Why United fans should be positive - Explaining recent decisions

[passing-wind]

Completely disagree, we have bad away form and bad form at home which has been persistent for months. If our current methodology of playing transpires into next season Ole will be gone by Xmas. All of our attacking players seem incapable of being a threat against the opposition, we have become very one dimensional if it's not a counter attack we are inept tactically, something again I think will transition into next season.

Results have gone well for Ole I'll give him that but a large majority of the performances have been defensive and underwhelming. We have to look at what Ole gives us two three years down the line and in my opinion it's not enough to close the gap between City / Liverpool.

 

[Raees]

Young was our best choice. He is a better defender than Dalot. He is also more experienced.

That said, he is not good enough. This says a lot more about our previous managers recruitment imo.

He was not our best choice - he's been in diabolical form. I would rather have gambled on Dalot or a kid from the academy who has some legs, than a proven failure over the past few weeks. It was a shit selection - end of.

Ole has overall still IMO done okay, and can't really argue with his other selection decisions but that for me was unforgivable and why on earth he's still captain and offered a new contract - mind boggling stuff tbh.

Never quite understood the mentality of - if they have proven they're not good enough - keep them and give them endless chances again and again because they're 'experienced'. Feck that, take a risk, play kids instead and if you're going to lose anyway well at least you might have discovered a gem along the way.

 

[Trizy]

Imagine being an Arsenal fan. Or a Liverpool fan. Or a Spurs fan.

Our “shite” years have seen us win a European Trophy, FA Cup, League Cup. Knock out stages of the CL.

We've averaged 5th place since Fergie. That is not good enough for a serial winning team with a budget double of the above teams.

 

[Sauldogba]

Imagine being an Arsenal fan. Or a Liverpool fan. Or a Spurs fan.

Our “shite” years have seen us win a European Trophy, FA Cup, League Cup. Knock out stages of the CL.

feck that shit.
We should settle for mediocrity because Liverpool,Arsenal and Tottenham fans do?
Nah mate.
This is how turning into shambles like Arsenal and co starts.
Fans like you saying weve still won more than xxx so we should be greatful.

 

[Acquire Me]

He was not our best choice - he's been in diabolical form. I would rather have gambled on Dalot or a kid from the academy who has some legs, than a proven failure over the past few weeks. It was a shit selection - end of.

Ole has overall still IMO done okay, and can't really argue with his other selection decisions but that for me was unforgivable and why on earth he's still captain and offered a new contract - mind boggling stuff tbh.

Never quite understood the mentality of - if they have proven they're not good enough - keep them and give them endless chances again and again because they're 'experienced'. Feck that, take a risk, play kids instead and if you're going to lose anyway well at least you might have discovered a gem along the way.

Before the match I think he was right choice. After the stupid mistake, I too wish we had used another player.

Young is clearly not good enough, but that mistake is not something you expect from him tbh.

My point in all this is that Ole and our club need to rebuild. The team is not good enough.

Its okay to feel down about the match, of course we want to win. That said, we should not expect miracles. Some guys on here said we should see this season as a write off and I think they were spot on.

 

[11101]

1) The Young situation - There was no better choice than starting Ashley Young last night.
It's as simple as it says. Now that doesn't mean that Ashley Young played well or that Ashley Young didn't make a mistake, it just simply means that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer made the logical choice. He couldn't play Eric Bailly at right back. We have seen how that turns out. Luke Shaw was gone. Valencia is on his way out. Darmian has played six times total this year and hasn't been seen for months. Rojo just got torn to shreds against West Ham. The only viable alternative is Dalot and realistically he has shown less defensively than Young. Ole could do nothing about this situation.

I can't agree with this one. Young is in the team because he is the Captain, and as an SAF product Ole sees the benefit of having a popular figure to manage the dressing room for him. If he genuinely thinks Young is our best playing option then any worry about his suitability as manager is well founded.

It's gone beyond just being poor in attack, we're at the point of Young costing us a goal a game. Not just by being part of the defence, but literally costing us goals by giving the ball away in dangerous places, losing his man, playing people onside. Say what you like about Darmian, Dalot, Bailly, or whoever. None of them are as bad as Young is right now.

