What is our problem?

[KM]

Our biggest problem is our fan base who have rubbish expectations and small memory.

They have forgotten the last four seasons and have completely disregarded the progress made in this season.

They've forgotten that we were beaten by the likes of Southend or Leeds etc in the domestic Cup competitions when we were managed by Ferguson.

Seems hilarious that when we this Cup last season, there wasn't too much celebration. However losing one match in it is causing people to re-evaluate the manager and the squads quality.

 

[Craig Ward]

Attitude is a great shout.

But I've got a few.
Two strikers playing on the wing.
Two number 10's who can't nail down the 10 and the right hand side spot.
Pogba who isn't a nailed down 10, 8 or 6 and needs to just play in the attack somewhere causing an imbalance of an already imbalanced attacking unit.
Midfield that lacks the creative balance to put Pogba on a pedestal and make him shine. Especially with McTominay not ready and Herrera in poor form next to Matic.
Finally we have have two wingers playing fullback.

We have a solid core in Rom, Pogba, Matic, the back 2 and De Gea.
The rest......... Needs a lot of work!

Agree.

We have no balance up front, Martial is the only one who looks competent as a wide forward. mata/miki/lingard/rashford are all used out of position far too often.

We also missed a trick by not signing another CM, as we overwork matic and when pogba is out we struggle. Herrera/fellaini not quite upto it, even when fully fit.

The attitude thing is still a big factor for me, as we have tried the "throw money at it" approach and it isn't working.

These players play for Manchester United, even if Rashford is on the wing instead of central striker, surely he can still take the game to his opponent. When we win 4-0 we look good, when we need a result, we look atrocious and the big thing for me is, we show absolutely no desire or willingness to run the extra yard. No leader, no captain to lead by example and too many instances of poor decision making.

SAF got the best out of poor squads, he always got the most out of his players. The Bristol game showed that Jose cannot do this throughout his squad. Jose does it to some degree, but the fringe players showed no desire to win that game.

 

[iamherenow]

our creativity is weak,besides pogba and maybe martial or Mata...the rest are runners that gets on the end of things..mhiki is too inconsistent to be playing for us..mourinho knows this,that's why he is targeting ozil and savic to help in that regard and a full back that bombs forward in sandro..

 

[tony54]

I think our demise started from when Sir Alex was in charge and then this was worstened by the stupid signing of
two bad managers and to a point the signing of Mourino may be part of our present situation. I like Mourino but think he
can alienate players too easily and I doubt whether the players like playing his negative style of play. This coupled with a leaderless team of players is not a good mix. We are also saddled with mediocre, individualist players who seem to have lost some spirit and all of the above are not making MU a club that the worlds best players would want to come to.
At the heart of all successful teams are good logistics, management and strong characters on the field and to get these, attitudes have to change at the club. The Glaziers need to get a new chief executive [ get the logistics improved} who loves his football, sack the scouts, and Mourino needs to change his mind set to long term or bow out now.
ps, And get some younger players with pace and stamina especially in the mid field.

 

[Red_Aaron]

our midfield is the problem, its reason we struggle to dominate games and maintain control despite clearly having some excellent players

we've the best goalie in the world, our defensive record is excellent and our strikers have been scoring at a decent rate.

unfortunately the glue that sticks all those things together has been largely missing for various reasons.
pogba and matic together are excellent but haven't played enough largely due to Pogba not being available.

we've still an issue at 10 however we all thought mhiki was an inspired signing but it's just not worked out for him, at least not yet.

if pogba and matic can both stay in the side now for a prolonged period you'll see an upturn in our control of games which will then spread confidence to us fans.

to be fair our points record in the league is excellent and we walked our CL group
Citys form is overshadowing these things and as we're the biggest club in the land with a prickly character in charge we're the lightening rod for most of the backlash.
if we've got a 'problem' then what does that say about Arsenal, Liverpool and reigning champions Chelsea?

