Scholes might not be eloquent but talks like a fan. I wonder how he'd react if one of the class of 92 was in charge?
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Scholes the Pundit
- Thread starter gooDevil
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this
This. Too many pansies in our team with no pride.
Thing is, people making excuses, this isnt a one off game where we played like this. The majority of this season has been dreadful and a bit of work to even watch. For me the United way is about a tactic or style or formation, its about fighting until the final whistle, fighting for every ball and working just as hard as the opponents so that the talent shines through at the end. We have not seen that for the majority of the season, we have not seen a team that goes out to win, but merely a team that tries to avoid defeat.
I have no issues with what Scholes or Rio have to say. Theyve both played for United, both clearly love United and if we take out talent, everything else is clearly up to scratch (willing to fight / hard work etc) and thats the bare minimum.
I have no issues with what Scholes or Rio have to say. Theyve both played for United, both clearly love United and if we take out talent, everything else is clearly up to scratch (willing to fight / hard work etc) and thats the bare minimum.
I'm sick of seeing the anti-Scholes brigade think that his views are so stupid.
"he needs to let go", of what? of high standards? He says he doesn't care who the manager is, he doesn't want LvG to lose his job, he just wants United to win while playing good football. feck him for wanting that, what a terrible attitude, right?!
Looks like you have a problem with the term "deep thinkers" more than anything else. Every single field where humans are involved can be called simple or complicated depending on the angle you are looking at it from. Football is no different and it is a fact that most average watchers do not understand every tactical nuance or detail that goes on on the pitch. If we did, we'd be making some serious money managing and coaching instead of venting on an internet forum. I want pundits to explain or at least attempt to explain those things to us instead of ranting and venting. I get enough of that from here and when I head down to the pub with funnier and more colourful people might I add. This mentality that it is all a simple game that doesn't need any more thinking is probably why we keep being outwitted by those overcomplicating idiots in other countries with the national team.
And actually no, he is not logical. If he is logical, you are saying that the entire Manchester United fanbase was logical after yesterday's defeat because he was basically just saying the same things. Nobody can be that emotional and logical. Not me, not you and not Paul Scholes.
He doesn't need to let go as far as I am concerned. He can criticize as much as he like and he in fact should because, well what else is there but to criticize? The problem is his criticism is not in any way insightful or informative. He talks like an angry fan which is not what you are looking for from an TV pundit. The standard of those in England are already very low but he manages to stand out as even particularly more bland and uninteresting next to Michael Owen!! That's quite a feat.
Scholes was spot on last night. Better than any shite Gary Neville has come out with.
You can probably find posts on here saying more or less the same stuff Scholes was saying yesterday. Some of them funnier even. If that's what you are looking for in football punditry, why do you need to watch him? What does he bring to the table that cannot be found among the average fan?
He expects us to be the same we were under Ferguson. The succession plan failed, its not going to happen and him constantly and publicly referring to how we were when he was there doesnt help anyone at the club. How do the current coaching/playing staff benefit when people close to the club are ripping them to pieces? Thats one thing that most certainly would never have happened when Ferguson was there.
The whole Class of '92 thing is a weight around the club's neck and we need to ditch it and get a fresh start.
Correct me if I'm wrong but does Scholes coach or is he gaining his coaching badges? I find it hard to take pundits seriously who just want to sit and slag others off without experiencing the difficulties of coaching or atleast put an effort into learning how it's done.
I think you've bought into the mock football intelligentsia.
I'd strongly recommend watching the 'I Believe in Miracles' documentary about Clough. He kept it really simple as did SAF.
When I see Pirlo, Alonso and Henry sat around talking in hushed tones as if debating the future of Hegel it just makes me laugh.
And Clough is the authority on this subject how? I suggest you watch the work or Arrigo Sacchi, Rinus Michels, the Dutch school of total football, Pep Guardiola and many others. What is your point? Football can be whatever you want it to be. You can make it simple and and straightforward and people have succeeded doing that. And you can come up with more thorough tactical plans and philosophies and people have succeeded with that as well. If it was as simple as you suggest, why are you not doing it? It's a fun job for a football fan and I am sure you would enjoy the money that comes with it as well so what's the hold up?
It's like the people who suggest footballers are overpaid prima donnas. You know the "getting paid millions for kicking a ball, why not try a real job" brigade. Why are they doing this easy job that pays so much if it was that simple?
I think you are caught up in the nostalgia that goes with how simple and innocent the "good old" days were.
