm far from his biggest fan but I think he's done well.
How exactly does Lloris have a harder job? I thought some Tottenham fans claimed Vertonghen was the best CB in the PL. If so then sounds quite easy for Lloris.
The players at Everton and Preston did give their all for him though and it looks like the Sociedad players are also.
Shaw is quite comfortably better then Valencia. He's also been a lot better then Dier and Chambers.
Defensively, Shaw's been outstanding. Just needs to work on his offensive game.
He's done well given that he's not a natural defender, but he's still rubbish defensively. He still plays very much like a right winger playing right back.
Not sure where to put this but I'm tired of the popular opinion that Louis Van Gaal spent £150m and that's it. So I'll counter it below because it seems to be unpopular in the acknowledgement of it.
Manchester United spent £150m last summer.
Why?
Because David Moyes spent around £70m on Mata and Fellaini and finished 7th with it. All trust was lost on the pitch and off it. We also lost Rio, Vidic, Evra, Giggs etc. A deficit of 2,000+ games in the Prem experience gone. Replacements were always coming.
What happened?
The club and their scouting and financial team had already lined up Herrera and Shaw deals. After a good World Cup, Rojo was available and we acted their too. While we also woo'd the Jorge Mendes money machine for Di Maria and Falcao. I'm not saying Louis Van Gaal didn't agree to these signings but 2 out of the 5 mentioned were already on their way while any of the other 3 could have been in the pipeline. LVG definitely brought in Daley Blind 100% and had a heavy influence on the requirements of a deal for Rojo - left footed CB/LB.
So what did Louis do?
At most spent £60m on Di Maria, £14m on Blind, £16m on Rojo and whatever you want to call the Falcao loan fee. £90m+ outlay. Slightly more than Moyes but we were in a much worse scenario. At least, £14m on Blind £16m on Rojo and submitted to the clubs will on other targets. However we also sold up to £42m (according to Transfermarkt) so he more than recouped the added expenditure he had over Moyes too. Last season we barely sold a thing.
Wrap up
United's hierarchy spent the £150m with Louis' agreement on preselected targets worth £60m. The rest is debatable but certainly Louis directly signed £30m at least. He sold £42m so recovered his own expenditure for that. The Di Maria and Falcao signings were bonus ones that no manager would say no to at the time either. LVG takes responsibility for the signings because he is the manager but to insist that he spent that sum and to not give the reason that Utd had the funds or that we screwed ourselves over to the point it was a necessity is poor and lazy.
Manchester United spent £150m last summer.
Why?
Because David Moyes spent around £70m on Mata and Fellaini and finished 7th with it. All trust was lost on the pitch and off it. We also lost Rio, Vidic, Evra, Giggs etc. A deficit of 2,000+ games in the Prem experience gone. Replacements were always coming.
What happened?
The club and their scouting and financial team had already lined up Herrera and Shaw deals. After a good World Cup, Rojo was available and we acted their too. While we also woo'd the Jorge Mendes money machine for Di Maria and Falcao. I'm not saying Louis Van Gaal didn't agree to these signings but 2 out of the 5 mentioned were already on their way while any of the other 3 could have been in the pipeline. LVG definitely brought in Daley Blind 100% and had a heavy influence on the requirements of a deal for Rojo - left footed CB/LB.
So what did Louis do?
At most spent £60m on Di Maria, £14m on Blind, £16m on Rojo and whatever you want to call the Falcao loan fee. £90m+ outlay. Slightly more than Moyes but we were in a much worse scenario. At least, £14m on Blind £16m on Rojo and submitted to the clubs will on other targets. However we also sold up to £42m (according to Transfermarkt) so he more than recouped the added expenditure he had over Moyes too. Last season we barely sold a thing.
Wrap up
United's hierarchy spent the £150m with Louis' agreement on preselected targets worth £60m. The rest is debatable but certainly Louis directly signed £30m at least. He sold £42m so recovered his own expenditure for that. The Di Maria and Falcao signings were bonus ones that no manager would say no to at the time either. LVG takes responsibility for the signings because he is the manager but to insist that he spent that sum and to not give the reason that Utd had the funds or that we screwed ourselves over to the point it was a necessity is poor and lazy.
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What do you mean?
After that expenditure and the poor result it returned, trust was lost in him to complete the next phase - a massive summer spend to replace Rio, Vidic, Giggs and Evra.
