I don't think you can fault him for his work rate since joining United. Guy doesn't stop!
Workrate
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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I don't think you can fault him for his work rate since joining United. Guy doesn't stop!
Well he’s just signed for the team that runs less than almost any other in the league so you wouldn’t really expect an improvement. The opposite, if anything.
This is a mistake we as fans have repeatedly made when it comes to marquee signings. We expect them to arrive and infuse the team with workrate and enthusiasm.
In reality, it's quite the opposite. These signings come thinking they are the stars, and expect the team around them to allow them to shine. It happened with di Maria, with Pogba and now it's possibly happening with Sanchez.
It's not entirely their fault tbh. We provide them iconic jersey numbers, massive wages and certainty to start irrespective of form. So the message we are sending is, "You are the star!" In fact, I'd say Sanchez has been the least culpable in that respect, he tracks back and shows defensive commitment.
But yes, his numbers are down (I remember reading he'd often have the lowest distance covered among Arsenal players) and at his stage of career, it's justified that he conserves energy for his actual role in the team, which is to provide goals and assists. If we want workrate, we'll have to look for it somewhere else.
Those points are very good. Especially that bit about players arriving immediately thinking they've achieved something purely by having signed.
I wasn't really, just observing a worrying trend in his career. He tracks back relentlessly when he's lost the ball, which happens quite frequently. He has been a bit of a non-effective fighter on the pitch so far. I'm sure he'll improve, but those points they raised above, being the least hard working team and somehow having this effect on new signings that they don't really have to earn their place consistently, are very worrying.
I really hope we end this trend and come next season we have at least half an outfield team there that takes responsibility effectively.
Sanchez coming in and running less is not on him. He is regarded as one of our hardest working players.
We aren't a top team in terms of possession, so you'd expect more sprints and distance covered. The fact that we are close to bottom of those groups as well is a problem.
All the stats and what I see on the pitch suggest that Mourinho has to revolutionise the way the team plays.
We aren't a top team in terms of possession, so you'd expect more sprints and distance covered. The fact that we are close to bottom of those groups as well is a problem.
All the stats and what I see on the pitch suggest that Mourinho has to revolutionise the way the team plays.
Can't excuse him of not trying but most of the time he looks like a headless chicken. Running around harrying and chasing but most of the time he is not winning 2nd balls or making a significant impact. He looks a shadow of his former self. In his pomp he looked so good on the ball, making great runs, he was an instinctive finisher. He seems very reluctant to play like that at Utd. I wouldn't blame him cause it takes time to adjust to Mourinho and this Utd team. He isn't the first to struggle or look out of sorts under Jose. Hope he can rediscover his form next season.
The way Sanchez plays doesn't necessarily suit Utd or Mourinho. Alexis loves to press, close down. That's not Mourinho's way. We don't press, we contain. I would love to see us press higher up the field and try to win the ball back but that doesn't work if only one player does it.
The most worrying thing for me is that Mourinho doesn't have a clear vision of where he wants to take the team after 2 seasons in charge and the squad seems as disjointed as it was when he joined the club.
He was heralded as a saviour but in the same time at the helm Pep Guardiola has clearly set out his stall with City and fans of theirs can feel confident for some years. Mourinho is nowhere near being in that position despite being in charge for the same frametime.
Some deluded fans may express delight in finishing comfortably ahead of Liverpool in the Premiership standings, but if the truth be known our football was rubbish towards theirs. It is like watching paint dry. 19 points behind our neighbours is not satisfactory to any Manchester United manager.
I really feel that the board should reprimand Mourinho for hanging young players out to dry for not playing his way, and also put to him that his strategy must change and his defensive minded football will not be tolerated in this coming season. If he has another 250 million to spend this summer, then It should be spent wisely on a "Team and Squad" to go and compete with Man City and all the rest, and Win the premiership or be shown the door.
He was heralded as a saviour but in the same time at the helm Pep Guardiola has clearly set out his stall with City and fans of theirs can feel confident for some years. Mourinho is nowhere near being in that position despite being in charge for the same frametime.
