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Would it necessarily? Any team would suffer without a key player, but right now, Pogba can play that role if Bruno is injured. Even without Bruno the team won games against Spurs, City et. al. Pereira were playing the 10 role in the 4-1 against Newcastle.
There are two schools of thought regarding tactics. Adapting to circumstances or sticking to a system. Neither are wrong, as history shows.
1) Not necessarily, but high likely it would. Based on how we fare in that system with and without Pogba this season.
The few games Pogba played this season pre-Bruno, we didn't actually play well (except season opener vs Chelsea). Even with Pogba, we struggled to break down defenses.
2) Pogba can but likely Ole won't play him there. Never did. The current system "
necessitates" Pogba to be more discipline which is limiting his attacking contributions. Actually for me, even with Bruno now, Pogba is more "limited" when attacking, compare to his performances with Herrera and Matic last season in advance centre-midfield role where he's free to go all-out rampaging through defenses. It's a trade off I suppose for the team. Still good impressive attacking contributions mind, but for me, we could've use his attacking and scoring talents more.
3) We have zero problems vs top teams, big game raisers.
4) Let's consider the most of the games we struggled in games with the likes of AP, JLingz and Mata there. We're basically playing with 10 men majority of the games.
Agree with you last point. Finding a balance with both method is for me the best way. I don't think we should stick with only either one. Thing is, I much prefer's Ole's approaches last season than this season, he was very proactive in regards to the system. He made necessary adjustments in response to the availability of players due to injuries and freshness/fitness. Stick to a system only if its the best and have all the tools --> thing is we just don't the 1st half of this season. Isn't it "
odd" to stick with an essentially failed system? Easy to say everything is okay now, once he finally hit a jackpot in the form of Bruno who fit that system so well and made it works.
Erm, you do realise he has played different formations?
3-5-2
4-2-3-1
4-1-2-1-2 narrow
You can play any formation, without a creative midfielder we will struggle in any formation.
Yes, I know and remember those games.
4231 is still the main one, which we used in majority of the games.
Therefore getting more creative midfielders (relying on just one is just "odd") should be one of the early necessity. Alternatively is to use creative players who are not a midfielder. We do have that kind of players isn't it within the first and youth teams, but Ole decided to not "try" them and stick with continue trusting the "trio" who kept on failing. To "balance" those players because of their weaknesses eg. defensively, then change of system may be considered.
1) Which players?
2) I think that was due to the fact that our midfield wasn’t geared or good enough to play other formations? Specially without Pogba and McT (who was out for quite some time as well). But which other formations would you have preferred?
In my opinion, due to the lack of quality available in midfield and up front for most parts of this season, it would’ve been a risk to try other formations in general.
1) Lingard, Pereira, Gomes, Matic (earlier, he's basically down the pecking order, rumored to be leaving even), etc. But I do get it may has to do with performances behind the scenes eg. in trainings, disciplinary issues, etc. Still, playing favoritism is just..... it's only reasonable if the player is performing. Don't get me wrong, I'm impressed with his management of other players, those are reasonably fine and especially the likes of Williams is just awesome... and who else? Greenwood is definitely moving in due to the CF/ST and RW slots opening up so just Williams.
2) I can't accept most of the other midfielders are that "limited". Surely the likes of Fred, Matic, Pereira, Mata and even gamble on the likes of Gomes, Garner, etc have all different sorts of skill sets, which needs certain roles in different systems to actually make the "certain skills" clicks to be our main weapon. Anyway, it has less to do with formation, and more with lineup, roles and taking risks more with certain players. Eg. a) since the trio senior players are failing at #10, gamble risk on Gomes, b) try Pereira on RW, c) play Greenwood more on RW (introducing him slowly is fine, but then he's far man enough than many of the senior players), d) just scrap the #10 system altogether and play with 3 man midfield instead with the likes of Fred, McT, Matic, Garner, Pereira, etc <-- those will bring Matic in earlier, and may even help settle Garner in better who is claimed to impress in trainings thus potentially could surprises us in games, could even be the answer to our problem at that time. There are plenty of other ideas. To not try new things and let things escalate losing more and more points is just pointless for me. Better try and try plus make mistakes along the way than not trying at all. The latter is putting in effort, the former is just leave it to rubbish luck. You make your own luck.
Fair enough, I do get it's a risk, experimenting at that stage is risky. But you know, if it doesn't work, then why persist for too long? Try different ways earlier before the damages are too much. Just a quick examples of the top of my head, if I recall correctly Conte's first season at Chelsea, he started with a 433 system was it? it was a bad run, then he changed it to 3-5-2 and variations of that, and then they went on that impressive run of form. The 3-?-? systems became popular. Anyway, point is, he made those changes early before things gets worse i.e. losing more precious points.
I also get that being in Ole's shoe, he had to make the big hard decisions, pressure of being a United manager... then again ever since Ole got this job permanently, starting last season, he has been making more and more "safer" decisions, there are still plenty enough of good rational decisions that are spot on of course, but then there's the "stubborn persistence" on decisions that just doesn't work or works less effectively. It's contrast to when he's the caretaker, proactive and dare to make the risky yet positive thinking decisions <-- it was awesome because it's very daring, and not really "rational" eg. dropping a proven 20 goal strikers, playing fresh new youngsters instead of proven elite players despite the form, and we went on that amazing run (ignore the results, and yes, there are other factors such as players motivations, morale, etc, even if we had bad results, I would still support those decisions of his).
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Anyhow, all those are in the past, and just my two++ cents. Let's move on. Hope Ole will learned a lot from those experiences and improve his managing and leadership. I don't mind manager "learning on the job". Manager that doesn't improve is boring. It's not just players that improves (and the opposite - gets worse). I'm worried if the same thing happen again. So far the current "manager Ole" is heavily reliance on individual players especially with this 4231 system, which may speaks volume about his "coaching prowess" ?? His (and his managing team's) good tactical prowess is only on show when he "play around" with the systems, but those are only specific games.