Exactly. Like in this fluid front 3 topic. A lot of people there who really believe that the Dortmund style just happens when the manager picks good player and says 'go out there, do as you like and have fun'. It's true that football is a simpe game, it's the getting good at it that is very complicated.
He said no such thing.
He said he wanted us to challenge, which any fan wants. The "class of 92 is ruining us" is a insanely stupid statement that's gotten old, and hasn't had any roots in reality.
We weren't great under Ferguson the last few seasons, but we were always challenging.
We've gone from that, through two failures as managers who no other top club in europe would stick with after the shit we were served by moyes and have been served by van gaal for so long. Barca, Real and Bayern, none of them would put up with the crap we've had to endure. He said that and it's in no way a lie.
You think him sitting there and saying "everything is fine - results will come" would in any way make the players play better?
Van Gaal has failed since he arrived, blaming that on the class of 92 is just mind-boggling.
This is so much more fair a comment. You'd like him as a pundit to give more insight, which is a fair point.
He's an angry fan who, because of his former position as a player is given a platform to be vocal about his feelings - and being paid for it.
I enjoy having him say it as it is, but i can respect anyone who thinks his job as a pundit is more than that.
Every time we come up against the best sides, it's the same. "well ermmm they have better players" comes the analysis from our esteemed pundits, Sounness and co. Football has been associated with the working class in this country forever and people don't like it intellectualized.
I just feel there is plenty of that elsewhere. Here for starters! I can head down to the pub and you can have your pick of angry fans who are pi$sed at how much we spent and how we are not playing like a top team. I don't see why pundits are paid what they are paid to just say the same stuff? It makes no sense to me. If I was cynical, I'd suggest it's all part of a game to get himself in the headlines but he comes across as genuinely hurt and as much as I like that as a fan, that is not what punditry is for.
You can find posts on here (won't mention names) by people who think that they're football scientists. The difference is that Scholes played at the very highest level and has a clue as to what he is talking about.
He looked properly deflated yesterday, I only hope there were players in the United dressing room that felt half the pain he did in studio. Rio was doing his best to cheer him up.
A few false equivalences here.
Saying a footballer is over paid isn't saying anybody could be one. Likewise football being a simple game doesn't mean any fan could be a manager.
I'm not saying Clough is the only authority but he took a Championship team and won two European Cups with them. I'd say that makes him somewhat informed. It's certainly a greater achievement than anything Guardiola has done. Same goes for SAF and Mourinho. They don't pretend football is anything overly complicated.
Scholes said we lacked technical quality and aggression and that's it summed up really. If you want more nuance than that I'd say your searching for something that doesn't exist.
It exists alright, it's just failing at Valencia.
Yeah because the working class don't like anything too intellectual.
TBH I like having a fans spokesperson on TV, one with a bit of weight. I just acknowledged that he is more fan spokesman than pundit. I get what you are saying, as he has had A LOT to moan about so how does he be positive? Roy Keane just supports the manager regardless and blames the players, probabaly because he is in the managers circle now and bangs on about "giving them time" irrespective of how they perform in their jobs
Like Keane I don't see Scholes as an diplomatic type of person, if Giggs or G. Neville was the manager and we played like we've done under Van Gaal, I honestly think he would say the same as he's done now under Van Gaal.
But there is a fine line between intellectualising and bullsh*t. Ultimately football is about finding a way to win, not theorising. Souness and Scholes know a lot about the dynamics of winning teams and are perfectly right to point out the philosopher emperor is wearing no clothes, even if he does spout pseudo philosophical crap based on what he did 20 years ago.
when you bring on Carrick and put him middle of a back 3, and a new very young striker playing wingback you don't need coaching badges to comment
I remember when fans on here were absolutely laying to Scholes early in the season for criticizing the team. He was spot on then and spot on now.
This.
Which is exactly why he should come up with more than "we spent 300m and we're not good enough yet". The bloke on the Arsenal channel who makes us laugh after every defeat of theirs speaks like that and he is not being paid by a network for it.
There were many criticizing Scholes because he was having a go at the manager and the fans did not want that. There was ample support for LVG that time and creating such a poisonous atmoshpere was not something that LVG needed.
I am still pretty sure that if Giggs was in this position, Scholes would have kept his mouth shut.
I don't disagree that Scholes is right. But saying we should have believed Scholes from the start is wrong. We trusted the manager and we wanted him to prove Scholes wrong. So big deal.
This doesn't make sense. I'm sure Scholes wanted to be proven wrong as well. We're not the only one's supporting United here.