Some deluded fans may express delight in finishing comfortably ahead of Liverpool in the Premiership standings, but if the truth be known our football was rubbish towards theirs. It is like watching paint dry. 19 points behind our neighbours is not satisfactory to any Manchester United manager.
I really feel that the board should reprimand Mourinho for hanging young players out to dry for not playing his way, and also put to him that his strategy must change and his defensive minded football will not be tolerated in this coming season. If he has another 250 million to spend this summer, then It should be spent wisely on a "Team and Squad" to go and compete with Man City and all the rest, and Win the premiership or be shown the door.
That's shocking considering that we're hardly an extremely technical team either. Which makes me wonder, why the feck do we keep so many water carriers (Lingard, Fellaini, Jones, Smalling, Young, Valencia) when they're crap even in terms of workrate?
You're righ, I'd want to add I find it weird how fans want to talk about the workrate of a marquee signing nearing 30 y/o, as you say you don't really sign that kind of player to eat the pitch and run 11km per game, you need him fresh in the game so he can get you a goal, and you want him fit enough to play 90 minutes every game for the whole season, that's hard to achieve for a forward if you demand from him a high workrate.
And it's even weirder when one of the main gripes Guardiola (that guy who just reached 100 points this season) had with Alexis was that he ran too much and needed to choose his runs and conserve his stamina/get injured less.
This was already 6 years ago, Alexis was 23 and at that age he already had to be reminded to not overextend because of injury problems, if the fans ask him to do now what he already couldn't do safely when he was 23... it's not Alexis fault, it has to be either the fans, the club or the coach in last instance if no one comes in his defense, because there was more than enough evidence to know that you don't sign this guy if what you really want is a workhorse like Perisic or Suarez.
So Russia are running/sprinting everyone into the ground.
I wonder why that might be?
Hmmm....
Jeez really? I think that's a damning indictment of our lack of movement off the ball more than anything else.
Russian athletes involved in nefarious goings on? Wash your mouth out!
Carried by the atmosphere, what a fairy tale.
Has to improve this year and hopefully a more mobile midfield helps.
We are usually near the bottom of every metric. We need to stop teams playing.
We are usually near the bottom of every metric. We need to stop teams playing.
I reckon Fred will clock up a few miles. From what I've seen, and everything I've heard, he's always moving.
We spend 70 mins of most matches camped outside our box. So you could put Haile Gabreselasie in that team and you still wouldn’t clock up much mileage.
I don't know about camped outside our board but A) we are conservative in our pressing and often allow teams to have the ball while trying to close out the spaces they intend to attack instead of aggressively pressuring them. I mean every team does a bit of both but we rely more on the former than other top teams. B) Our attack seems to rely on quick transitions from a few key attackers rather than the entire team pushing forward and creating big overloads.
That's my best guess as to why we run less than most.
Workrate is a strange stat. I love the idea of an incredibly hard working team, working immediately after giving the ball away to win back the ball. I'd love to see our quick and aggressive midfield be used together with Sanchez and Lukaku's intensity up top to win balls back in our attacking half. This will be the 1 thing that leads to the type of football that we all want to see. We have rashford and Lingard that will also work and have pace to recover.
Wait, so if we worked even less we would have won the champions league? Darn try hards
I think that is the key point as Jose sets the team up to contain and counter attack. Problem is that we are bad at transitioning from defence to attack. If we were good at that, no one would care about work rate.
Oh that was what Besiktas was trying to do here.
Seriously though running a lot doesn't guarantee you win anything, it's always useless in football to look at just one metric and draw any conclusions from that. If you run a lot because you are pressing but your press doesn't work because the coordination is lacking you run a lot for nothing so without context those stats are useless.
Beckham and Giggs were world class players who werent shy in covering a lot of ground
They were effing workhorses. Loved them
They were effing workhorses. Loved them
Do we really? I can think of a few games we do that but not against the rest. And certainly not at home.
