Jose: The forwards to blame for that

Today was abysmal, Jose is spot on about the forward players.... pathetic performance from Miki, Rashford, Martial and Lingard. That lot couldn't score in a brothal armed with a wallet stuffed full of £50 notes.

Miki was anonymous for the whole time he was on the pitch. I now have serious reservations about Martial and Rashford. What the £#%&! is wrong with these two? They couldn't hit a barn door and dont look natural centre forwards.

When Fellaini is the best United on the pitch you know you are trouble. The same when United player of the season is Valencia. A converted winger to right back who couldn't cross a road let a lone a football. I am sick to death of seeing him bomb up the pitch, stop at the first defender and do some kind of shuffle from his right foot to his left foot then play the ball sideways. Granted he has improved as a defender, but he is £#%&!ing useless going forward.

Patience is required with Martial and Rashford.

At a club as big as Utd, you would expect these two to be playing alongside world class players in their prime. But we don't have any of those in the final third. Very disappointed with Mikhi today, we needed him to step up to the plate in the absence of the others, and he barely did anything of note.

Originally Posted by Sparky***

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZCLdkl7BTo

2:30

very relevant comments. really digging a few players out. They know who they are.

In fairness he speaks a lot of sense there but it's too simplistic to lay the blame solely at the front 4
Build up from defence through midfield was far too slow
You need to get your forwards the ball in dangerous positions but our midfield or defenders never did that

Missed Pogba's creative passing today

We arguably missed Mata more, tbh.

Joint 2nd for best defence, tying with Chelsea (23 goals conceded each) and only behind Spurs (21).

Unfortunately we've only scored 42 goals. The lowest in the top 7 by far - even Everton have scored 52. We've scored the same amount of goals as Bournemouth and only one more than West Ham.

[/statto]

Glaringly obvious where our problems lie - it was a similar story under LVG. Only managed 49 goals last season and conceded 35, so I think we'll have improved on both by the end of the season, but there hasn't been a massive shift in Mourinho's first season. How do we change it though? More squad upheaval? Spend another few hundred mil on players? Or is it more a mentality that needs to be ruthlessly dismantled regardless of who is brought in?

Originally Posted by TheKitchenSink

Joint 2nd for best defence, tying with Chelsea (23 goals conceded each) and only behind Spurs (21).

Unfortunately we've only scored 42 goals. The lowest in the top 7 by far - even Everton have scored 52. We've scored the same amount of goals as Bournemouth and only one more than West Ham.

[/statto]

Glaringly obvious where our problems lie - it was a similar story under LVG. Only managed 49 goals last season and conceded 35, so I think we'll have improved on both by the end of the season, but there hasn't been a massive shift in Mourinho's first season. How do we change it though? More squad upheaval? Spend another few hundred mil on players? Or is it more a mentality that needs to be ruthlessly dismantled regardless of who is brought in?

There has been a shift insofar as we've lost less games than anyone other than Spurs.

A decent midfielder and a somebody else up top we'll not go far wrong.

Originally Posted by TheKitchenSink

Joint 2nd for best defence, tying with Chelsea (23 goals conceded each) and only behind Spurs (21).

Unfortunately we've only scored 42 goals. The lowest in the top 7 by far - even Everton have scored 52. We've scored the same amount of goals as Bournemouth and only one more than West Ham.

[/statto]

Glaringly obvious where our problems lie - it was a similar story under LVG. Only managed 49 goals last season and conceded 35, so I think we'll have improved on both by the end of the season, but there hasn't been a massive shift in Mourinho's first season. How do we change it though? More squad upheaval? Spend another few hundred mil on players? Or is it more a mentality that needs to be ruthlessly dismantled regardless of who is brought in?

Under LVG we didn't create chances. Now we create bundles and miss them all. £#%&!ing annoying. pretty much every attacking player has missed open nets and crucial 1v1s this season so it's not like you can drop that one bad finisher.

And you can't really throw money at it either. In isolation all our players are good finishers, but put them in a match and they're almost more likely to miss easy chances than score these days.

All I can imagine is training against DDG and Romero or whatever shooting drills they're doing is not helping.

I see that Mourinho threw our forwards under the bus last night, publicly criticising Rashford, Martial, Lingard and Mkhi for not scoring.