 

[tony54]

Agree, we are light in the midfield. But maybe our good defense is at the cost of leaving the midfield too thin.
If you compare Vidic with Smalling you can hopefully see that Vidic got up close to the half way line through out a match whilst Smalling just goal hangs. This action alone strengthens the midfield. Likewise when we have mata and Miti playing they dont have the speed and strength to track back and bolster the midfield and this is why we are overrun in too many games.

 

[MancunianAngels]

I think the issue is that things aren't even that bad. If we were in 7th now, changes would be more obvious.

Had we not been up against this City team then you'd say (League Cup aside) we have improved from last season and on track for title 21.

6th to 2nd

European form improved aswell, 5 wins in a supposed harder competition.

Of course, there is still the sense that we are underachieving. Arsenal haven't made the step up from challengers/top 4 to champions since 2004.

 

[Bestietom]

Just not good enough in many areas. Pogba needs to be given the free role as playmaker and bring in another top box to box midfielder to play with Matic. A goalscoring right winger is a must, and then we need to look at the full back positions.

 

[jem]

Correct.

Mourinho: “It was another day in the office and for some of our players they probably didn't even want to come into the office today.”

I didn't see the game. Any idea which players Mourinho might have been referring to?

 

[Icemav]

Same problems as last year.

We offer little down the right because we have no right winger or RAM who is decent (Mata average and Miki a total bust), and Valencia is useless in attack and pretty poor at build up play when pressured.

Our 2 young wingers on the other side are pseudo wingers and inconsistent and poor at build up play. They have both put in some great performances and better than last year but still... should have signed Perisic.

Pogba is inconsistent because he has been absent and we have nobody to replace him, or come close.

Matic has helped the midfield and solidified things but with Fellaini out he is a one man band that is overplayed, looks knackered and his performances are starting to decline. Predictably. Chelsea fans told us this vefore the season started.

That aside our tactics have been very very negative recently and it has bled into our general play as I feared it would. The players have tacitly been told they are inferior to other teams and everything has been concentrated on the defense with our possession and attacking play going completely to bits. Poor management or practical management? You decide.

Better than last year but we have many of the same problems with a manager looking for results. Hopefully it blossoms into a master plan like Pep but afraid its hard to see at the moment. As usual our squad looks about 4 players short of where it needs to be and our young starlets about 2 seasons from maturing. Tactically though we seem to be digging a hole for ourselves but perhaps that is better than losing.

 

[Edgar Allan Pillow]

1) Lack of proper Regista.

We need someone in midfield who can control the tempo, someone who can help retain and recycle possession. Carrick did that excellently despite being underrated by vast majority. Alonso, Busquets, Schweini (pre-United) were all excellent. Denying opponents the ball is half the road to victory. Somebody who can thread passes in addition to Pogba so we don't become a unidimensional team.

2) Get a proper Wide Forward (on the right).

Not am AM like Mhki who cam drift wide, but a striker who can drift wide. Someone to complement Martial on the left. A proper goal scoring, quick and dribbly player. Sadly Depay didn't work out, but we need a better forward on right.

3) Stick with a preferred formation and regular Starting XI.

Rotation/Injuries aside, the regular tinkering of squad annoys me. Be it 4-3-3 or 5-4-1, it needs to be constant.

4) STOP DEFENSIVE MENTALITY FOR BIG GAMES!

United have traditionally been very good at counter-attacks, but we've never been a counter attacking team. We are simply not good at defending in numbers and everytime we attempt it we never keep a clean sheet.

 

[Dion]

Some of the threads are overboard, but at the same time our fans who have their heads buried in the sand are arguably just as bad. Worst thing is, Alot of those don't even know they are in that category.

I haven't seen any threads saying we're going to win the treble because we beat West Brom, which is the equivalent of this thread in reverse.

 

[minoo-utd]

Our biggest problem is our fan base who have rubbish expectations and small memory.

They have forgotten the last four seasons and have completely disregarded the progress made in this season.

They've forgotten that we were beaten by the likes of Southend or Leeds etc in the domestic Cup competitions when we were managed by Ferguson.

Seems hilarious that when we this Cup last season, there wasn't too much celebration. However losing one match in it is causing people to re-evaluate the manager and the squads quality.

