Where will United finish this season?

Where will United finish this season?

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Infra-red said:
Opta have crunched the numbers and run 10,000 full season simulations through their AI. It has been decided, United will finish 6th:

1. Manchester City
2. Arsenal
3. Liverpool
4. Chelsea
5. Newcastle
6. Manchester United
7. Tottenham
8. Aston Villa
9. Crystal Palace
10. West Ham
11. Brighton
12. Fulham
13. Everton
14. Brentford
15. Bournemouth
16. Wolves
17. Nottingham Forest
18. Leicester City
19. Ipswich
20. Southampton

https://theanalyst.com/2024/08/premier-league-predictions-2024-25-opta-supercomputer/
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There is usually a heavy anchoring and adjustment bias in these models. Below is for 23-24 which is almost a copy of the season before that:
https://theanalyst.com/2023/08/premier-league-2023-24-season-predictions-opta/

Wouldn't read too much into these predictions, especially when they use the word "AI", which means it's mostly baloney and they need a hip jargon to justify that baloney.
 
We seem to have a pattern where we bounce back after a dip, so 3rd or 4th for me, especially if Rashford finds his form like he did every season when we bounced back. At the cost of Liverpool who seem to have an awfull season every time we have a good one.
 
Our defense looks solid now. Assuming we bring in Ugarte, we should compete for fourth.
 
bringbackbebe said:
There is usually a heavy anchoring and adjustment bias in these models. Below is for 23-24 which is almost a copy of the season before that:
https://theanalyst.com/2023/08/premier-league-2023-24-season-predictions-opta/

Wouldn't read too much into these predictions, especially when they use the word "AI", which means it's mostly baloney and they need a hip jargon to justify that baloney.
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You are of course correct regarding their model - my post was intended to be a bit tongue-in-cheek. I actually think that the range of possible outcomes for United this season is much wider than usual. We finished 8th last year, but in terms of performance, I felt our final league position actually flattered us somewhat. This season, I could envisage anything from 3rd to 10th as possible outcomes, which feels a bit mad.

The squad looks stronger (although the early signs are that we might not have vanquished our old foe, muscular injuries). We also played pretty well against City. Despite the improved squad, there needs to be an enormous tactical shift this season for us to stand any chance of a top 4 place - basically, Ten Hag needs to rip up more-or-less everything in terms of his approach last year, and start again. If he can manage to do that (and he does have a new coaching staff to help him), then I'd lean towards the more optimistic end of that 3rd - 10th range, and predict a top 4 finish. If he simply adopts the exact same tactical approach as last season (albeit with an improved squad), we'll be battling for a Europa Conference place. The most likely outcome is probably something in between - we'll be just "OK" tactically, our new signings will make a net positive contribution and we will land somewhere around 5th/6th (which, depending on how Villa do in the UCL, might even be enough for us to qualify for the 2025/26 UCL, anyway).
 
As it stands and if City escape the charges I reckon a fight with Liverpool for 3/4 place. Probably 4th, but a point or two difference.
If we do get another one or two midfielders then this could get us closer to the top two.
We could even finish 2nd if City are relegated
 
21st

But honestly 3rd-4th, we will surprise a lot of people.
 
Reiver said:
Don't understand where all the optimism is coming from.
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A new season and a fresh start always brings a sense of renewal and optimism, no? I have rarely gone into a season thinking it will be terrible (perhaps Mourinho's final season, aside). Some optimism is healthy, even if a little naive sometimes.

I expect there will be plenty of posters on the Chelsea, Newcastle, Spurs, and Villa forums predicting top 4 finishes for their clubs, too, even though at least three of those four teams will miss out. All part of the summer experience as a football fan.
 
We have no firepower.
The defence looks good, but who’s scoring the goals?
We are relying too heavy on Rashford again.

I’d say between 5th and 7th is realistic.
 
Reiver said:
Don't understand where all the optimism is coming from.
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I can't either. While I think we're set up to fare better this season than last season, assuming we don't experience another injury crisis, I still don't think there's enough goals in the squad to compete for 3rd or 4th.
 
As long as the team stays somewhat healthy 4th is doable, but I'm a pessimist.
 
Todd said:
I can't either. While I think we're set up to fare better this season than last season, assuming we don't experience another injury crisis, I still don't think there's enough goals in the squad to compete for 3rd or 4th.
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Nope. Defence is stronger but I doubt Zirkzee will take our attack to the next level. Rashford and Höjlund must improve a lot. Will finish 5-8th.
 
