Football: Make us dream, Paulo

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Yes, some of their players most certainly gave in to their anger and frustration.

C. Ronaldo and Pogba foremost. Maguire another should've been red, was not really that vicious a foul. It was just a professional foul to cut out a clear goal scoring opportunity. A red all the same, but not really vile imo. Bruno was another candidate, where you could tentatively talk about him being lucky to not have been sent off. That was also in the frustration category, but there's a much better argument for him getting off with a yellow than for C. Ronaldo.

And yes, C. Ronaldo arguably has made United worse. It was luxury signing from the beginning. He didn't address any needs of the squad, unless he was supposed to be retrained as a DM. That's the problem in that entire United squad. Furthermore C.Ronaldo is too old and immobile to really fit into the way United supposedly want to play. He really is more of target man these days, that needs to be carried by his team, as he doesn't really help that much with closing down, defensively. He provides goals, and that's about it.

Closing down/pressing is however a concerted effort, that needs to be drilled into a team during sessions. When to do it, how to do it (who helps, which spaces need to be watched). If that's not done, you end up with whatever United were trying to do on the first goal. With a lot of players drawn out of position and spaces opening up. Space always open up to a degree when you press, but if done properly, you force the player to part with the ball early and not offer him the opportunity to pick out the best ball. Liverpool failed to do that against Real during the first leg in the CL, by allowing Kroos way too much time to pick out a target of his long range passing.

Eitherway, what I wanted to say is, if you want to play a high press game, you have to do it properly not half assed. That needs to be trained, and then you really can't afford a passenger like Ronaldo. Pep should count his blessings that United hijacked that transfer.

[Spockydog]

18 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

He really is more of target man these days, that needs to be carried by his team

Carried? Don't you mean wheeled into place by his team?

[Spockydog]

The best thing about Utd signing Ronaldo is he cannot be dropped. So they're basically stuck with him in the team, week in, week out. 

Beautiful. 

[Consigliere]

2 hours ago, Heartofice said:

At first glance every thing seemed to fall apart when Ronaldo came in, but there are so many other questions to be asked of Ole right now 

Defensively, things were falling apart before Ronaldo joined. United's shape has completely crumbled this season. Our transition into defence when possession is turned over is disorganised and chaotic (players look like they have no idea what they should be doing), our pressing has been an uncoordinated mess all season barring a few patches within games here and there and there are huge gaps between the lines which every opponent has been exploiting all season which is why we've looked so vulnerable to counters. Yesterday was just the first time a team was clinical and took full advantage of the deficiencies. Prior to yesterday it was a combination of poor finishing and De Gea that prevented us from conceding a load more goals. 

 

ETA. saying drop Ronaldo and play Cavani is a facile analysis. The issues are primarily tactical failures on the part of the manager and coaching staff and has little to do with Ronaldo not pressing much. Under Solskjaer we've gone through these spells before where the team has looked completely and utterly clueless. 

[polishgenius]

2 hours ago, Consigliere said:

 

ETA. saying drop Ronaldo and play Cavani is a facile analysis. The issues are primarily tactical failures on the part of the manager and coaching staff and has little to do with Ronaldo not pressing much.

 

Meh. Obviously it isn't the only failure, a long long long way from, but there are many things wrong with Ronaldo playing up front, and lack of pressure is only the start. Our central forward either needs to be a true nine, making the movements pushing the CBs back when we have the ball, or someone who can lay it in for Rashford/Greenwood/whoever running in from the flanks. Ronaldo does neither so he's essentially a hole in the formation both on and off the ball. Even setting aside the moral reasons he shouldn't be playing, he just doesn't fit. 


 

2 hours ago, Consigliere said:

Under Solskjaer we've gone through these spells before where the team has looked completely and utterly clueless. 

We've never been close to this bad though. Like I said to my brother on Saturday that if we only lose 4-0 tomorrow we'll have done well and I was only slightly joking. It's the first time we've been that disorganised that I couldn't even countenance the possibility we'd bed in, sit tight for the tough game and have a chance at forcing a win. It's way worse than after the 6-2 at Spurs. 

[Darryk]

It's baffling that Man U don't go all out for Conte.

[Consigliere]

1 minute ago, polishgenius said:

Meh. Obviously it isn't the only failure, a long long long way from, but there are many things wrong with Ronaldo playing up front, and lack of pressure is only the start. Our central forward either needs to be a true nine, making the movements pushing the CBs back when we have the ball, or someone who can lay it in for Rashford/Greenwood/whoever running in from the flanks. Ronaldo does neither so he's essentially a hole in the formation both on and off the ball. Even setting aside the moral reasons he shouldn't be playing, he just doesn't fit.

Maybe a better manager can figure out how to fit Ronaldo. If a world class player is somehow considered a huge hole in your team then it's the manager's fault. Like I said, Ronaldo not pressing much has little to do with the problems which are primarily tactical failures. In fact, against Atalanta, Ronaldo put in more work than Rashford or Greenwood. He put two players 13 and 16 years his juniors to shame.

