MercenaryChef Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 can i get one of you in england to place a bet on ole getting sacked after this weekend's loss to city? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 18 hours ago, polishgenius said: But I wish Ronaldo wasn't undroppable Me too. If not for him we would be worse off in the league and dead last in our CL group. He's almost single-handedly keeping Solskjaer in the job. The guy is clearly a liability. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spockydog Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 3 hours ago, Soylent Brown said: He was considered being worth way more than £100m by Spurs though. That's Levy for you though. He has a rather unfortunate history of overvaluing players he wants to sell, whilst undervaluing those he wants to buy. And recently, a whole bunch of journos have pivoted from lauding his famed, hard-nosed negotiating tactics, to questioning the man's competence when it comes to buying and selling players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spockydog Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 1 hour ago, MercenaryChef said: can i get one of you in england to place a bet on ole getting sacked after this weekend's loss to city? William Hill offering 5/1 that he's the next PL manager to get the sack. Not sure if you can get better odds elsewhere on that specific scenario i.e. Sacked after losing to Citeh. Happy to stick it on for you. I have Paypal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 36 minutes ago, Consigliere said: Me too. If not for him we would be worse off in the league and dead last in our CL group. He's almost single-handedly keeping Solskjaer in the job. The guy is clearly a liability. United didn't have him last year, but they somehow managed. It's not something that's easy to measure, unlike his goals and assists, but it does seem like United are playing worse overall with him in the team, so it could be that he's fixing problems that he's helped create. The alternative is that all of the other players have just gotten worse, and that OGS is somehow more inept than usual, and that seems less likely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 58 minutes ago, Soylent Brown said: United didn't have him last year, but they somehow managed. It's not something that's easy to measure, unlike his goals and assists, but it does seem like United are playing worse overall with him in the team, so it could be that he's fixing problems that he's helped create. The alternative is that all of the other players have just gotten worse, and that OGS is somehow more inept than usual, and that seems less likely. The team was playing worse before Ronaldo joined. In fact we ended last season rather poorly and that has continued into this season. Ronaldo didn't create the problems but is rather papering over the cracks. Solskjaer has lost the plot and is more inept than usual. That isn't less likely because it's exactly what has happened. This is the same kind of logic people were using to defend Lampard. Signing Chilwell, Ziyech, Thiago Silva, Mendy, Werner and Havertz all of sudden made Chelsea worse. As it turned out, Chelsea was worse because of an inept manager. Unfortunately, United's board are more desperate to keep hold of their yes man rather than doing what's best for the team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MercenaryChef Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 2 hours ago, Spockydog said: William Hill offering 5/1 that he's the next PL manager to get the sack. Not sure if you can get better odds elsewhere on that specific scenario i.e. Sacked after losing to Citeh. Happy to stick it on for you. I have Paypal. message me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 1 hour ago, Consigliere said: The team was playing worse before Ronaldo joined. In fact we ended last season rather poorly and that has continued into this season. Ronaldo didn't create the problems but is rather papering over the cracks. Solskjaer has lost the plot and is more inept than usual. That isn't less likely because it's exactly what has happened. This is the same kind of logic people were using to defend Lampard. Signing Chilwell, Ziyech, Thiago Silva, Mendy, Werner and Havertz all of sudden made Chelsea worse. As it turned out, Chelsea was worse because of an inept manager. Unfortunately, United's board are more desperate to keep hold of their yes man rather than doing what's best for the team. I'm not trying to defend OGS's position, I agree if United are serious about completing he needs to go, but I'm not convinced he's steadily getting worse either. I just don't think he's figured how to cope with the problems Ronaldo brings yet. I'm not sure the Chelsea comparison works - Chelsea weren't worse with the new players, they were about the same but with higher expectations placed on Lampard. Interesting to note as well that Tuchel turned Chelsea's fortunes around without relying too much on them, instead using a lot of the players that were already there in Lampard's first season. Other than Mendy, none of the signings have shown themselves to be huge upgrades so far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 10 minutes ago, Soylent Brown said: I'm not trying to defend OGS's position, I agree if United are serious about completing he needs to go, but I'm not convinced he's steadily getting worse either. I just don't think he's figured how to cope with the problems Ronaldo brings yet. Ronaldo doesn't really bring any major problems though. Sure, he doesn't press much but Solskjaer has never relied on a high press and United certainly never pressed with a similar intensity to City, Liverpool, Leeds or even Chelsea. Martial barely presses too but that never resulted in the teams shape completely breaking down. As I said, United finished last season poorly, especially defensively, and that has continued into this season. 