 

[Di Maria's angel]

2014 - April; sacked Moyes, cue positivity. Hired van Gaal. Total football with a philosophy. Talks of a warchest.
2015 - April; think we were 3rd at one point, maybe 2nd. Things looked OK. Will spend more money.
2016 - April; totally failing in the league, atleast we had an FA cup final and Mourinho was looking likely to be appointed. More talks of a warchest.
2017 - April; again, league form was shite, but we had the EL final and EFL. Mojo back? Likely to spend more money.
2018 - April; 2nd the league, still doom and gloom given the CL. Had an FA cup final coming up. Again talks of spending more.
2019 - April; league form not so bad, still lingering around 6th, similar problems as before. Biggest warchest available.

Honestly, we've been here before. There have been numerous false dawns and I don't see how anything we've witnessed over the last four months would illustrate our fortunes are about to change. We're literally becoming the thing we feared most - Liverpool.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

We have bought poorly. That shit happens. It happens at every club. I’m hoping with a change in manager we can put that right. I place the last three years of mediocrity on Mourinho and his team.

You can’t put this all on Mourinho - we have bought badly for 10 years now under 4 managers (yes, even Fergie towards the end). I’m afraid I can’t just dismiss it as “shit happens” - it’s the one constant during our decline and indicates major structural problems around recruitment and squad management.

I'm all for a bit of positivity but this is the elephant in the room. Our transfer dealings have been abysmal, for fecking ages. Even through my most red-tinted spectacles I'm struggling to convince myself that the manager of Molde (with all due respect) will have a better eye for a signing/contacts in the transfer market than any of the previous three managers. So on what basis are we expecting better signings this summer than over the previous several years?

Ole's done brilliantly so far at getting the best out of a bunch of disheartened players, whose confidence had been wrecked under Mourinho. Rebuilding a team by buying and selling CL quality players requires a completely different skillset and these are skills completely absent from Ole's cv.

 

[dangler]

Good post buddy.

I'm sure it will be dissected and each point attacked but I'm also positive about the future.

Ole is a much better choice than Pochettino. At least he had won stuff both as manager and player and know what it takes. The difference between winning and finishing second is huge and requires something special to achieve.

Also Glazers seem to be adopting the american football trend of letting contracts run down, so we should get rid of most of the expiring squad.

Woodward is not there yet but he's getting better with transfer deals. It might take another 2-ish years to become smart and fast on the transfer market but the football quality should improve from next year with some fresh blood.

The biggest worry for me is that our top players seem to not care much. There is some complacency and lack of hunger. I guess when you play with subpar players it's expected.

We need to bring players with winning mentality and desire to get better themselves instead of gold diggers, no more Di Maria's and the likes. I hope that Ole could identify 2 such guys this transfer window.

 

[deadrevelz]

Good post. Like others I disagree about Young though. Would have played Dalot and either Jones or Smalling at RB. Or maybe Lindelof LB and Dalot RB.

 

[redIndianDevil]

We appointed Ole too soon. He is not the man for the job. I'm happy to be proven wrong but he will lost long IMHO, he doesn't have the coaching credentials/talent or enough experience of handling a huge transition like ours. I fear we have lost another season because of another hurried idiotic decision, we will not just lose a year we may lose a year more if we don't sign players properly next season.

 

[Smores]

Oh feck off with the forced positivity, people are allowed to be pissed off and disillusioned. Most of what you've written is biased bollocks written as insight and it just makes it all the worse.

To be honest this might be the most disillusioned I've been. A little part of my hope died when Jose was sacked as after two failed managers i thought he'd get us back and whilst better than the previous two it still turned to shit. Now I'm just annoyed that i was right in thinking it was also the players, i wanted to be wrong on that.

I'm happy to put some faith in Ole but not this bunch of no hoper players.

 

[GazTheLegend]

The Young situation is not excusable. He is playing because he is one of Ole's favourites, if performances had any weight in the decision he wouldn't be playing. Extending his contract and the contract of jones is just rewarding mediocrity.

Beyond that I'll give Ole the benefit of the doubt for now.

Who the feck else is available at left back that could have done a job vs -Barcelona- of all teams?

Wtf is going on with these forums am I in bizarro world where we have a load of hidden world class players that solskjaer is refusing to pick out of stubbornness

 

[Hawks2008]

Who the feck else is available at left back that could have done a job vs -Barcelona- of all teams?

Wtf is going on with these forums am I in bizarro world where we have a load of hidden world class players that solskjaer is refusing to pick out of stubbornness

I explained in another post in this thread why Dalot should have played. There's no way he can be worse than Young. It's favouritism plain and simple.