It's largely the reason why teams like City seem to have so much space. Relentless running off-the-ball and workrate is a huge factor behind fluidity of play.
For me, personally, I don't sign a player unless his workrate is above 13, anyway.
For me, personally, I don't sign a player unless his workrate is above 13, anyway.
Beckham used to run until he collapsed. And some of Giggs’s tackles. Brilliant to watch. Martial would do well to watch their performances!
Martial will do well to watch Lingard's work rate.
I think a team can get away with having one or two super stars, like CR or Messi for example who don't work much off the ball but conserve their energy for attacking plays but overall, yeah you want your team to put in a shift to cover space that opened up or to put pressure on the ball carrying player, depending on the way you play. I feel like José's team usually set up in a way that they don't need to be among the hardest working teams, which can def be a benefit if you can conserve some energy during a game, so not always running for 90 + minutes like crazy might not always be a negative, it all depends on how you want to play.
Using Barca and Madrid as example of teams not putting the hard yards but excelling, doesn't do us justice.
We don't have that kind of quality. Look at Messi, he barely moves but is still one of the best .
We can't afford that.
What I think it's a problem for us is that we are not exceptional at any aspect of the game, possession, defending, creating space, movement etc. A team like that has to work it's socks off, on and off the ball imo.
We don't have that kind of quality. Look at Messi, he barely moves but is still one of the best .
We can't afford that.
What I think it's a problem for us is that we are not exceptional at any aspect of the game, possession, defending, creating space, movement etc. A team like that has to work it's socks off, on and off the ball imo.
Sanchez looks like a new signing this season and Pereira is another who has caught the eye.
With Fred linking Matic and Pogba and Pereira and Herrera fighting for places our Midfield will be much stronger.
I hope that Dalot hits the ground running and if what I think Mourinho will do and play a 3-5-2 with Dalot as a wing back we will be a much more attacking unit this season.
This depends on whether we can bring Alderweireld in. But I would also keep 1 of Tuanzebe or Fosu here.
With Fred linking Matic and Pogba and Pereira and Herrera fighting for places our Midfield will be much stronger.
I hope that Dalot hits the ground running and if what I think Mourinho will do and play a 3-5-2 with Dalot as a wing back we will be a much more attacking unit this season.
This depends on whether we can bring Alderweireld in. But I would also keep 1 of Tuanzebe or Fosu here.
We ran 95km over 90 minutes against Brighton. The only teams in PL history to cover less ground were playing with 10 men.
You have to wonder if the players are actively trying to get the manager sacked. Again.
You have to wonder if the players are actively trying to get the manager sacked. Again.
If we were superior in possesion we could probably get away with performances like that, but we're pretty crap at that so..
I think it often shows when you're watching the game as well, teammates are generally not trying that hard to make themselves available for a pass, the player with the ball are far to often on his own.
I think it often shows when you're watching the game as well, teammates are generally not trying that hard to make themselves available for a pass, the player with the ball are far to often on his own.
I don’t think players actively trying to do anything when we’ve seen same stats flying around for the past two seasons. We don’t have a switch to suddenly start running like the madmen, our players bodies simply not used to running such lengths during the games. I genuinely won’t be surprised to see that Fred had run the most of out of the whole lot as he just joined and his body must still be operating on the old habits.
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Either that or Mourinhos tactics are worse than we thought. This isn’t a new characteristic sure it isn’t?
Still depressing all the same.
95km is a joke. Something is wrong.
You could tell on Saturday something was wrong. Everyone was playing scared and frustrated and giving up on 50/50s too easily. I've said many times but there's nothing wrong with the ability of any of our players. There's something else going on.
It’s not new but it’s getting worse. And to run less than we’ve ever run before when we’re chasing the game is inexcusable.
You could certainly think that, especially looking at Pogba's body language, and he's our captain. Tho only one who looked as though he was putting in a shift was Fred, although he needs to cool down a bit imv.