The fact is everything Scholes said early on the season was spot on. And you didn't need hindsight to know that either. People criticized him, abused him and yet couldn't come up with a single reason for why he was wrong.
What he would have done with Giggs in charge is hypothetical not to mention irrelevant.
For me this was Scholesey's most brutal criticism:
United have settled for being the next Arsenal. And in settling for being the next Arsenal, we can't even actually be the next Arsenal. We got pounded out of a weak CL group and are at serious risk of missing out on the CL again. LVG at one time was a fantastic manager but for whatever reason he's settled for being a fourth place club and in so doing we can't even manage that.
The last thing I want for Manchester United is for them to be happy to win the FA Cup and come fourth in the Premier League. That's what Arsenal do every year. You see them out celebrating on the pitch when they come fourth in the Premier League. That can't happen at Man United.
United have settled for being the next Arsenal. And in settling for being the next Arsenal, we can't even actually be the next Arsenal. We got pounded out of a weak CL group and are at serious risk of missing out on the CL again. LVG at one time was a fantastic manager but for whatever reason he's settled for being a fourth place club and in so doing we can't even manage that.
I usually disagree with Scholes as a pundit but last night he was spot on.
Majority of the United fans wanted to give LVG the support and hope that he would come good this season even though the performances on the pitch did not reflect that. What is so difficult to understand? Many thought although the team is playing badly, LVG is trying his best and we need to give him time and scholes is trying to put a spanner in the works.
At one point United were top for the league for a day or a week. When we had Darmian and Shaw as full backs, we were actually quite decent to watch.Plus he was criticizing LVG on a regular basis which i thought was over the top and there was talk that he (class of 92) wanted Giggs to come in (cue Giggs being in charge comment)
Scholes refused to criticise Rooney who is / was one of the biggest culprits in the United team even when he was playing atrociously. This was me was very very irritating. He was very critical of Rooney before the world cup and suddenly Rooney could do no wrong when he was THE bloody worst player on the pitch in almost all the games he has played this season. This for me was the biggest reason i could not take Scholes seriously.
Dortmund is at the heart of the "Kohlenpott", the coal pot, it's a typical industrial area, all about coal and steel, heavy industry. For about 10 pounds they stand and watch their club every other Saturday. It doesn't get much more working class than that, and it's never an excuse to refuse to think.
If you want to find a way to win, you've got to look for it. If a club or a manager learns the ways of Guardiola, Van Gaal and Tuchel, and then decides that it's not the way to win, fine. But if you discard it because it's just too difficult and too much work, you're not trying to find a way to win, you'll just have to try to find excuses for beeing lazy and ignorant.
Souness knows a lot about the dynamics of losing teams too, especially as a manager. People who can't distinct fabric from skin can't judge the emperor's clothes. Soeness, Shearer, it's ignorance like that is responsible for this:
Van Gaal wasn't caught with his pants down, although he had to play a lot of kids who earned only 200k, a year. Maybe this had something to do with his pseudo philosophical crap. I'm in no doubt that Soeness shit shoveler's philosophy will get us more priceless moments at many tournaments to come.
It's not Scholes fault there are a ton of fans out there who needed more time to see that LvG is highly unlikely to get it to work.
Fair point. But it's really weird that you are calling the fans who rallied behind LVG and the club rather than joining Scholes and booing the United manager.
What good would that have done for United?
I do agree i was wrong and that i never expected LVG will be this bad. I expected that United will turn things around eventually and i thought the 3 wins last week were the start. I still want him to continue till the end of the season since we do not have any alternatives.
He is an expert analyst; his analysis should be more measured. He shouldn't speak from the heart, getting all wound up and red in the face. That's just unprofessional.
I don't think we've settled with it. It's where we are right now but just compare what we did in the summer with Arsenal. There's a definite drive to get back to the top.
Not sure if those efforts are being conducted well enough though.
You make it sound like the two are contradictory. Theorising is just a fancy way of saying "finding a way to win". If we are going to get down to it, football is 11 sweaty men chasing a ball and trying to put it in a net. Everything after that is some form of a theory. Putting 4 at the back with two either sides of the pitch and same in midfield with 2 up front and one of them maybe being a big strong lump is a theory of what is the best way to win. As is the case with every field that humans have been involved in, it has been developed and people have been coming with new ways to innovate it and make it more efficient. Some for some reason choose to focus on one point in time and call that specific point just enough theory with everything that comes after it being "pretentious" or whatever.