 

[duffer]

Where's the "This is fine" meme when you need it?

 

[Murder on Zidane's Floor]

This thread feels like our Ty - Wenger moment.

 

[Smores]

Who the feck else is available at left back that could have done a job vs -Barcelona- of all teams?

Wtf is going on with these forums am I in bizarro world where we have a load of hidden world class players that solskjaer is refusing to pick out of stubbornness

You know who, why do people keep asking that question as if they don't? I can only assume it's a false question trying to make some clever point.

No you're right the player on his last legs who is in terrible form was definitely the right choice. I hope Young starts every game

 

[dangler]

I'm all for a bit of positivity but this is the elephant in the room. Our transfer dealings have been abysmal, for fecking ages. Even through my most red-tinted spectacles I'm struggling to convince myself that the manager of Molde (with all due respect) will have a better eye for a signing/contacts in the transfer market than any of the previous three managers. So on what basis are we expecting better signings this summer than over the previous several years?

Ole's done brilliantly so far at getting the best out of a bunch of disheartened players, whose confidence had been wrecked under Mourinho. Rebuilding a team by buying and selling CL quality players requires a completely different skillset and these are skills completely absent from Ole's cv.

Ole has an idea of how he wants to play and hopefully will buy players that help him get there. We won't challenge for titles next year unless we get a lucky run but we could get closer. Even if we finish fourth next year we should look more like Wenger's Arsenal than Moyes's Everton.

The last couple of managers had weird, maybe even outdated tactics. I don't think we even need to discuss Moyes.

LVG really lacked quality to play the way he wanted. It could have worked if we had Barca or Bayern teams but he had slow and fat Rooney. To get there he needed to spend 600-700m which he wasn't given. He was also too stubborn or clueless to change his style or as he loved to call it - philosophy. As much his as the board's mistake. I like to think of it as unfortunate blip. It could have gone either way, it went the tedious way.

Mourinho was another risky signing and the fan base was split 50/50. Yes he was bad but he never fit United to begin with. He was backed to some extend almost like the board were 50/50 with him too. There were ton of articles and interviews about Mourinho and what went wrong, lets just leave it at it went wrong. I don't think it could have ended good long term but he half did what he was supposed to and gave us some titles. It was still boring and he alienated the squad. Too many blips or what? At some point we should look at the guy hiring and keeping them there.

Ole is still new and we can't know how it will go but he has the drive and you see that he lacks the ego or stubbornness of previous goat managers we've had. Very nice, very honest dude, who says things as they are. He may actually be willing to adapt and learn instead of blaming everything and everyone for his team's failures. He's the only manager I'm really excited to have. I was pro-Mourinho because I couldn't see other options at that time and LVG football was making me sad and miserable. I was never excited with him thought as I am with OGS. I hope that the board will give him 100% support and 2-3 years to get the squad going instead of half-assing it once again.

 

[deadrevelz]

I'm all for a bit of positivity but this is the elephant in the room. Our transfer dealings have been abysmal, for fecking ages. Even through my most red-tinted spectacles I'm struggling to convince myself that the manager of Molde (with all due respect) will have a better eye for a signing/contacts in the transfer market than any of the previous three managers. So on what basis are we expecting better signings this summer than over the previous several years?

Ole's done brilliantly so far at getting the best out of a bunch of disheartened players, whose confidence had been wrecked under Mourinho. Rebuilding a team by buying and selling CL quality players requires a completely different skillset and these are skills completely absent from Ole's cv.

The fact that our signings have been abysmal for 6 years points to something other than simply the managers though. If it was down to experience and having the right CV, why did Moyes, LVG and Jose fail?

As has been stated many times, the main issue is the scatter gun approach with idiosyncratic signings from very different managers, none of whom really fit the way United had operated for 30 years. Solksjaer - I believe - does know which types of players he wants and will try to build a positive and well fitting style of play for the club.

We don't know if he is any good at picking players, though I'm unsure if that's as big an issue as you think. Ferguson made lots of bad choices, as does Pep. The scouting team is mainly responsible for finding the players, unless they are well known anyway, in which case you know what you are getting. The managers job is to pick the players based on the style of play / age / position etc, not so much talent.

The fact that Ole was a part of the club as a player and coach for over 12 years surely helps him when identifying players? He's seen how different players fare at a top club, the successes and failures.

I'm confident whatever happens, Ole will leave the club in a better position than when he joined, which is a big improvement over our last 3 managers.

