Theyy don't play if they don't do the basics.
Unfortunately, United isn't in a position to not play a few of the players and, please remember, these aren't Ralf's players anyway. They're just inherited from previous bad/good buys.
In addition to that, a few of them got to play in a very functional system under LVG, then in a "let's be men and wing it" system under Mourinho and in god knows what under Ole. Most of them need to be moved on as their development has been hugely affected.
Ralf's job is literally to get some stability until the summer and finish the season. The club waved the season goodbye when they appointed him and you should have seen that a mile a way.
His only job since he came in was to steady the ship and start putting methods in place that will be carried over by the next man. So, basically, he's doing part of the job ETH would do anyway. Try to play a new system, with a new style and see who's on board or not.
When ETH or any other manager comes in, he'll have a competent squad report built by a proper manager not some amateur like we had before. Added to that, he'll find a good training structure with a few new methods implemented that he can take over.
It's a very basic concept called change management and it applies absolutely everywhere, from construction to business and sport.
Pretty much disagree with this in its entirety.
The Glazers/board legitimately thought Ralf could turn this around, get top 4 setting the club up for the manager of choice to join at the end of the season. This is a public company, and intentionally losing £100m in revenues by spurning top 4 is tantamount to business mismanagement and would open them to serious legal issues by large shareholders.
So let’s assume, for the sake of it, that you’re correct, and that the board was happy to feck off to CL and CL revenues and wanted “stability”.
Where’s this “stability”? You’ve got a player who is arguably the GOAT who is in terrible form. Rashford, so low on confidence he can barely make a 5 yd pass. he completely fecked up the Martial and Lingard situations. Ralf’s tried to implement an incredibly naive 4-2-2-2 which hasn’t worked at all, aside from 45 min at Crystal Palace, which all the Ralf apologists tout as “see, it works!”. He’s abandoned that to try and get results and thus we are no closer to ETH’s system. And oh, by the way, when he took over, how could he know which manager we’d get and what system to install? His results have basically been the same as Ole this season (40% win percentage), he’s lost a derby badly, we’re out of the CL, FA Cup and mired in 7th.
All this for a a magical “report on the squad” which I’m sure will be dusted with gold and emanating rainbows as ETH bows before the master that is Ralf and humbly accepts this blessed roadmap to success that “the brilliant professor” has generously bestowed upon us.
If ETH has a grain of common sense, he’ll make his own assessment of the squad, make a few key buys in the summer and somehow build a foundation of success with the players we’ve got (including academy players and u23s).
Ralf’s pretty much been a disaster, the squad is at its lowest point since I can remember, and that’s saying something because the Moyes days were pretty dark.
