He didn't play well the other night. He cost us a crucial goal.
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Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 40
- Clean sheets
- 8
- Goals
- 1
- Assists
- 1
- Yellow cards
- 3
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
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Quite right but nothing strange, a common reaction of bad losers. They think they get more right the more posts they make.Some people wrote him off too quickly and instead of accepting they may have been wrong they’d rather just double down with their criticism. Comparing him to Januzaj now
No, there was nothing wrong with his decision. Had Shaw picked up Barnes earlier and gotten goalside of him, Lindelöf wouldn't have made the move, but you don't see me blaming Shaw.
Oooh, look at the contrarian. Aren't you special and unique?
You don't have to be convinced by him, but his mistake is only a mistake with the benefit of hindsight (and even then it's still not a mistake, because there was nothing wrong with his decision making) and outside of that he had a good game.
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Yes, the hypocrisy on here is absolutely ridiculous based on something you completely made up in your own mind.
Why do you keep pushing that he cost us a crucial goal? You've already been shown up on that.
Top class is a word of definition. He is by faaar the best cb we have, have gotten several Motm (and close to others) and been praised week in and week out by analyst worldwide since Ole took over, rightly so. He have the potential to become worldclass in a couple of years if he get the right partner beside him.
The way he has progressed these two month, theres no doubt in my mind he will become a stable and reliable starter for us if he excel the way he does at the moment.
One thing I do agree with the Lindelof critics about is that our defence is still ropy. Hopefully the return of Smalling fixes this. The fact Lindelof is playing well despite having a different CB partner in almost every game is a credit to him. It can’t be easy.
Nick Wright (Sky sports) write about Victor and show some statistics about him and the team-
https://www.skysports.com/football/...delof-has-overcome-a-difficult-start-to-shine
https://www.skysports.com/football/...delof-has-overcome-a-difficult-start-to-shine
There is a lot of confidence in Smalling since he's been out of the team. I'm not sure why things would improve drastically once (If ever) he stays fit enough to come back in for any length of time. Quite surprised we didn't move for a CB given how difficult Smalling finds it to remain fit and how he's never been the calming commanding influence when fit we all want him to be.....
I think Smalling is better than Jones and Bailly and our defence will get better the longer our first choice central defensive pairing can play together. Lindelof has improved a lot as an individual, the next step is for him to bring those improvements to a regular partnership. Smalling’s injury record is actually pretty good (fecking miles better than Jones/Bailly!) so that’s not a major worry.
Agreed.
The problem we have is that managers keep using this guy and keep renewing his contract. He rewarded Jose, by losing the FA Cup last season and also either scoring OGs or assisting opponents to score goals against us.
The only time Jones looks good, is when the ball is kept in the opponents third of the pitch, away from Jones.
Smalling is overrated. The defence was ropy with him in it before so why would their be any drastic change now? He's decent but hardly gamechanger.
Smalling was often a 1 man defence. When he had a good partner (Blind) we had the best defensive record - Yes De Gea helped that too.
Lindelof was very shaky before hand but now he's playing at a higher level I think they could have a good partnership. Smalling seems to prefer the RCB role though which could make it tricky.
He needs a solid partner. He's not a particularly aggressive player so we need a foil to that, but not one who then sacrifices awareness or on the ball ability. You'll see when Smalling comes back we will have a stronger defensive unit but our overall play will suffer as we sit back more and the midfield has to drop to collect the ball.
This was a messy situation where basically everybody left their normal position to cover for the other one who left his position, like a chain reaction. Of course some individuals could have done better, but I agree, the whole situation came from the midfield leaving them exposed.
Because Lindelof is getting better all the time and our midfield is giving them better protection partly because Ole’s given Hererra a new lease of life but mainly because we’re playing with more belief, which means spending a lot less time camped in our own half inviting the opposition onto us.
When you have young defenders, they are liable to make errors (unless that defender's name is Varane).
For this reason, what should happen is you pair up an coming defender with an experienced defender. Any errors made by the youngster will be covered by the experienced guy. That's part of his job to do this.
If Rio or Stam (in their prime), were with Lindelof, they'd see his mistakes before he even made it and would be there to provide cover.
Unfortunately, our experienced defender is P.Jones, who isn't particularly good and can't provide cover for anybody.
Smalling isn't great, but he is our best defender.
I doubt his addition to the team will be a "gamechanger", but it will certainly help.