14 minutes ago, Soylent Brown said: I'm not sure the Chelsea comparison works - Chelsea weren't worse with the new players, they were about the same but with higher expectations placed on Lampard. Interesting to note as well that Tuchel turned Chelsea's fortunes around without relying too much on them, instead using a lot of the players that were already there in Lampard's first season. Other than Mendy, none of the signings have shown themselves to be huge upgrades so far. Thiago Silva has been mint under Tuchel. Havertz massively improved under him too as did Werner even though he's still wasteful. Ziyech improved a lot too even though he's not a regular starter. The comparison with Chelsea absolutely works - the team looked utterly incompetent defensively under one manager yet another manager transformed those same players into one of the best defensive units in Europe. Now, United don't have as good a midfield as Chelsea does but Solskjaer should be doing better with the squad he has. This is primarliy a failure of the manager and coaching staff rather than one guy at CF not pressing much in a team that has never relied on a high press especially when the defensive frailties started showing up towards the end of last season. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 Thiago Silva has played well for Tuchel, but then so have all of the other centre backs - he's not really an upgrade there. Havertz has done okay but been a bit underwhelming, and Werner works hard but can't score. The squad Lampard inherited was a great squad. The reason I say the comparison doesn't work is because Tuchel would have been getting exactly the same results he's getting now with those players. I'm not denying a better manager would make all the difference - I completely agree there - just that Chelsea didn't really improve the first team all that much, if at all. The players were newer and shinier, but not better. United have improved their squad though - Ronaldo, Varane and Sancho are all obvious upgrades, so why are United playing as bad/worse now? OGS is useless, but I'm not convinced that he's more useless than he was this time last year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
polishgenius Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 'He doesn't press' is a massive simplification of the team problems caused by Ronaldo playing. Martial might not press but when played up front, even though he wasn't great at it, he at least made an effort to be the line-leader, run-maker, focus point. Ronaldo doesn't, he drifts deep and wide and he isn't the kind of creative player that could play false nine and be playing the wide forwards in behind. That's why I said the other day that the 2 up top works better for him, but even in that formation, you're losing team contribution for in-the-box sharpness against players who are also pretty capable of in-the-box sharpness. Ultimately the biggest issue is that in order to get the best out of Ronaldo, you have to play for/round Ronaldo (in a way that wasn't really true in his prime even with his reputation at his most selfish, because then he stretched teams with his off-the-ball movement in a way he does not now), and it's not at all clear that the team is best served by playing for Ronaldo (it should be playing for Bruno and is at its best when it does). He's not a no-value player, of course, but he shouldn't be undroppable. The idea that if he wasn't there to score those late goals none of the other forwards would score is a tad misleading. The team play would be different, the situation would be different. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Consigliere Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 The narrative that playing for Ronaldo has somehow resulted in the defensive structure of the team capitualting is a laughably bad one. The defensive structure was crumbling since the latter part of last season. Aside from the Leeds game this season, we were getting bullied by Southampton and Wolves (before Ronaldo joined) and were not any better against Everton when Ronaldo didn't start. I'll say it again: this is primarily a failure of tactics and coaching. Without Ronaldo we would be worse off in the league and dead last in our CL group. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raja Posted November 3, 2021 Author Share Posted November 3, 2021 Yo, if Poch keeps losing the man will end up at United. This is not good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 Liverpool 2-0 up so far, but we'll no doubt concede a bunch so we need to score another 3 or 4 if we want to win. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 This referee really doesn't like Sadio Mane. Gives him a yellow card when he goes to ground after being repeatedly kicked, then grumbles that he's spending too long on the ground after again being kicked in the back of the leg. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 What a horrible bunch of dickheads Atletico are. To a fucking man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 Oh well, may as well make it four in a row: It sounds like Wijnaldum is having one of his four good games a season! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soylent Brown Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 Liverpool's finishing has been diabolical in the second half. We should be 6-0 up, but it was very nearly 2-1 just. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wilbur Posted November 3, 2021 Share Posted November 3, 2021 Credit to Atleti, they have never stopped chasing. Even the elder statesman Suarez was on his horse to the bitter end. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Antony Posted November 4, 2021 Share Posted November 4, 2021 I wouldn’t be dropping Tsimikas if I was Klopp. Great game from him. Ox also looked really good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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