Mourinho needs to look closer to home. He picks one of the fastest forward line ups in the league and then, instead of employing tactics to create space for them to run at or in behind the defenders, expects them to play a slow build up game that better suits Zlatan.

It's ridiculous - Mourinho really doesn't have a clue how to adapt to the traditions of United and the evidence is on the pitch.

Originally Posted by gav81

I see that Mourinho threw our forwards under the bus last night, publicly criticising Rashford, Martial, Lingard and Mkhi for not scoring.

Mourinho needs to look closer to home. He picks one of the fastest forward line ups in the league and then, instead of employing tactics to create space for them to run at or in behind the defenders, expects them to play a slow build up game that better suits Zlatan.

It's ridiculous - Mourinho really doesn't have a clue how to adapt to the traditions of United and the evidence is on the pitch.

Never mind the"traditions", that sounds pretentious. It's just common sense. We gave them so much time to pack their blockers behind the ball.

Originally Posted by gav81

I see that Mourinho threw our forwards under the bus last night, publicly criticising Rashford, Martial, Lingard and Mkhi for not scoring.

Mourinho needs to look closer to home. He picks one of the fastest forward line ups in the league and then, instead of employing tactics to create space for them to run at or in behind the defenders, expects them to play a slow build up game that better suits Zlatan.

It's ridiculous - Mourinho really doesn't have a clue how to adapt to the traditions of United and the evidence is on the pitch.

Not exactly possible to run in behind defenders when they're camped in their own box tbf

Originally Posted by Ethers

Not exactly possible to run in behind defenders when they're camped in their own box tbf

I think a lot of us were expecting this. Frustrating. Cba going thru the reasons, we all know.

Just seen Jose interviewed but that BBC nob

Love Jose

Originally Posted by Ethers

Not exactly possible to run in behind defenders when they're camped in their own box tbf

That's a by-product of Mourinho's system. The team is so compact and organised to defend that it's difficult for the opponent to advance. The result is that the opposition are pinned back in their own half and the game becomes congested. It's very difficult to pick out a cross, play a through ball or get a clear shot in those circumstances and the game is stalemated as we keep seeing.

If instead we stretched the game, both by leaving a couple of players up the pitch when we defend and using the full width of the pitch then the game becomes more spread with much greater space for our attackers to exploit. It's obviously not as sound defensively and encourages the opponent to come out more but it opens up the game for better exciting, end to end action and creation of chances where the superior quality of our players will prevail. That is how Ferguson played and why we had all those 4-0, 3-2, 4-3, etc scorelines.

In contrast, Mourinho's tactics give us greater control but shut down the game for both sides. It really needs a Ronaldo, Hazard, Neymar calibre of player to open up the defence and be successful. But then any manager can be successful with a player like that. What we need is a manager who knows how to play a proper attacking game to score goals as a team without that quality of player.

Originally Posted by Sparky***

The time wasting we've witnessed at old trafford this season has been appalling no doubt. Particularly the game today, the Hull game and the bournemouth game. But then that's also United's fault. Is it too much to ask that United can take the lead early in a game at home? They can't time waste and defend a 1-0 defeat can they..... we are as guilty of playing into their hands as any of them are for time wasting. We make it very easy to time waste because we are so utterly brainless in most things we do.

A couple of long range efforts which Foster made look good for the cameras but other than that the West Brom defence never looked panicked or in danger of cracking. And this from a defence that hadn't kept a clean sheet in 13 away games.

Obviously the personnel has to change, the squad depth at the moment is very very poor. But also the way United approach these games in future needs to change.. too often we slip into the routine of slow, benign sideways passing -allowing the other team to organise and get breathing space. There's very little intensity about anything United do...we don't make the opposition scramble or force them into mistakes. It's one of the reasons we've hardly had any penalties this season, we don't make other teams defend on our terms. They're all quite happy for us to have the ball and recycle it endlessly infront of them because they know they're facing very little in the way of quality in wide areas, which is where they'll inevitably force us.

The movement off the ball today was also absolutely dreadful. Everybody just stood still waiting for someone to pick them out amongst 9 west brom defenders, there was no 1-2's, nobody appeared to be on the same wavelength when they got to the edge of the 18 yard box. All we had was Rashford or Martial putting their head down and running at people before hitting the first defender or just banging the ball hopefully across the area to nobody in particular. That entire starting eleven out there today for United had a grand total of 12 league goals between them. That is seriously, seriously poor.

