Do teams play better against us than against other teams?

[Rozay]

This has been on my mind for ages. Like, years, probably. I’ve not wanted to write it as I feel it may be seen as cringeworthy, and I should just stop looking for new ways to say we’re ‘shit’.

But I can’t help it anymore. I know teams will be ‘up’ for playing United, but then I’d see them get smashed by another top side the next week all the time. They couldn’t ‘motivate themselves by playing against the best players’ in that game! One could say that it’s because those other top sides are much better than us, maybe that’s true. But I’ve watched enough games of these shit teams to know that they are really just not that good.

The Brighton that beat us. That dominated us. They’d take a few points off some of our rivals too if they could match that effort. But they will instead just play like little old Brighton and lose 6-0, whereas I think even if we played a lot better, we could not smash the team we faced that day. I watched Newcastle play against Cardiff, and they are a very rubbish side. I know we beat them, but why can’t we ever get the same fecking Newcastle that Cardiff got?!

 

[Adisa]

Myth. We allow teams play.

 

[Rozay]

Myth. We allow teams play.

More than seemingly every other team in the league? West Ham were hopeless and lost every game before playing us. Until we decided to let them be great?

 

[ClaytonBlackmoorLeftPeg]

I think it used to happen - we were the mighty Man Utd, and it was an amazing achievement of teams beat us.

From a players perspective, it’s easy to see that you would rather bust a gut and play your heart out playing the best team in the country than against Bolton.

I don’t think it’s the case anymore, there are lots of good teams, and lots of great players especially in the ‘top 6’ and clearly we are just one of many teams now. But against Fergie, teams raised their game. Not now, and can’t be used as an excuse as to why we are so poor.

 

[Adisa]

More than seemingly every other team in the league? West Ham were hopeless and lost every game before playing us. Until we decided to let them be great?

We allow team settle, let them pass without pressure. Even the most shit of teams will grow in confidence. In a lot of matches, especially away from home, that can be tantamount to suicide. The fans get on side and suddenly we are up against it .

 

[Cassidy]

No we make them look good imo. Because we’re very passive

 

[Ibi Dreams]

Probably just confirmation bias. You don't remember the relatively dull games where we beat a weak team who didn't do anything, and you don't watch enough of the other top teams to see how other teams play against them.

I know what you mean, though. It sometimes does feel like a lot of teams raise their game when they play against us, but I don't think it's significantly more than what happens with other teams, plus we have to accept responsibility for allowing them to play that way.

 

[fitforwork]

I think it used to happen - we were the mighty Man Utd, and it was an amazing achievement of teams beat us.

From a players perspective, it’s easy to see that you would rather bust a gut and play your heart out playing the best team in the country than against Bolton.

I don’t think it’s the case anymore, there are lots of good teams, and lots of great players especially in the ‘top 6’ and clearly we are just one of many teams now. But against Fergie, teams raised their game. Not now, and can’t be used as an excuse as to why we are so poor.

Yes, teams used to either bust a gut against United, or they were scared and pretty much beaten before the game started. These days teams don't fear us at all. We aren't that good.

 

[RedB4ndiT]

Teams don't attack City/Liverpool because they will get destroyed if they lose the ball.

Teams attack us as if we're a lower division team because we are set up to be passive and encourage the opposition to take their chance.

 

[Ether]

When Norwich were last in the league, it felt like they always turned up with a big performance against United but got smashed by Liverpool and City. Proper annoying, that.

 

[Canagel]

It's a myth. Teams don't raise their game against United .We just make them look like world beaters. Stop inviting pressure and play on the front foot. Teams will respect you.

 

[Rozay]

Teams don't attack City/Liverpool because they will get destroyed if they lose the ball.

Teams attack us as if we're a lower division team because we are set up to be passive and encourage the opposition to take their chance.

What about how shit Newcastle looked when they played Cardiff? Or West Ham against poorer sides?

It’s both the good teams and the poorer teams. They can never seem to match that level. Brighton harassed us all over the pitch in a way I never see in other games.

 

[Cloud7]

No they don’t, we simply allow teams to play. To be fair that isn’t something recent either, we’ve sort of always been a club like this. Even under the great man, we’ve never been a club who tended to play their opponents out of the game entirely. Contrast this to a Guardiola team, they strangle the opposition, so it’s very difficult to play your game against them, unless they have an off day.

There was someone from one of the Italian teams, it may have been Kaka, who said once that they enjoyed playing against Manchester United, because we allow teams to play their game.

This is like all those times when we mention that keepers have a worldie against us, when in fact it’s our finishing that’s poor. If you hit ten shots straight at the keeper and he saves all ten, that’s not him having a worldie.