I'm expecting a poor season, Erik will have to completely reinvent himself and given his stubborn attitude in the past it's hard to see beyond there being any differences. The biggest issue for me is when after a few opening games the opposition figure out what the team want to do and Erik last season fundamentally failed in readjusting aside the last three games of the season.

However, I do think there were isolated instances where the team actually looked decent in pre-season. If United can bring in Ugarte possibly even Berge in addition, I think it changes the dynamic of the team throughout the midfield and gives United more of a base to build from with either player partnering Casemiro.

The teams I feel will do well next season are Arsenal, City, Spurs and Newcastle. I think Newcastle will excel when you crunch the data of the last two seasons they have had one of the best defensive records in one and one of the best attacks in the another. If they can assemble some type of median between those two feats they could close the gap on the top two.

Liverpool, Chelsea and Villa hard to estimate with two new managers and Villa were fortunate with top four overall when you consider their form towards the end of last season.
 
Frankly, i simply do not care where we finish or how many games we lose. I want to see a total of 120+ goals this season across all competition. I don't even care who scores, who creates. I just want to see some exciting forward thinking gameplay. THAT IS ALL!!! Rest will fall in place automatically.. EtH must say, go out there and think only about scoring. We should never care who we are playing against. We need goals every game. GOALS GOALS GOALS!!!
 
Red Star One said:
6 or 7th I think. It will take time to fully benefit from the structure change and I expect us to undergo a manager change during the season.
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manager change is too harsh.. just after renewing.. you'll see a positive united this season for sure but i'm sure about the position either.. Erik Ten Hag likes his football style to be exciting, therefore defense can be very open sometimes. It's not the same as Eredivisie, we could get hammered. Let's see what happens
 
All depends on who they bring in. He needs a good transfer window.
 
I am usually pessimistic but I see pretty much everyone writing us off. Listened to different podcasts, at least a couple have ETH being first to get sacked etc. Who knows how it's going to go but this we have been better this preseason than last season. Yes it's only preseason but still we aren't being carved open repeatedly like last season. We have been more compact so far. That gives me hope.

Now if you told me Casemiro will be decent, that would be close to guaranteeing top 4 in my opinion. And I do expect Ugarte to be done
 
Absolutely everyone is writing us off this season. We surely can’t have the same injury issues as last season and we’ve raised the floor of the squad. We’re a 6/DM away from a top 4 finish IMO. I think we could almost be the dark horses of the prem this year.
 
I'm thinking somewhere between 4th and 6th. So I've gone for 5th, as I think a lot of teams would have to struggle, and the bar be quite low points wise, for us to get top 4 at this stage of our rebuild. Hopefully 5th would still be enough for CL qualification.

Most important thing for me every year though is winning trophies. The league being the best of the lot, but as that's not going to happen, then winning a trophy and getting CL qualification would be my hopes for the season. Of course, winning the EL ticks both boxes regardless of where we finish in the league - so that's my main (realistic) hope for the season.
 
It's really hard to say until we've seen our main rivals for the fourth spot -- Spurs, Villa and Newcastle -- play a few matches. Surely we must all be in agreement that the top three will be City, Arsenal and Liverpool and probably in that order, so it's all about the scrap for fourth place. I like the improvements to the squad and I'm pretty sure we'll be in the conversation for fourth, but until we see what those three have put together it's just too hard to predict.

Let's just win the fukking EL trophy.
 
With our midfield as it is now I can’t see us finishing higher than 6th, we will be outrun and out played there too often, even if we do improve the tactics from last season.

However if we can bring in couple of midfielders then we should push for 4th, I am hopeful that will happen but lot of work to do.
 
I'll keep saying it but there's f**k all in it between the sides who finished 3rd - 8th last season. All those sides are capable of having great or awful seasons.

I know Scousers that are concerned about their lack of signings and the potential for a post Klopp drop off.

Chelsea remain a basket case.

Spurs are Spurs.

Newcastle still have a very average squad and are constantly 2 injuries away from a crisis.

Villa will have to battle with the extra workload of 8 high intensity Champions League games.

Would it really be a massive shock if we finished about at least three of those sides?
 