 

Quote

We've never been close to this bad though. Like I said to my brother on Saturday that if we only lose 4-0 tomorrow we'll have done well and I was only slightly joking. It's the first time we've been that disorganised that I couldn't even countenance the possibility we'd bed in, sit tight for the tough game and have a chance at forcing a win. It's way worse than after the 6-2 at Spurs. 

Disagree. We've been as shit before. The Spurs game last season was bad but the Brighton game in which we fluked a win was as bad or worse than yesterday's performance. If Brighton weren't so shit in front of goal last season they'd have put six past us easy. The game against Villarreal this season was just as bad but we fluked a win so it gets forgotten - they should have put 4 past us in the first half alone. Wolves played us off the park too and should have won very comfortably. We can argue about degrees but the fact is we've gone through several spells of shockingly dire performances under Solskjaer. This is hardly a first and not a result of Ronaldo.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Out of curiosity, what formation does United want to play primarily.

Last season I would've said, the squad looks most suited to a 4-1-2-1-2 set up.

Basically doing away with the wingers, and playing Rashford/Greenwood upfront, is as a pair or alongside Cavani. Bring in a good DM (let's say Rice for the sake of the argument). And basically field a midfield forward line like this.

        Rashford  Cavani

                   Bruno

            Pogba  McTominay/vdB

                    Rice

 

Ofc, bringing in a genuine wide player like Sancho doesn't really fit that set up tactically.

[Heartofice]

1 minute ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Out of curiosity, what formation does United want to play primarily.

Last season I would've said, the squad looks most suited to a 4-1-2-1-2 set up.

Basically doing away with the wingers, and playing Rashford/Greenwood upfront, is as a pair or alongside Cavani. Bring in a good DM (let's say Rice for the sake of the argument). And basically field a midfield forward line like this.

        Rashford  Cavani

                   Bruno

            Pogba  McTominay/vdB

                    Rice

 

Ofc, bringing in a genuine wide player like Sancho doesn't really fit that set up tactically.

I think rice would be a very good addition.

You’d think with Bruno you have to play a 4231, Rashford on the left and Sancho on the right providing width ( AWB could probably be a good inverted wingback) 

I dunno, that seems like a pretty good formation, but Uniteds problems don’t especially stem from formation. They don’t press well AT ALL. I dunno why they don’t just sit in a low block all the time like West Ham ( maybe they could hire him??), would be a bit more reliable than the hap hazard defending going on now 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

No, in a 4-1-2-1-2 Bruno is still a CAM. It leaves some tactical freedom, whether you use him as a playmaker or more as a goal scoring threat going into the box himself. The CF can/should drop wider occasionally.

The problem with the 4-2-3-1 are the two CM. That's a bit too lofty with the players at hand. van de Beek and Pogba aren't defensively sound enough. McTomminay could kinda work imho. But he'd need a sound partner next to him to provide some sorta shielding for the back four. Matic, if he still can run would be my pick. But then again, why sign van de Beek, and what do you do with Pogba? You can get away with fielding them against lesser teams, but if you run into decent/good teams you ask for trouble. If you reach the conclusion that van de Beek and Pogba are defensively not sound enough and suddenly arrive at a Fred McTomminay partnership by default, then that formation is probably not an ideal fit. Plus you are more likely being forced to push the back four up a bit further to make sure the gap between the back four and midfield doesn't get too big. There you'd really want CBs, who are quick on their feet, so that opposing forwards are not outrunning them after a longball found its way behind the defense. Maguire isn't exactly a pacey centre back. You can play it, but I don't think that's an ideal formation for the United team.

[mormont]

This is getting towards the real issue though, which is that Man Utd are signing players because they're good players and not because they have a plan. Wan-Bissaka is a good player but not an attacking full-back, which is fine if tactically you don't rely on full-backs for creativity. CRonaldo is a good signing if you don't need him to press from the front. Sancho is a good signing if you're going to go for width. But if you asked me if any of these signings were good signings for Man Utd under Solskjaer, I literally couldn't tell you, because I have no idea if Solksjaer believes in using FBs creatively, or what his pressing strategy is, or if he even favours wingers or inverted wingers or what.

[polishgenius]

4 hours ago, Heartofice said:

I think rice would be a very good addition.

Rice is a really good player but he wouldn't solve any of the problems we have, he'd just be better a bit better at plastering over them than Fred or McTominay. You'd still not be able to play him holding the defensive duties on his own with Pogba alongside - he's still a defensively-focused but box-to-box midfielder who doesn't long-pass consistently well, so like both of them, you get either sitting defensive duties or good ball progression out of him, but not both, and he's not naturally suited to sitting deep so it'd be a waste.  
I mean, if Pogba left then you could think about Rice and another partner who can do a bit of both and would balance better with Bruno in front, and tears for the Van de Beek cult. But however frustrating he can be, keeping Pogba if you can get him working is a better idea than selling Pogba.