It’s all a load of confirmation bias. United fans think everyone raises their game against us so they go looking for evidence of this and find it all over. I very much doubt that a player from Fulham would be more passionate about beating us than they would City or Chelsea. They’re all scalps against the big boys.

 

[Cliche Guevara]

They absolutely do, West Ham and Brighton being too recent examples.

I think we do encourage it, however, and need to return to the approach of going out and smashing these teams.

 

[BigRon1985]

Didn’t Sir Alex once say players were cheating their manager by raising their game against us? I remember West Ham denying us the league title in ‘95 even though they’d already been relegated.....

 

[Stacks]

More than seemingly every other team in the league? West Ham were hopeless and lost every game before playing us. Until we decided to let them be great?

We allow team settle, let them pass without pressure. Even the most shit of teams will grow in confidence. In a lot of matches, especially away from home, that can be tantamount to suicide. The fans get on side and suddenly we are up against it .

It's a myth. Teams don't raise their game against United .We just make them look like world beaters. Stop inviting pressure and play on the front foot. Teams will respect you.

Covering the least ground in the league through the lack of application of pressure, having a disjointed attack and defence. It snowballs. In fact every match is a challenge for us but on occasion, a moment of quality from one of our expensive signings can bail us out.

 

[AshRK]

It won't be wrong to say teams always raise their game when playing against us but since sir alex has left we have lost to these so called small teams because of our own incompetence.

 

[Rozay]

I think it’s easy to just say we should not be ‘passive’. That’s not how it goes. Against Brighton, we didn’t go to ‘sit back’. We were bullied and chased off the ball everytime we got it. This may be down to lack of quality, but then are we saying we don’t have enough quality for Brighton?

Tbh, we made unforced errors in that game to encourage them, but I think they were Brighton in name only that day. If that’s the Brighton that City and co smash 4 nil, then they are much better than us than I thought they were, because that looked like a very difficult team to hammer on the day.

 

[Varun]

Our style is fantastic in averaging out the field of play.

Which is unfortunate given we have the better players in 90% of the games.

 

[GodShaveTheQueen]

I definitely think the motivation is very high when teams get to play against the United team of the current few years.

Games like these could end up being the only highlight of team in the middle and lower end of the table apart from their local derbies. A win in these games gets spoken of for a few seasons and is fondly remembered in an other wise obvious, expected season where a trophy was neither expected at the start of the season and rightly so not deliver at the end of the season.

Of course, the question does arise as to why they don't turn up the similar way against City or Pool. The obvious answer being that we are a shambles and much more likely to let them spring a surprise at this current point than they are.

Go back a few years into the Fergie era and teams were less motivated and more scared of playing against United like they are today of Pep's City. I often felt teams didn't play to their best or were motivated enough against Fergie's United. Its in fact a complaint many of my rival friends had against the PL teams and managers (Yea, the Liverpool bunch mostly)

Is that extra motivation good enough to pip us? I think yes, big time. Mindsets and motivation play a huge role. How else do you explain teams performing so differently at home than they do away with exactly the same players? Its not the just crowds.

 

[Utdstar01]

I think it's a bit of both, we don't help ourselves in how we play.

 

[VeevaVee]

They do yeah. Because they know they need to play well, and now that they can get something from us if they do. We let them play their game though, and are so laboured in our build up that keepers are ready for most shots so they look like worldies. We're also poor at the back so get pulled all over the show, and we're not great at passing across the park so lose the ball when pressured. We make them look better than they are.

 

[Rozay]

They do yeah. Because they know they need to play well, and now that they can get something from us if they do. We let them play their game though, and are so laboured in our build up that keepers are ready for most shots so they look like worldies. We're also poor at the back so get pulled all over the show, and we're not great at passing across the park so lose the ball when pressured. We make them look better than they are.

We’d be the worst team in the league if that were a fair summary of us surely?

 

[Red_toad]

It's a myth. Teams don't raise their game against United .We just make them look like world beaters. Stop inviting pressure and play on the front foot. Teams will respect you.

Has been happening for decades, we've not been passive for decades. Obviously players try harder against the bigger clubs and some especially against United, as they're driven on by their fans, who all appear to hate United. Plenty of crap teams raised their games during Fergie's tenure.

 

[Andersons Dietician]

I think it used to happen - we were the mighty Man Utd, and it was an amazing achievement of teams beat us.

From a players perspective, it’s easy to see that you would rather bust a gut and play your heart out playing the best team in the country than against Bolton.

I don’t think it’s the case anymore, there are lots of good teams, and lots of great players especially in the ‘top 6’ and clearly we are just one of many teams now. But against Fergie, teams raised their game. Not now, and can’t be used as an excuse as to why we are so poor.