Good post, the fans living match by match but at the end of the day if we finished runners up and qualified to the last 8 or 4 in C.L then it's progression for me considering we finished sixth last season and there was no C.L that's our judgment should be placed but you can never control the emotions and the love of the club we want to win something this year we want to challenge for everything.

 

[Lord SInister]

Problems? We have many, but my Top 3 would be

1. High Fan expectations. It's not end of the world if we don't win anything and/or finish outside top 4. Get back to your consoles!
2. Not spending enough money. Eddie Woodie has been skimping and we've not spent enough. We need to up our spending!
3. Not getting rid of David De Gea. Come on, he manages couple of good saves...that would never be needed, if we had decent defence ahead of the keeper. Sell him to Real and use money to fund a decent defensive line. Romero is good enough!

 

[Member 5225]

1) Lack of proper Regista.

We need someone in midfield who can control the tempo, someone who can help retain and recycle possession. Carrick did that excellently despite being underrated by vast majority. Alonso, Busquets, Schweini (pre-United) were all excellent. Denying opponents the ball is half the road to victory. Somebody who can thread passes in addition to Pogba so we don't become a unidimensional team.

2) Get a proper Wide Forward (on the right).

Not am AM like Mhki who cam drift wide, but a striker who can drift wide. Someone to complement Martial on the left. A proper goal scoring, quick and dribbly player. Sadly Depay didn't work out, but we need a better forward on right.

3) Stick with a preferred formation and regular Starting XI.

Rotation/Injuries aside, the regular tinkering of squad annoys me. Be it 4-3-3 or 5-4-1, it needs to be constant.

4) STOP DEFENSIVE MENTALITY FOR BIG GAMES!

United have traditionally been very good at counter-attacks, but we've never been a counter attacking team. We are simply not good at defending in numbers and everytime we attempt it we never keep a clean sheet.

Should be in the Football Manager thread!

 

[Edgar Allan Pillow]

Our biggest problem is our fan base

Pfft, glory hunter!

 

[TheReligion]

Our biggest problem is our fan base who have rubbish expectations and small memory.

They have forgotten the last four seasons and have completely disregarded the progress made in this season.

They've forgotten that we were beaten by the likes of Southend or Leeds etc in the domestic Cup competitions when we were managed by Ferguson.

Seems hilarious that when we this Cup last season, there wasn't too much celebration. However losing one match in it is causing people to re-evaluate the manager and the squads quality.

Well said

 

[TheReligion]

I think our demise started from when Sir Alex was in charge and then this was worstened by the stupid signing of
two bad managers and to a point the signing of Mourino may be part of our present situation. I like Mourino but think he
can alienate players too easily and I doubt whether the players like playing his negative style of play. This coupled with a leaderless team of players is not a good mix. We are also saddled with mediocre, individualist players who seem to have lost some spirit and all of the above are not making MU a club that the worlds best players would want to come to.
At the heart of all successful teams are good logistics, management and strong characters on the field and to get these, attitudes have to change at the club. The Glaziers need to get a new chief executive [ get the logistics improved} who loves his football, sack the scouts, and Mourino needs to change his mind set to long term or bow out now.
ps, And get some younger players with pace and stamina especially in the mid field.

You'd think we'd been relegated post Fergie, not won three major honours, got back into the CL knockout phase and sit 2nd in the PL

 

[VeevaVee]

We have no leaders.

Zlatan and Pogba may be good characters but I wouldn't class them as leaders.

Compare our squad to some of Fergies, Robson, Keane, Neville, Rio, shit even the likes of Beckham, Evra, were far better leaders who demanded a level of performance from their team mates. We don't have anyone doing that now.

Not saying thats the one answer but its definitely a major factor.

This is part of the problem for me. A lot of passive players. A lot have come into a team that was struggling to get top 4 and I wonder if they think it's 'good enough', or maybe they just aren't good enough. I know we'd be challenging for the PL any other season (and possibly still are), but performance wise it seems like it might be the case.

It's not about losing to a crap team or whatever, but what we see from them annoyingly often.