Ok but what if Lindelof was very shaky because of Smallings presence? Am i the only one who noticed this change? He feels more confident to take charge of backline recently. Anyways Smalling over Jones- that's not in question individually but just curious..
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I don’t think he was shaky because of Smalling, because I don’t think he has been shaky this season, but I really do think Jones and Lindelof have worked well as partners. Also it allows Lindelof to play to the right.
No he didn't. But until now you've ignored the posts telling you why so no wonder you're still peddling this.
We shall see.
No way. How could Smalling effect him like that? Lindelof is just more settled now, knows the league better and feels like he belongs at the club.
He was too timid before but he's aggressive now, you can see him shouting at other players and so much more confident on the ball. Before he kept passing backwards and sideways under any pressure because he was scared of messing up. Now he's running upfield and launching 30 yard passes.
It was purely mental with him.
Liverpool now have 1 clean sheet in 7 games, with the only consistent factor in that back 4 is VDD. He was completely at fault for Leicester’s equaliser, too Is he rubbish as well?
What you’re asking of Lindelof is to display better prescience. He has no idea, which of the 2 strikers he was left with, would receive the ball. Blaming him for getting a 50/50 incorrect is like berating him for getting a coin toss wrong, and stinks of someone who can’t admit they were wrong about the player.
Even if the second goal was his mistake, he made up for it with the equaliser. End of discussion.
I just realised that he's the same guy who was arguing that Lindelöf being outfoxed by Alli and him not plowing through Rashford to stop Alderweireld getting to a header meant he had a bad game. He couldn't give an objective analysis of Lindelöf with a gun to his head.
Will he be our Player of Season 2018/19?
Search his name in this thread. He's not had a good word to say about him. He decided Lindelof was shit and is hellbent on refusing to accept what the rest of the sane world can see.
I see where you're coming from to an extent, I think initially Smalling was meant to be the leader between the two, however he's obviously not a leader and lead to communication issues and mistakes. Perhaps now that Lindelof is taking control himself and starting to flourish in the leadership role, in a better set up team (with more protection in midfield) we could see a much more solid/improved pairing.
Smalling isn't top class but he's better and more reliable than Jones or Bailly. Rojo isn't even worth talking about.
His return should, you'd hope, help Lindelof.
I still think the jury is out on Lindelof, but he's shown tremendous mental strength to come back from where he was. He looked utterly out of his depth at some points last season. He's been good the last few months.
His return should, you'd hope, help Lindelof.
I still think the jury is out on Lindelof, but he's shown tremendous mental strength to come back from where he was. He looked utterly out of his depth at some points last season. He's been good the last few months.
It'll be Pogba/Rashford based on current form IMO.
Varane made plenty of errors as well.
Not a chance
He's one player. He's played next to Phil Jones. You need to see the big picture to realize how much he's meant to us this season.
Best improved player since awhile?
People should watch their 'world class' players in a game. Seriously, everyone make mistakes. The difference between good and bad defender, IMHO, are their positioning, and passing skill in modern game and Victor has those plenty. Now he plays proactively, gained muscle and heading skill. He even is more commanding these days.
Very good point of view, against better opponents it is logical that it happens to everyone sometimes, otherwise it is not better opponents.
Some peoples agendas are showing through in this thread. He's coming along very nicely, was left stranded in a 2v1 for their second so it was basically a pick your poison situation where it meant leaving Wood or Barnes unmarked. At any rate the equaliser makes up for whatever mistake he made.
It'd be funny seeing him twist himself into knots trying to find something to criticise Lindelöf for, if it wasn't so tiresome (and pathetic).
Indeed. People also tend to see mistakes where they want to see mistakes. Like our contrarian up here, who has decided that Lindelöf made a mistake leading up to their second goal, despite the fact that Lindelöf's decision in that situation was a sound one.
We should form an agenda driven XI for the caf (good or bad). So far:
Peyroteo (Ronaldo)
Nou_camp99 (Lindelof)
Reckon we can make a pretty good team of players, while simultaneously creating a cheat sheet ignore list for the uninitiated.
Peyroteo (Ronaldo)
Nou_camp99 (Lindelof)
Reckon we can make a pretty good team of players, while simultaneously creating a cheat sheet ignore list for the uninitiated.
Lindelof's improvement first started while he was being partnered with Smalling. He's taken it to another level over the last month, but that's more likely to be because of Ole and the style of play rather than having Jones/Bailly as his partner. With Smalling coming back, hopefully Lindelof gets the stability to keep improving further.
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