MancunianAngels said:
I'll keep saying it but there's f**k all in it between the sides who finished 3rd - 8th last season. All those sides are capable of having great or awful seasons.

I know Scousers that are concerned about their lack of signings and the potential for a post Klopp drop off.

Chelsea remain a basket case.

Spurs are Spurs.

Newcastle still have a very average squad and are constantly 2 injuries away from a crisis.

Villa will have to battle with the extra workload of 8 high intensity Champions League games.

Would it really be a massive shock if we finished about at least three of those sides?
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Liverpool aren’t imploding bad enough for them to be anywhere close to us.

I do agree you don’t need to be a top side to sneak into that 4th position

Chelsea, Newcastle, Villa, Spurs aren’t all that but we were horrendous last season. One of the worst season I’ve seen and we’ve seen some shite since Fergie.

I’ve lost all trust in Ten Hag.
You can’t be this bad and bounce right back up in a few months. I hope he proves me wrong.
 
Last third of 2023-24 has us sitting 14th. I think that trend will continue into the next.

It will all depend how well both the old and the new porcelain holds up to be honest.
 
With so much money spent in the last few years, and overall decent squad, with good manager who understands Premierleagu, we should be easily behind City. Potentially even foghting with City if our strikers could score goals and if City have mediocre season.

However, our manager needs 24 players from Ajax to make us work, so realistically it would be criminal if we don't finish in top4, so I am still optimistic!

If I had to be negative, I would say sixth, but then if I want to be really negative, I would say we would fire Ten Hag until december and find new decent manager who will easily get us top4(which is still positive!).
 
I've going for 5th, though it feels like it could easily swing between 4th and 6th. City and Arsenal are on a different level, and Liverpool should comfortably be in the mix despite some doubts about their squad depth. Spurs have strengthened well and seem more balanced now, while Newcastle will be dangerous if they can avoid injuries, especially with no European distractions.

Our biggest issue remains in the midfield, where a lack of depth could hurt us over the course of a long season. If we get a couple of key injuries, it could easily derail us. I’m hopeful the new signings will help solidify the defense, but without a consistent goal scorer, it’s hard to see us finishing higher than 5th.

If we manage to find more goals from elsewhere in the squad, we could push higher, but 5th feels like a realistic prediction given the competition.
 
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SWE-Chucky said:
If we bring in Ugarte on a loan + option to buy for 50m euro
If we can avoid long injuries on key players like Onana, De Ligt, Martinez, Kobbie, Ugarte and Höjlund/Zirkzee
If Arsenal (who I believe is the second strongest team in England at the moment behind city) dont have the luck, they had last season, to avoid ANY injury on their key players (Saliba, Gabriel, Rice, Ödegaard, Saka)

Then i truly believe that;

------------------------------------------------Onana
---------Dalot/Mazza - De Ligt/Yoro - Martinez/De Ligt - Mazza/Shaw
-----------------------------------------Ugarte/Casemiro
------------------------ ----Bruno/Mount - Kobbie/New CM
-----------Amad/Garnacho - Höjlund/Zirkzee - Garnacho/Rashford

is a great starting eleven and are capable of fighting for the second or at least third place this year already IF the youngsters take another step in the right direction (Yoro, Kobbie, Amad, Garnacho, Höjlund, Zirkzee).

All of our new players could take a place in the starting eleven directly (Yoro is injured and so young so we should not put to much pressure on him now that we have De Ligt also). I also see Amad and Mount as "new players" because this is the first season Amad is really a player that is fighting for a spot and Mounts first season was destroyed because of injuries and he has showed in preseason that he has great potential and that he is a perfect player for the type of style ETH wants to play.

We need to sell AT LEAST Lindelöf (10m euro), McTominey (30m) and Hannibal (10m) which could be enough to buy a new CM to compete with Kobbie. If we somehow could sell Eriksen, Casemiro, Antony and Sancho then we should also bring in a player that can play LCB/LB and deep playing CM (De Jong type, Zubamendi would be the perfect fit together with Ugarte but he is staying in Spain, while there are reports that Barcelona wants to get rid of FDJ huge wager and would accept a price around 50m euros - I would take him if he would be prepared to cut his wager to max 300k/week.

If we pulled all this off, I truly believe we could be fighting for the title with a lot of luck, no long injuries on the key players like mentioned and with the troop above, we need to rotate a lot more then the last 2 seasons so that we always have fresh legs starting the game and that would also prevent injuries.