 

[edcunited1878]

United's problem is more fact than anything.

The manager and players have not been good enough to compete or win the league since 2012/2013. Plain and simple.

It's not a problem that they aren't good enough, that's reality. City, Chelsea and Leicester have been better since Fergie retired.

Fans bitching and complaining is a problem. It's annoying as feck as well.

 

[JohnnyKills]

Our biggest problem is our fan base who have rubbish expectations and small memory.

They have forgotten the last four seasons and have completely disregarded the progress made in this season.

They've forgotten that we were beaten by the likes of Southend or Leeds etc in the domestic Cup competitions when we were managed by Ferguson.

Seems hilarious that when we this Cup last season, there wasn't too much celebration. However losing one match in it is causing people to re-evaluate the manager and the squads quality.

I'd look at it the other way. I'd say too many posters are overly concerned about appearing like top reds, and believe that being blindly loyal makes them somehow a better fan than people who post objective criticism.

So when someone confronts them with said criticism (for example, a perfectly reasonable suggestion that one of the world's most expensive squads shouldnt be playing long ball) they try and shut the convesation down with aggression and playground insults.

 

[KM]

I'd look at it the other way. I'd say too many posters are overly concerned about appearing like top reds, and believe that being blindly loyal makes them somehow a better fan than people who post objective criticism.

So when someone confronts them with said criticism (for example, a perfectly reasonable suggestion that one of the world's most expensive squads shouldnt be playing long ball) they try and shut the convesation down with aggression and playground insults.

That's good but that doesn't happen here where the majority believe that Mourinho and Utd are shit.

 

[JohnnyKills]

United's problem is more fact than anything.

The manager and players have not been good enough to compete or win the league since 2012/2013. Plain and simple.

It's not a problem that they aren't good enough, that's reality. City, Chelsea and Leicester have been better since Fergie retired.

Fans bitching and complaining is a problem. It's annoying as feck as well.

If you don't enjoy bitching and complaining mate, why are you on a football forum? What did you expect to find - people swapping pictures of puppies and telling each other how much they love Taylor Swift?

 

[JohnnyKills]

That's good but that doesn't happen here where the majority believe that Mourinho and Utd are shit.

I don't think most people believe that. I certainly don't. But the suggestion that the football could be better, and that the negative tactics have actually cost us matches this season, is certainly fair.

 

[KM]

I don't think most people believe that. I certainly don't. But the suggestion that the football could be better, and that the negative tactics have actually cost us matches this season, is certainly fair.

It's certainly debatable. That's the second post where you've mentioned your opinion(and of similar minded people) as "fair" and "objective" which is hilarious.

 

[Class of 63]

Our problem is that every Manager isn't Alex Ferguson, every Academy graduate isn't a Paul Scholes/Ryan Giggs, and every purchase doesn't have the instant impact of Eric Cantona, apart from that we're fine.

 

[BAMSOLA]

Too many good players, not enough very good players and certainly not enough exceptional ones (possibly only one being Pogba).

We need to streamline the squad by getting rid of a couple of players who are merely good(Darmain, Blind and Mkhitaryan would be a good start).

Bringing in high quality to replace them right away would be a start. We should approach Schalke right away and offer them a decent fee for goretzka, We should be willing to spend big this window for Savic from Lazio and I'd love to see us go after Gelson Martins to fill the RW spot.

In general more exceptional (or potentially exceptional) players are needed and less merely good players like the one mentioned above.

 

[MJJ]

It's certainly debatable. That's the second post where you've mentioned your opinion(and of similar minded people) as "fair" and "objective" which is hilarious.

only took two posts to demonstrate his point.

I'd look at it the other way. I'd say too many posters are overly concerned about appearing like top reds, and believe that being blindly loyal makes them somehow a better fan than people who post objective criticism.

So when someone confronts them with said criticism (for example, a perfectly reasonable suggestion that one of the world's most expensive squads shouldnt be playing long ball) they try and shut the convesation down with aggression and playground insults.

