By the time lindelof ages and his body adapts to physicality of this league even further in an see him being a top centre-back.
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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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But that was not the point. No one said that.
The point was that Victor had developed this season and was dominant in our defense under OGS when he got to play RCB for an extended period of time. He was our best CB during that period. We actually looked like a footballing side then.
His form has dropped after being switched to LCB and now to RB to accomodate other players. Smalling foremost.
It its not the right strategy. I am a Smalling fan but if he cannot play LCB he should be second choice after Victor at RCB or saved for games like Burnley away when we need a Smalling.
Putting Smalling at RCB and shuffling Victor to LCB makes our ability to play out of the back worse and its the last thing we should do right now.
I’d say the overselling is the problem of those who oversell and overbuy, it doesn’t really concern Lindelöf nor Solskjær. What concerns them is Lindelöfs actual and potential ability and how these complement what we’ve got and what we can buy.
Lindelöf has already shown better ballplaying ability and more leadership in example, movement and communication than from any of our other CBs. He also has better concentration, better decision making and better positioning awareness. Smalling is better in the air, Jones is better in duelling intensity (slightly), Bailly is faster and is better at tackling. Rojo has the coolest name and funkiest attitude. But do we buy a nee Cb to complement Smalling, Jones or Bailly, or Lindelöf? Unless we buy two undisputable first choice Cb’s at once, which I don’t think we will, I’d go with Lindelöf. His ideal partner would be better than him, good on LCB, good in the air and fast, and confident, and he’d need to be as good as Lindelöf with the ball in his feet, but not necessarily brilliant.
A year later we could assess wether Lindelöf has continued to develop enough, or if we should purchase someone not unlike him but better, to complement his hopefully brilliant partner.
He's decent with the ball but why would you expect a Swedish centre back to be brilliant on the ball? It's a laughable notion.
We need a quality CB to partner him. I think he's a great defender personally!
Lindelof was playing very well, and I agree you don't move arguably the best defenders in the world to accommodate inferior defenders. The problem though is Lindelof is no Van Dijk and neither is he Rio. We had a defender as good as Smalling coming back into the team, so I would say it was only natural that Lindelof moved to accommodate him.
I wouldn't say his form has dropped because he's been moved from RCB, I actually think his best performance under Ole was at Anfield where he played at LCB next to Smalling. Just like the rest of the team, purple patch seem to over and every player has reverted to how bad they were under Mourinho - Lindelof's been no exception.
That remains to be seen. I actually think we have very good players who are been hampered by a lack of decent proactive and progressive coaching. Lindelof and our other players has already shown what they are capable of during our good run few months ago, I think they could do with a top manager to take them to the next level.
So ole? Isn't the one?
Van Dijk is not as good as he is because he knows how to defend. Same with Rio. At this level that's a given. They are the best because they know how to play on the front foot, command a defensive unit and play as part of the team instead of just waiting for a tackle or a header to come their way and send the ball back upfield.
Smalling knows how to defend. That's all. Lindelof has shown he has the potential to do more and we should be encouraging him to build on it as much as possible.
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Van Dijk is as good as he is because he is very good at defending - arguably the best in the world at that. Rio's rated very highly because he could defend very well and had the longevity to go with it. Smalling is as good as he is because he can defend very well. Lindelof is not as good as any of the three because he cannot defend as well as them.
That remains to be seen too. I would admit that I've not exactly been blown away by what I've seen so far.
Yeah, he defended coutinho very well.
No, they are rated the best defenders.
Man Utd 0:2 Man City
Back to the level he's had for most of this season. Calm with the ball and no defensive mistakes.
Solid today. No-nonsense performance. The only one that should be content with their performance after tonight...
Arguably our best player. We saw what sets him apart from our other defenders tonight.
Solid performance from big vic
Yet again Mr consistent 7-10 performance.
He is so calm. Smalling is the complete opposite. Always heads the ball into no man's land when there's no pressure on him at all.
Composed, used the ball well, MOTM for me.
He’s the only defender we have that’s up to the standard required.
Correct. You can make a case for Shaw but Lindelof definitely.
Decent performance. Prevented one goal through good defending.
Wasn't he responsible for Sane's goal with bad defending? He just backed out and gave Sane all the time and space in the world to shoot.