This, I used to dread playing Blackburn, Brad Friedel would suddenly become Buffon, there were teams for sure who I would think just out of pride would go to another level against us, unfortunately I don’t think we command that same sort of reaction now, no one fears us, they know we can be beaten and they don’t have to put in superhuman efforts for it to happen.

 

[Seveneric]

Maybe under Fergie (but even that's a stretch), but the past 3-4 years or so, why would teams do that?

 

[Camilo]

Of course not. That's just your victim mentality talking. Poor little Manchester United.

Obviously when we dominated English football for the best part of 20 years we were good enough to beat the small teams. Now that we're playing shit those smaller teams beat us. There's no mystery. We're not special. We're not different. We're just not very good.

Poor, poor Manchester United. All our money and success.

 

[bosnian_red]

We give other teams encouragement to play and attack the way we set out to play. Other big sides go and do.inate sides pretty often and put them under pressure, we usually let them play and they gain confidence. Or they see us as potential upsets because we drop so many points

 

[simplyared]

Those days are gone. No big deal playing us anymore.

 

[Treble]

More than seemingly every other team in the league? West Ham were hopeless and lost every game before playing us. Until we decided to let them be great?

WHam drew with Chelsea. United played poorly vs them. And vs Brighton too. It was obvious and stats back it up in terms of sprints, distance covered, etc.

 

[Alabaster Codify7]

No. We used to be a scalp, not any more. We're no bigger a scalp than Liverpool, City, Chelsea, Spurs or Arsenal. We are just a tumescent football team who cannot create or finish chances.

 

[Infra-red]

Teams play better against us than the other big clubs because we're worse than the other big clubs at preventing the opposition from playing. It's not really a case of them 'raising their game' because "it's United"; rather, we're just simply too passive.

 

[Regulus Arcturus Black]

Myth. We allow teams play.

This. We sit back and allow teams to play against us.

 

[Van Piorsing]

They smell the blood and they press as United are still in for some crucial transformations ahead.

 

[Class of 63]

They don't necessarily play better, but they always put 20% more effort in playing against United, always have done, and probably always will, it's if they stop and consider playing United as just another match we'll have to worry...

But that ain't happening anytime soon.

 

[Buster15]

Oh I am sure that they do.
Footballers are human and will always like to beat the 'big teams'. They would naturally put in that little extra effort to try to beat Manchester United as opposed to the likes of Cardiff city or Southampton for example.

There is the issue of Fear Factor. When United were winning everything managers sometimes fielded weaker teams but currently that is clearly not the case.

 

[Fracture90]

It's because our awful "sit deep and let the opponent have the possession" mantra that makes every average team look amazing vs. us. Also them knowing we gonna have that approach gives them extra motivation.

 

[ClaytonBlackmoorLeftPeg]

They don't necessarily play better, but they always put 20% more effort in playing against United, always have done, and probably always will, it's if they stop and consider playing United as just another match we'll have to worry...

But that ain't happening anytime soon.

I think we have reached that point, smaller clubs don’t differentiate between us and the other top 6 anymore. All teams think they have a chance against us, and the difference between us and City, Liverpool, Spurs and Chelsea is that if they had a go at any of those teams and didn’t get it right they would get smashed by 4,5,6,7 goals. If we dominate a team, we might win by 2 goals - so the consequences of having a good go at is are far less. We are not feared, Newcastle showed that last weekend.

 

[edgar allan]

They don't necessarily play better, but they always put 20% more effort in playing against United, always have done, and probably always will, it's if they stop and consider playing United as just another match we'll have to worry...

But that ain't happening anytime soon.

Sadly the often of late they don't have to put in any great extra effort to get s result

 

[lysglimt]

This has been on my mind for ages. Like, years, probably. I’ve not wanted to write it as I feel it may be seen as cringeworthy, and I should just stop looking for new ways to say we’re ‘shit’.

But I can’t help it anymore. I know teams will be ‘up’ for playing United, but then I’d see them get smashed by another top side the next week all the time. They couldn’t ‘motivate themselves by playing against the best players’ in that game! One could say that it’s because those other top sides are much better than us, maybe that’s true. But I’ve watched enough games of these shit teams to know that they are really just not that good.

The Brighton that beat us. That dominated us. They’d take a few points off some of our rivals too if they could match that effort. But they will instead just play like little old Brighton and lose 6-0, whereas I think even if we played a lot better, we could not smash the team we faced that day. I watched Newcastle play against Cardiff, and they are a very rubbish side. I know we beat them, but why can’t we ever get the same fecking Newcastle that Cardiff got?!

With that reasoning - we would surely never would have won the League...ever!