That's good but that doesn't happen here where the majority believe that Mourinho and Utd are shit.

 

[Boycott]

only took two posts to demonstrate his point.

Quite a few posts from him recently acting as if there is a correct opinion to have and people who don't share it are in the wrong. The Utd forum is unbearable to many these days and I can see why but it's not just the doom mongers / City love in that is why. There is another camp that makes it worse of and that is the mob mentality certain posters have in jumping on a contrary opinion - typically from newbies.

 

[MJJ]

Quite a few posts from him recently acting as if there is a correct opinion to have and people who don't share it are in the wrong. The Utd forum is unbearable to many these days and I can see why but it's not just the doom mongers / City love in that is why. There is another camp that makes it worse of and that is the mob mentality certain posters have in jumping on a contrary opinion - typically from newbies.

Yup, the same mob mentality was applied when anyone dared criticised moyes, van gaal or rooney. No idea why some people have to act like top reds or cant accept that it is possible to have an opinion that is different.

 

[cyril C]

Too many good players, not enough very good players and certainly not enough exceptional ones (possibly only one being Pogba).

We need to streamline the squad by getting rid of a couple of players who are merely good(Darmain, Blind and Mkhitaryan would be a good start).

Bringing in high quality to replace them right away would be a start. We should approach Schalke right away and offer them a decent fee for goretzka, We should be willing to spend big this window for Savic from Lazio and I'd love to see us go after Gelson Martins to fill the RW spot.

In general more exceptional (or potentially exceptional) players are needed and less merely good players like the one mentioned above.

MK (and Kagawa) was the most exciting talent in Bundesliga few seasons ago, how do you know Goretzka will do a better job than these 2?

 

[Fracture90]

You can just tell that there's serious lacking in attacking coaching department. Our offense is stagnant and it all comes down to getting the ball to our flair player that's on the pitch in that moment (Martial, Rushford) and expect him to perform miracles against 2 or more opposition players.

 

[Jim Beam]

You can just tell that there's serious lacking in attacking coaching department. Our offense is stagnant and it all comes down to getting the ball to our flair player that's on the pitch in that moment (Martial, Rushford) and expect him to perform miracles against 2 or more opposition players.

We're very good this game attacking wise.

 

[Sarni]

Our biggest problem is our fan base who have rubbish expectations and small memory.

They have forgotten the last four seasons and have completely disregarded the progress made in this season.

They've forgotten that we were beaten by the likes of Southend or Leeds etc in the domestic Cup competitions when we were managed by Ferguson.

Seems hilarious that when we this Cup last season, there wasn't too much celebration. However losing one match in it is causing people to re-evaluate the manager and the squads quality.

Good post. We have had an excellent season so far, this is easily the best we have seen since Ferguson left and I will even say we are as good now as we were during his tenure after Ronaldo left if not better.

People are blinded by the fact that City won 95% of their games and somehow think it's a benchmark for doing well. It's not.

Our fan base on here has been abysmal these last few years. It unbelievable, we should be called CityCafe.

 

[Jim Beam]

We're very good this game attacking wise.

I will just quote myself because this was written 30 seconds before the second one. Good one, Jim.

 

[Jim Beam]

Good post. We have had an excellent season so far, this is easily the best we have seen since Ferguson left and I will even say we are as good now as we were during his tenure after Ronaldo left if not better.

People are blinded by the fact that City won 95% of their games and somehow think it's a benchmark for doing well. It's not.

Our fan base on here has been abysmal these last few years. It unbelievable, we should be called CityCafe.

I came into thinking they would moan if we were first also.

 

[Sarni]

I came into thinking they would moan if we were first also.

Probably right.

If we win Champions League we will have hoards of people saying we are nowhere near City anyway for all Summer.

 

[Fracture90]

We're very good this game attacking wise.

What part of my post made you believe I was referring to tonight's game in particular and not the in general?

 

[Jim Beam]

What part of my post made you believe I was referring to tonight's game in particular and not the in general?

The part where you write in the middle of the game. Is it that hard to comprehend?

 

[hobbers]

A lot of pace and power but no brains.