 

[dove]

Who the feck else is available at left back that could have done a job vs -Barcelona- of all teams?

Wtf is going on with these forums am I in bizarro world where we have a load of hidden world class players that solskjaer is refusing to pick out of stubbornness

Yeah you definitely are in bizarro world if you wan't see that certain players get picked no matter how shite form they are in. Young and Lingard are prime examples. OK fair enough we didn't have much options in fullbacks against Barca but that's not the point. The point is, Young has always been picked before Barca game and he will always be picked for the rest of the season.

 

[RedSky]

Agree with the OP. Big Summer of transfers coming up, we have to get this right.

 

[ROFLUTION]

Agree with just about every point on that OP. Well articulated too. Another thing for me is the whole "We have not spent wisely" part. It's easy to say this in hindsight, but I feel that this too should be seen with the right context. The appointments of both LvG and Jose were seen as the right decisions by the majority of the fanbase (I said majority, so let's not quibble) and both managers came in wanting their own players and with their own vision. I don't think anyone can argue that they were given their targets even when some were puzzling. From Schneiderlin, Schweinsteiger and Memphis to Mkhi, Lukaku and Pogba, virtually all our purchasing was done to meet the manager's demands. In hindsight, it's easy to say that this was wrong and that we should have had a DoF who decided on our style and who to sign - but the question that remains is whether the managers in question would ever have accepted a role where they were (as Jose put it) just "coaches" and not "managers". Both wanted control and both got it.

It might be easy to say that "we havent spent wisely" in hindsight, but it's also very necessary to take a look back and see where our failings lie, and what we should do different this time around. The main-failing has probably been that we haven't hired a manager who fits the history of attacking and playing in a direct, fast way at the club. As you mention, we fans, also just wanted LVG and Mourinho but we need to learn from all this. A lot of Woodward's decisions reflects what the fans want here and now, and I'm not sure this short-thinking is very healthy. In turn this change of manager has led us to spend a lot more than necessary on each project to make up for the previous failings.

So we might have given the managers money, but we've also blindly believed that each manager were the true saviors, and we would only have to buy players for the long future to that one system. In that sense, we have not spent wisely, when for instance Lukaku, Matic, Blind, Depay, Schweinsteiger, etc, etc doesn't fit a new manager's style. Spending wisely would be to have players that every new manager could use, so we wouldn't end up with a Frankenstein of different players for different systems. Now Ole have to find players that fits his system again. So do we learn from all this? We don't know yet, but a DoF has not been hired.

So at the moment we're still without a DoF - Who should be a big part of this whole revival project and learning process... And possibly spunking 300m this summer.

Part of "We've not spent wisely" is also about not maintaining the squad. To me, needing to spend a feckton this year is just a sign of not having spent wisely maintaining the last 5 years. We've cried out for a right winger - Then Jose goes and places Sanchez on the left, fecking up 3 players development and game-time (Sanchez, Rashford, Martial). Where is the understanding/balancing of expectations between Woodward and manager here?

I like all the positivism, dislike all the Young-hating and I understand how Woodward has been pragmatically handling a lot of situations correct - But we're not seeing signs of a good overall plan in place yet.

 

[GBBQ]

I'm all for a bit of positivity but this is the elephant in the room. Our transfer dealings have been abysmal, for fecking ages. Even through my most red-tinted spectacles I'm struggling to convince myself that the manager of Molde (with all due respect) will have a better eye for a signing/contacts in the transfer market than any of the previous three managers. So on what basis are we expecting better signings this summer than over the previous several years?

Ole's done brilliantly so far at getting the best out of a bunch of disheartened players, whose confidence had been wrecked under Mourinho. Rebuilding a team by buying and selling CL quality players requires a completely different skillset and these are skills completely absent from Ole's cv.

I mean this should be a selling point to a lot of up and coming players. Neymar might not pack his bags to join Ole in Manchester but I think the lure of the club, the reaction of the young players and (lets face it) the buckets of cash we can provide would be enough to attract some top class players.

 

[Dr. StrangeHate]

The next generation of guaranteed world class players (Mbappe, Sane, Sterling, De ligt, Dembele, De Jong, Sancho, Saul, etc.) are already accounted for by the big clubs. We are not getting any of those. The already world class players are not going to come to us. Why would they? Our scouting department is not good enough to identify a Salah, De Bruyne, or Silva. Until Pep leaves the PL we are not winning the PL. Ole is a complete unknown quantity at the top level. There is not much to be positive about. We are looking at atleast 3 more years of irrelevance.