I dont believe that we will sell any of Eriksen, Antony, Casemiro or Sancho (maybe a loan with obligation to buy to PSG, but probably not even that). I think we will bring in Ugarte on a loan with obligation to buy next summer and if we can sell all three of Lindelöf, McTominey and Hannibal, then we might bring in Fofana from Monaco or a player like Chillwell to cover up for Shaw (Amass is a amazing talent but not ready to play 35-40 games this season).
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Its not that we didn't have injuries, our entire left back situation never resolved all season after Timber. Zinchenko missed big chunks, we had to play Tomiyasu (a crock himself and not a LB) at LB with Kiwior (also not a LB) at LB. Martinelli missed a lot of games, so did Partey and Jesus. Its just that we have very good depth, Trossard came in for Martinelli, Tomiyasu despite being out of position is very good and covered well, Jorginho despite having no legs is very good positional wise.

While our best players stayed fit, we did have injuries elsewhere but our depth covered them well. And you're right we'd struggled without Saliba and Rice but elsewhere our depth covered us fine. This season with Califiori in provides more depth as well.

In general I agree with you, thought I'd point it out.
 
I am an optimist so I am going to go with a 4th place finish. But we will not make it easy for ourselves that is for sure.
 
Have very mixed feelings going into the season.

The obvious early negative is injuries being a big disappointment, especially with the season we've just had and especially to players, who could have potentially been starting against Fulham. Left back is a worry. Malacia isn't a player we should be expecting anything from this season and given Shaw's injury record, we need/needed to address that. Mazraoui can fill in there, but he is our back up right back, so it leaves us spread thin before a meaningful ball has been kicked. The international tournament disrupting our pre-season is something we need to expect, but it is happening at a time when we are trying to integrate new players and are potentially trying to change things tactically, which isn't ideal.

On the positive side I'm generally happy with the signings we have made. I'm shocked some think our squad/XI is worse than it was last year. Varane was a great defender, but I do think De Ligt can offer similar, or more than what he did last year. Yoro is incredibly exciting, feel like I read his name in the transfer thread every other post at the end of last season season, when discussing who we should sign. Although he may not improve our XI completely, he definitely improves our squad and I think there is a chance he could be pushing to be a starter by the end of the season. Zirkzee is another who instantly improves our squad. Although I thought Hoijlund did well last year, I also don't think it's unreasonable to think that Zirkzee could have a better season this year. Mazraoui is the one player I think who could potentially be a net negative, although I think he is better player and fit than Wan-Bissaka, the former was always available. Not sure if we will get Ugarte over the line, but the positive is it looks like we aren't done and hopefully should strengthen some more.

I'm also hoping/expecting for more from some of our existing players this year compared to last: Martinez (injury), Mount (injury), Casemiro (performance), Rashford (performance). Also having our young core of Mainoo, Garnacho and Hoijlund a year older should hopefully see them improve. Another young player who should improve individually as well as our team is Amad. Having him as a preferred option on the right wing, excites me a lot. He could potentially be the biggest upgrade to our team, based on some of the performances we seen from that position last year. Having Sancho, as a saleable asset, or a cup/squad player should be an improvement on whatever last year was for him.

Finally I'm hoping for an improvement tactically. We appear to be going with something like a 4-2-4 mid block defensively and a fluid 3-2-5 when building up play. I do worry about how open we have looked in the defensive transition, but I'm hoping a consistent, improved defence might help with that.

Although I believe we probably have the 3rd best squad and 4th best XI in the league. I think a slow start with the changes and little preparation time might see us get off to a slow start, which could be disastrous for us in terms of morale. I think with some smart rotation and better luck with injuries, we won't see the sort of collapse we did last season and we will recover to finish around 5th.
 
5 or 6 I think, but it depends on whether we get a DM or not. People forget that we still have Erik ten Hag as manager.
 
For me one of our biggest issues has been midfield. We haven’t improved that yet and only bringing in Ugarte for it won’t fix it.
Our wingers need to vastly improve on and off the ball and do their defensive work to tuck in and protect midfield as with combinations of Bruno, McT, Casemiro it’s going to be left wide open and vulnerable.
Hopefully having defenders who can step up it should help but our midfield is weak as hell and it’ll cost us.

So for me again struggle for top 4, probably 5th-6th.
 
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