Hence why we went for a senior and vastly more experienced manager to deal with the pressure of it all.
They were queueing up to stick the boot into him at Everton the minute he left. Fans, staff and all were absolutely delighted he'd been shifted on and replaced with the bad case of emperors new clothes you've got managing you now.
I'll grant you that having made the step up to United he struggled to command respect and its not a coincidence that all is rosy now he's made a step down again. He's at his level.
No chance. Even if we ignore the strengths or weaknesses of each defences. The pressure at being number 1 is far higher and has cracked up the odd keeper. Just take a look at the stick De Gea got for his year at United for a few mistakes, the scorn of the media eye is always on.
You could argue that Lloris has been equally good or saved more points. I haven't seen enough of Spurs' matches to comment on the latter.
Lloris has also made a couple of howlers this season. Hes a top keeper 95% of the time but hes always had mistakes in him.
I'm sure I read the other day that De Gea has made 0 errors leading to opportunities on goal this season, despite how active he's been. Struggling to find where I saw it now so I may have imagined it.
Obviously I'm not claiming that De Gea is perfect, but that his error rate is that of a world class goalkeeper whereas Lloris seems rather more prone to a howler.
The pitch invasion at Aston Villa-West Brom put a little bit of life back into the game of football.
I don't really think it added all that much to be honest, showed some passion, but it's not as if we never see pitch invasions these days at all. But the overreaction was a little bit cringeworthy from commentators etc.
Not this season he hasn't. He's not made any meaningful error or howler for about a season and a half. About the biggest mistake has been slicing a clearance out of play.
I'm sure he's made one mistake this season. Before that he had the one against Sunderland in the cup. Can't think of anymore since his first season.
Yeah the Sunderland League cup one was the one I was thinking of. I genuinely can't think of any significant ones since then.
Made one against West Ham earlier this season, but I'm not sure what their definition of an error is.
Daley Blind as much as I like him, isn't the answer for the deep midfield role. Keeps possession tidy, but is too easy to get past, and has no physical or athletic ability of note. Carrick is still a far better player.
Rojo is our best centre back, and by a distance. We over rate the others on this forum because we've had them for years throughout our successful periods.
Wayne Rooney should never of been offered a contract until he's 34. As he ages it's going to become a massive elephant in the room, similar to the Gerrard situation at Liverpool.
Rojo is our best centre back, and by a distance. We over rate the others on this forum because we've had them for years throughout our successful periods.
Wayne Rooney should never of been offered a contract until he's 34. As he ages it's going to become a massive elephant in the room, similar to the Gerrard situation at Liverpool.
The length of this thread suggests a RAWK like monitoring of regular threads. Fear
John Terry is still the best centre back in the PL and possibly the best defender of the PL era.
That's probably true but with the dearth of top centre backs around at the minute that's not saying much, the second bit definitely belongs in this thread.
I really like Rojo but I rate Smalling higher.
Id agree with this tbh, absolute arsehole in real life but as far as a being a CB goes I'd rate him along with vidic (in his prime)
Rio Ferdinand was considerably better IMO.
I like Rio more cause he was a class defender (only Nesta and Maldini are above him on my eyes) but on the other side Terry was a leader (more than Rio) and scored tons of goals. On my opinion, Rio, Vidic and Terry were around the same level (all things considered) and for the best ever (in EPL) it is between Rio and Terry (cause Vidic played far shorter on EPL).
That's probably a more balanced opinion. The reason I personally place Rio higher is cuz usually Terry had much better protection ahead of him as well as beside him.
It is really strange that Terry and Rio played together for the National Team but nothing came out of it. No-one will ever remember their partnership.
This, and
This. He misses everything and is always scrambling. Terrible to see.
Absolutely. Decent passer, but not more. Good utility player, good sub, covers a lot of positions, and can from a solid part of a 2-man DM. But not good enough alone. Carrick is better at everything except mobility, and it's not too far there either.
Iv been saying for the last few weeks now that he isn't having bad games as such, he is just contributing very little really. Like you say he is a good utility player but not sure if he is good enough to be our starting DM once we get back into the Champions League etc.
People forget that Terry -Rio - Lampard - A.Cole - Gerrard and Rooney were all teammates for a while, but the blame always falls on Rooney.....perhaps it has something to do with the hype and all
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