 

[Leftback99]

Who the feck else is available at left back that could have done a job vs -Barcelona- of all teams?

Wtf is going on with these forums am I in bizarro world where we have a load of hidden world class players that solskjaer is refusing to pick out of stubbornness

Dalot would have played like prime Evra you just can't see it.

It seems that at least 50% of the moans are over Young playing. Like it would have made any difference.

 

[GazTheLegend]

Yeah you definitely are in bizarro world if you wan't see that certain players get picked no matter how shite form they are in. Young and Lingard are prime examples. OK fair enough we didn't have much options in fullbacks against Barca but that's not the point. The point is, Young has always been picked before Barca game and he will always be picked for the rest of the season.

Solskjaer hasn’t even had a transfer window yet sjfmakdmkdmAndndmsms

Football fans really are the absolute most knee jerk cringey mofos in the sporting world

Like - Solskjaer has had no transfer windows. He has a squad of 22 players and some green academy footballers.

What do you actually, realistically expect? He can’t magic up football players. He has to work with what he has. What he has - is Ashley Young and Phil Jones. You haven’t even given me an answer. What team do you pick that beats Barcelona over two legs out of our squad?

 

[Swearing Budgie]

Regarding signings, I find it strange that United never go in early for a player that everyone has been raving about - think Erikkson before he joined Spurs. He was one of the biggest emerging talents in European football and we didn't make an attempt to sign him, I think Spurs had a clear run at him.

United usually wait until such a player inevitably becomes one of the best players in the league, then try to buy him for about 10 times what he cost when he first came to the Prem.

There are plenty more examples of this. I just can't think of them right now. So there.

 

[Sylar]

The summer dictates how we go on. Whether we have CL or not, it will be interesting to see how many people we recruit, how many changes we make, how much money we spend.

It does seem like we seem to spend more when we arent in the CL (we finished second last season, and one of our signings was a GK on a free) whereas when we finished 7th and 5th, we did spend more and thus gave higher wages.

 

[bosnian_red]

Yeah theres really not that many reasons to be negative. Ole turned us around and since he took over, we've performed like ~ the 3rd best team in the league. That is our max level with this group, it's crazy to think otherwise. We made it to a CL quarter final and the FA Cup quarter final. We made a good account of ourselves in big games, but Barcelona, not surprisingly at all, were just way better than us. Theyve been way better then us almost every year for the past 20-30 or so years too. That's not some shock to be outclassed by a team that has the best player ever in their squad, especially considering all the problems we've had.

There is work to be done, of course there is. Nothing wrong with that though. It's not a 1 summer job, which is why it makes sense to extend loyal hard working and versatile squad players. Players like Young and Jones have survived this long exactly because they are loyal, hard working, versatile and have a good mentality, and with all the managerial turnover, each new manager will have no problem keeping them around initially and getting rid of the players with questionable mentalities.

Going forward with Ole I'm more optimistic than I was at any point since Fergie retired. We likely won't win the title in the next 2 years IMO, but you know that Olr will have the right mentality and try to build us in the right way, playing the right style. I had no faith in Mourinho because his ideal side with endless spending isnt what I ever want to see at United. Van Gaal's ideals were also way too boring and slow. Moyes never had the right mentality and never knew what was required. Patience is needed because we do have a relatively young squad, we have some extremely promising players (who do need to work hard themselves and make the step up as well), and with all the turnover we'll have, itll take time. We will almost definitely see around 15 players leave over the next 2 seasons and the summer before the 3rd, and then bring in ~10 hopefully. That's what is needed over the next few years but as long as we see steady improvement, everyone should be happy enough.

Everyone loves complaining about how shit the last 6 years have been, but it really hasnt been so bad since Ole took over. Ignore what happened before, it doesnt do anyone any good to complain about anything that happened previously, it's a fresh start and things have been relatively good again, though clear at the same time that work is needed.

 

[bosnian_red]

Regarding signings, I find it strange that United never go in early for a player that everyone has been raving about - think Erikkson before he joined Spurs. He was one of the biggest emerging talents in European football and we didn't make an attempt to sign him, I think Spurs had a clear run at him.

United usually wait until such a player inevitably becomes one of the best players in the league, then try to buy him for about 10 times what he cost when he first came to the Prem.