 

 

4 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

There you'd really want CBs, who are quick on their feet, so that opposing forwards are not outrunning them after a longball found its way behind the defense. Maguire isn't exactly a pacey centre back. You can play it, but I don't think that's an ideal formation for the United team.

When things are working, Maguire helps because he's a very good passer and very good positionally and can therefore support the midfield really well - but he needs a fast partner to cover behind him. The one idea Ole definitely had this season was Varane would allow us to push the defence higher and support the midfield that way, but sticking with that plan even when Varane is out has been absurdly stupid.



But ultimately Mormont's right that there's no solid overall plan, though coaching's a bigger problem than tactics for me. Like right now we don't, Ole's got no clue how to fit Ronaldo and Sancho in and also keep Pogba involved without breaking midfield, so that's a mess, but generally speaking through Ole's time we've known what we're trying to do, though it's taken him longer to get there than it should, but there's been no point where the teamwide execution of any given gameplan smacked of having trained it week-in week-out till it was down and that won't change even if he did somehow figure out some way to keep everyone happy and positionally gelling in the current situation. 


I don't think it's fair to say we bought Sancho without a clear plan, I think what he was meant to do was fairly obvious- act to stretch low blocks by adding genuinely creative wideplay and by being our only player really comfortable at dribbling at low speeds, so able to drag a compact low block apart by running into it. But he hasn't worked out yet and Ole seems undecided about how to get him into the groove, it's weird.

[Soylent Brown]

For me, the biggest problem with Pogba's situation is Fernandes. I don't think you can afford to have them both in a midfield three at the same time, and if you're playing 4-2-3-1 to accommodate him that way then Pogba probably isn't best suited to playing in a 2 either.

I guess you could stay with 4-3-3 and move Fernandes into the forwards, but then you're dropping one of the many good forwards United have and gimping Fernandes' runs from deep.

Probably the best solution would be to bin Pogba off and make sure you have two guys behind Fernandes in midfield who are happy to work hard.

[BigFatCoward]

Walter Smith has died. 10 league titles (even in Scotland) is no joke. 

[Soylent Brown]

As far as our midfield situation goes, Keita's injury doesn't sound too bad at least. His leg wasn't planted when Pogba tried to do a bad murder on him, but he is made of biscuits so I expected the worst. Just bruising though, apparently.

Fabinho will hopefully be back for the Brighton game, and Thiago the week after, it seems.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

12 hours ago, polishgenius said:

When things are working, Maguire helps because he's a very good passer and very good positionally and can therefore support the midfield really well - but he needs a fast partner to cover behind him. The one idea Ole definitely had this season was Varane would allow us to push the defence higher and support the midfield that way, but sticking with that plan even when Varane is out has been absurdly stupid.

A high line is still not doing Maguire any favours, which is the point. That highlights the issue with Maguire's (lack of) pace. Which is the entire point. If your entire matchplan is build one Varane never ever being injured, then that's sorta problem, too. Don't you think?

[Mark Antony]

1 hour ago, Soylent Brown said:

As far as our midfield situation goes, Keita's injury doesn't sound too bad at least. His leg wasn't planted when Pogba tried to do a bad murder on him, but he is made of biscuits so I expected the worst. Just bruising though, apparently.

Fabinho will hopefully be back for the Brighton game, and Thiago the week after, it seems.

Keita getting stretchered off and being relatively fine is the last thing I expected lol. 

[Iskaral Pust]

If OGS retains his job, the lesson he’ll take away from Liverpool is to play like the last 30 minutes and keep the entire team in their defensive half in a deep shell and look to burst forward occasionally.  At least against teams with any strong attack.  I’m not saying it will work, but that’s what trauma does to people.

[mormont]

3 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

Walter Smith has died. 10 league titles (even in Scotland) is no joke. 

He had a decent stint as Scotland manager too: steadied the ship after the Berti Vogts experiment went, shall we say, poorly. 

I had a lot of time for Walter Smith - he seemed a pretty decent guy as well as a pretty good manager. His time at Everton was, unfortunately, badly timed. With proper backing he could have done well.

[Consigliere]

It's unfortunate that United's board are reluctant to sack Solskjaer. He's been shown more faith than he's actually earned and more than Moyes, LVG or Mourinho were given. If he's staying, he needs to go back to what he's comfortable with i.e. playing in a midblock and pressing in the middle third of the pitch rather than high up. Solskjaer doesn't have the ability to set up a high line high press system - that kind of system needs a much higher calibre of manager to successfully implement. We already saw with Lampard what happens to good players when a mediocre manager tries to implement a system that's beyond his abilities to properly set up. Kante, Kovacic and Jorginho (plus the defence) all ended up looking like clueless bums and were shipping goals for fun.