Or maybe good defending doesn't really matter compared to being calm and composed nowadays.
Or maybe good defending doesn't really matter compared to being calm and composed nowadays.
I swear I read that this guy was two footed before he was signed by some Caf pro scouts so why should it matter where he plays? No one ever talked about which side the center backs played before LVG, but hey anything to beat Smalling with.
Haven't you confused Lindelof with Darmian ? Unless you mean Lindelof should have confronted Sterling when it was 4 City players against 3 United defenders ?
Fred gave the ball away initially. Then Fred and Lingard blundered and managed to turn 4 City v 5 United, into 4 City v 3 United. Then De Gea failed to stop a shot he could have saved with either his foot or his hand. Perhaps Darmian should have got closer to Sane before he took the shot.
Dang, you're right. It is his Italian brother. I really thought it was Lindelof, which was weird with the praise he got.
Now cary on... *goingoutwithtailbetweenthelegs*
It is rather new to the PL with playing CB as part of the game plan. If you have two traditional PL centrebacks who are good at running, tackle and who prefer clearing instead of passing, it doesn't really matter which position they play.
I’d have a glimmer of hope for us if we could get Lindelof a decent partner. I think he’s a really good, consistent defender. But he gets pulled all over the place covering for Smalling and Co.
I doubt we will get the quality defender we all crave due to our league position and unproven manager.
I doubt we will get the quality defender we all crave due to our league position and unproven manager.
This is not the truth. Besides, Smalling is the only CB we have who can actually nullify aerial threats and be a real physical presence in his own box. Lindelof is soft in this respect. Lindelof and Smalling complement each other well, more than any other partnership at the back
Our best centre back. Far better than fecking Smalling, anyway.
So composed, hope we can get him a decent partner in the coming window.
I really don't know what some of the posters see in Smalling. He's an okay defender who lacks any sort of compsure on the ball. Him, young and de gea are horrible at playing the ball out the back and constantly lose possession hoofing it up. It puts our entire team on the backfoot time after time.
I'd rather we build towards a modern approach and play our most well rounded defender in his best position and sign someone to complement him. This team needs serious coaching towards a playing style and we need balance in our first xi and our squad.
I'd rather we build towards a modern approach and play our most well rounded defender in his best position and sign someone to complement him. This team needs serious coaching towards a playing style and we need balance in our first xi and our squad.
I think the latter might be true, but dont agree with the former.
I do think our best stuff under Ole however came when we had Lindelof and Jones as our CBs together. Its when we had our run, (and obviously helped that we had Herrera in front). But we saw more triangles out of the back with Jones/Lindelof playing.
A pretty good game after a run of shaky ones where his partners were clearly better than him and suddenly he’s the best defender at the club by far? Calm down, guys.
This is the main thing. We're never going to progress as a team if we have such limited footballers as Smalling and Lukaku in the starting 11.
Lindelof and Smalling don't complement each other. How many times have we seen teams completely happy to let Smalling have the ball whereas when Lindelof has it there's either someone on him straight away or the passing options have been cut and back to Smalling is the only one available.
Teams have let Smalling have the ball for years and by playing him next to Lindelof you take away Lindelof's passing as he's the only one that can do it from the back and thus gets stopped doing so. The below example in a game we lost 2-1 vs PSV is still relevant 4 years later.
Teams have let Smalling have the ball for years and by playing him next to Lindelof you take away Lindelof's passing as he's the only one that can do it from the back and thus gets stopped doing so. The below example in a game we lost 2-1 vs PSV is still relevant 4 years later.
The exact same thing is happening to Lindelof. He's not left alone and Smalling is.
For the love of God, please buy a centre half that can build a solid partnership with Big Vic. I like him and argument for our player of the year.
Jones will never be regular starter at United though, its a waste of time discussing him in this manner. As far as our most reliable and most readily available CBs go, Smalling and Lindelof are the best pairing
This is our level it seems. I wonder how high Lindelof would be rated if he played for one of United's rivals.
Whether Jones will be a starter is irrelevant to the point I made though
Since Ole has taken over, we were more solid and lindelof looked much better paired with Jones than smalling.
Smalling might be better than Jones individually but the team looked better without smalling and with Jones rather than with smalling and without Jones
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