There are plenty more examples of this. I just can't think of them right now. So there.

Martial/depay/dalot/Shaw/bailly/lindelof since Fergie retired. Haven't worked out as well as we all hoped yet (no thanks to the playing styles of the previous managers as well)

 

[Pogue Mahone]

I mean this should be a selling point to a lot of up and coming players. Neymar might not pack his bags to join Ole in Manchester but I think the lure of the club, the reaction of the young players and (lets face it) the buckets of cash we can provide would be enough to attract some top class players.

Yeah, definitely. I just wish I had a bit more faith in anyone at the club telling the difference between the genuinely "top class players" and all the other dross we've spent millions on over the last 7 years.

 

[JPRouve]

I mean this should be a selling point to a lot of up and coming players. Neymar might not pack his bags to join Ole in Manchester but I think the lure of the club, the reaction of the young players and (lets face it) the buckets of cash we can provide would be enough to attract some top class players.

That's a good point and that's why I'm optimistic if we bring technical directors, I feel that Ole is a good coach and a good manager but only from a footballing standpoint the rest is impossible to gauge since he has never really done it, at least not at that level.
Though I believe that he is making a mistake in changing the system that often, he needs to go back to the original tactics and build on that. If we have to play youth player we should do that, it will make his summer dealings that much easier.

 

[acnumber9]

It’s nice that somebody who didn’t make these decisions is here to explain them to us.

 

[Dr. StrangeHate]

Yeah, definitely. I just wish I had a bit more faith in anyone at the club telling the difference between the genuinely "top class players" and all the other dross we've spent millions on over the last 7 years.

Identifying absolute top class players like De Jong, De ligt, Sancho, Felix is easy. The problem is none of them want to come us as we are not going to be winning anything anytime soon. You are right that we are not able to identify the soon to be 'Top Players'.

 

[BlueHaze]

@Wumminator You seem like a intelligent guy and that is why I'm shocked you make statements like "There was no better choice than Young" Dalot should start over him any day of the week even with his much less experience he is young and naturally a full back. Young has been finished for years. Every single time we play against a team that is a big threat he gets found out and looks completely out of his depth and that's what happens when you shift an old mediocre winger into a full back.

Also the fact that you think extending his and Jones contract made sense is just as shocking. If we ever want to compete for honors again these guys are the exact ones who should have been shipped off years ago. Darmian, Rojo, Smalling, Jones, Young etc, these guys are all Crystal Palace level at best and literally sums up why we are so far behind the elite teams. None of these guys would even make the bench for any other top team in Europe so why the feck are we handing out extensions to awful players like that? It's been over 8 years now where Jones Smalling and Young have constantly been starting games for this team. That sums up the absolute mess we are in.

 

[Swearing Budgie]

Martial/depay/dalot/Shaw/bailly/lindelof since Fergie retired. Haven't worked out as well as we all hoped yet (no thanks to the playing styles of the previous managers as well)

I'd never heard of Martial when we signed him, truth be told. Was everyone talking about him as being a future legend and I just missed it (I don't play FM!). Same with Dalot, who I think has every chance of turning out to be top quality. Lindelof I had heard of and knew he had a pretty big reputation.

 

[Devils11]

Ole wasn't ruthless enough apparently to have the balls to drop a Manchester United captain.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Identifying absolute top class players like De Jong, De ligt, Sancho, Felix is easy. The problem is none of them want to come us as we are not going to be winning anything anytime soon. You are right that we are not able to identify the soon to be 'Top Players'.

It's not even just the "soon to be top" players we're missing out on. How about players like Aubameyang, Salah or Bernardo Silva? These cost our rivals approximately the same (or less) than we paid for Martial or Fred.

Whether we're buying the most expensive players (Pogba vs De Bruyne vs Van Dijk) or players from the tier below that, or potential superstars of the future, we seem to be spending our money far less wisely than the clubs we're competing against. I obviously hope this will change under Ole but I've yet to see any decent argument why?

 

[AndyJ1985]

If we continue to operate the way we have been, there is no reason to be positive. Simple as that.

 

[devilish]

Last night was a very sombre experience for United fans. We got battered and bruised by a team who are quite simply on another level to us. The fact is though we are on the way back and it was fecking great to just to get to this part of the competition. I notice that the posters around here are starting to turn on Ole and it is absolutely madness in my eyes. I thought I'd make a sane thread to cancel out all the nonsense.