No point in getting angry at the opposition any more - how many times can you have teams turn up at Old Trafford and do the exact same things and still not find a way around it? They are under absolutely no obligation to turn up and attempt to beat us in a game of football.

Unbelievable, and yet very believable stat.

Originally Posted by gav81

That's a by-product of Mourinho's system. The team is so compact and organised to defend that it's difficult for the opponent to advance. The result is that the opposition are pinned back in their own half and the game becomes congested. It's very difficult to pick out a cross, play a through ball or get a clear shot in those circumstances and the game is stalemated as we keep seeing.

If instead we stretched the game, both by leaving a couple of players up the pitch when we defend and using the full width of the pitch then the game becomes more spread with much greater space for our attackers to exploit. It's obviously not as sound defensively and encourages the opponent to come out more but it opens up the game for better exciting, end to end action and creation of chances where the superior quality of our players will prevail. That is how Ferguson played and why we had all those 4-0, 3-2, 4-3, etc scorelines.

In contrast, Mourinho's tactics give us greater control but shut down the game for both sides. It really needs a Ronaldo, Hazard, Neymar calibre of player to open up the defence and be successful. But then any manager can be successful with a player like that. What we need is a manager who knows how to play a proper attacking game to score goals as a team without that quality of player.

Thanks for that Rinus Michaels

Originally Posted by gav81

That's a by-product of Mourinho's system. The team is so compact and organised to defend that it's difficult for the opponent to advance. The result is that the opposition are pinned back in their own half and the game becomes congested. It's very difficult to pick out a cross, play a through ball or get a clear shot in those circumstances and the game is stalemated as we keep seeing.

If instead we stretched the game, both by leaving a couple of players up the pitch when we defend and using the full width of the pitch then the game becomes more spread with much greater space for our attackers to exploit. It's obviously not as sound defensively and encourages the opponent to come out more but it opens up the game for better exciting, end to end action and creation of chances where the superior quality of our players will prevail. That is how Ferguson played and why we had all those 4-0, 3-2, 4-3, etc scorelines.

In contrast, Mourinho's tactics give us greater control but shut down the game for both sides. It really needs a Ronaldo, Hazard, Neymar calibre of player to open up the defence and be successful. But then any manager can be successful with a player like that. What we need is a manager who knows how to play a proper attacking game to score goals as a team without that quality of player.

There's only one man who fits that bill as far as I can see. A certain Mr Roy Keane.

Originally Posted by Ethers

Not exactly possible to run in behind defenders when they're camped in their own box tbf

so you're saying it's a bit stupid to set your team up to play on the counter-attack against a packed defence? fair enough.

Originally Posted by Sapien

There's only one man who fits that bill as far as I can see. A certain Mr Roy Keane.

Keane, Giggsy, Bruce or any other ex-Red you care to mention couldn't have fared any worse post-Fergie tbf
We're not even going to make the top 4 again. Absolute £#%&!ing shambles.

Player recruitment has been shocking.

Originally Posted by MJ Ramone

Player recruitment has been shocking.

coaching and management of the players we actually have should really be a priority.

Originally Posted by jem

coaching and management of the players we actually have should really be a priority.

Agreed, we already have the best squad in the Premier League and at the start of the season most supporters said it was good enough for a title challenge. The issue is the managers not getting the best from the players with both the system and lack of motivation to blame.

Originally Posted by jem

coaching and management of the players we actually have should really be a priority.

yes it should, but bringing in the likes of Falcao, Schweinsteiger & Zlatan is reminiscent of Chelsea in the early 2000's ('name' players in their twilight years) & completely out of character for us.
It's short-term bullshit.

The rest of our post-Fergie buys speak for themselves. 3 or 4 of them might be good enough in the long term but none of them have convinced me 100% - the rest were or are shit.

We need a squad of young, hungry bad losers.
Hopefully Mourinho will put one together.

Originally Posted by gav81

Agreed, we already have the best squad in the Premier League and at the start of the season most supporters said it was good enough for a title challenge. The issue is the managers not getting the best from the players with both the system and lack of motivation to blame.

£#%&! off.