1) The Young situation - There was no better choice than starting Ashley Young last night.
It's as simple as it says. Now that doesn't mean that Ashley Young played well or that Ashley Young didn't make a mistake, it just simply means that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer made the logical choice. He couldn't play Eric Bailly at right back. We have seen how that turns out. Luke Shaw was gone. Valencia is on his way out. Darmian has played six times total this year and hasn't been seen for months. Rojo just got torn to shreds against West Ham. The only viable alternative is Dalot and realistically he has shown less defensively than Young. Ole could do nothing about this situation.

2) Our recent contract extensions - Jones/Young will feature next year.
I see a lot of posts complaining about these two having their contracts extended. Well the simple fact is, while they are no longer good enough for United, they are better than their alternatives. Behind them in the pecking order are: Darmian, Rojo, Bailly and Valencia. At least three of them will leave next summer. Realistically our defensive options without these two contract extensions could be: Lindelof, Smalling, Shaw and Dalot. We NEED more squad players than that, especially with our injury problems. Due to our deficiencies else where it would be madness to sign 3/4 defenders. So Young/Jones getting a contract makes sense.

3.) If we are going to play like this we should have kept Mourinho
I am seeing more and more of these types of posts. Mourinho was done. He had just got battered by Liverpool and had fallen out with the squad. The key here is though is that Pogba and Rashford weren't performing for Mourinho. They were our best players and Pogba had been dropped. It is evident that Mourinho had a toxic relationship with the players and we can't just get rid of the whole squad (some of you may wish this was possible)

4.) Ed Woodwood hasn't backed us in the transfer market
When Mourinho took over at United, we had been spending just over 210 million on the wages of our players. We've just announced we have wages of 296 million without Sanchez being here for a full year) Mourinho spent over 400 million. He recouped around 100 million. So on average every year he was here had had a 100 million net spend while increasing the wage bill by about 30 million a year. For those figures we have Fred, Dalot, Sanchez, Lukaku, Lindelof, Bailly and Pogba to show for it. Are those players worth the money? No. Now we hear rumours (nothing confirmed) that Mourinho wanted Maguire, Perisic et al. Would these have improved us? Woodwood was in the unenviable position of making more signings that wouldn't have improved us or dismissing a manager who had just finished second. Either one might have put us in a worst position than we are now.

5.) We will spend a feckton this summer.
Not really a decision but important to say. Just as important as net spend is the wage bill. We are looking at reducing this massively. Players who aren't contributing enough are going, Mata, Herrera, Valencia are pretty certain to leave. Rojo, Darmian, Periera will likely follow them out the door. We've already recouped money for Fellaini. We are for the first time in ages have a proper clear out. You might think you hear this every year, but this time we know that contracts are expiring. This should clear out our wage bill massively. Furthermore with our relative lack of spend this past summer and the clear deficiencies in our squad it is obvious where we need to buy. I expect a 200+ million pound summer. The Glazers have been shown to back new managers when they need it.

6.) Giving Ole the job.
This is a no brainer. When he was hired no-one expected us to be challenging for the top four or get past PSG. He accomplished both and the players and fans loved him. There was no other option. Some people keep talking about waiting till summer.. what would this have accomplished? There will be no big name managers leaving their post this summer and Ole might rightly have told us to feck off if we waited. So what benefit would that have done? Since he took the job he has us pretty much top of the premier league. Our recent form isn't great but we've player Barcelona twice, Wolves twice and Arsenal away. They are all games that ANY manager would struggle with.

We have to be positive. We are in a much better position now than we have been for the last four/five years as far as I can see. We have a manager who has already done a great job. We have money available and we have space in our squad. Even though watching City/Liverpool push on is galling, this is not Ole's fault and we just need to put everything into preparing for next year now.

1- We had Dalot whose better then Young.

2- Which doesn't really back the 'survival of the fittest and the best' theory up.

3- I agree. Mou had to go. A manager who spent 400m on mostly tripe can't stay on especially if he lost the very dressing room he had built

4- Sure money was spent before but it had been spent badly. There's no guarantee we'll be spending big again. You might not notice but we're owned by business men not by oil rich nations

5- And yet here we are, giving a long contract to Jones and keeping a very shit Young

6- Still there was no pressure to give Ole job now

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I get it, we're in deep shit and it will take time to rebuild. However keeping shit washed up players like Young won't cut it. Id rather see us rely more on youths then giving more game time to proven failures.