Do we have a rat or are we seeing the start of something worse?

DoomSlayer

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Under these circumstances, it's best to end this. I always assumed it was common practice to provide links to any quotes in a discussion like this, but yeah, it seems more sensible to throw around quotes and numbers and expect the other party to either blindly accept them as true, or have them google some random numbers, which will obviously and with ease point me to their source.
Oh your Higness, the Baron of Munich, your expectations that someone has to provide you sources to refute your unfounded opinions is absolutely amusing, considering the subject at hand is our club that we follow on a daily basis and it involves, somehow, the league that said team participates in every single season of football.

The mere fact that you believe to know more about it than United fans is insulting. It's common logic among the whole league and other fanbases that we have been the laziest team in the last 3 years.
 

HTG

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How hard is it to google, "distance covered by PL clubs 2018-19".
How hard is it to simply provide the link so others can verify your claims? By the way, not every source you'll find will show the same numbers. There are different approaches and ways to gather information like this, which makes it even more important to actually provide the source.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league-running-stats-reveal-14184242

They have Brighton and Cardiff with less distance covered. First article I found. So yeah, the source matters.

@DoomSlayer
And now I'll leave for my castle in Munich. For I intend to spit on the peasants, walking below my balcony.
 
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Affirmation

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I posted this in the "Ole Gunnar Solskjær" topic but I felt it was worth posting here as well:

So I have been seeing more rumours of discontent on Twitter apparently regarding the "foreign contingent" at the club and their views on how they are being treated in comparison to the British players. Usually I wouldn't pay much attention to such rumours until there is a bit more validity to them however I do recall Duncan Castles making almost the same claims a couple of months ago or so.

He made a statement similar to the recent rumours that are gaining traction on the "Transfer Window" podcast and that a lot of the players were allegedly "angered" by the generous contracts being given to a lot of the British players that many in the dressing room see as "past their best". This group of players were also concerned about the approach being taken in this Summers Transfer Market and about the overall structure and management at the club. I find it interesting that these newly surfaced claims regarding the same situation line up with what Duncan Castles was also saying so there is a decent chance there is probably some legitimacy to them.
 

roonster09

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How hard is it to simply provide the link so others can verify your claims? By the way, not every source you'll find will show the same numbers. There are different approaches and ways to gather information like this, which makes it even more important to actually provide the source.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league-running-stats-reveal-14184242

They have Brighton and Cardiff with less distance covered. First article I found. So yeah, the source matters.
20th in 2017-18
ttps://www.dreamteamfc.com/c/news-gossip/371527/premier-league-table-distance-covered-this-season/

20th in 2016-17
https://www.express.co.uk/pictures/sport/12360/Premier-League-distance-game-sportgalleries

Top 5 in 2015-16 under Van Gaal
https://www.skysports.com/football/...er-in-2016-than-any-other-premier-league-team

Yeah, 18th in 2018-19. Shows how we have fallen from top 5 to 20th, 20th, 18th. That's the concern and the very first point I made, that players are not lazy but not trained to play at higher intensity.
 

Affirmation

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At about the 11 second mark it looks like Paul Pogba and Jesse Lingard are having some sort of dispute so Victor Lindelof gets involved to break it up:

 
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Crashoutcassius

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Or you have a general understanding of modern exercise in football.
What do you mean ? That the players are right and they shouldn't be doing as much running? I'm sure we have sports scientists that are streets ahead of lukaku or whatever fans we have on sports science
 

DoomSlayer

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At about the 11 second mark it looks like Paul Pogba and Jesse Lingard are having some sort of dispute so Victor Lindelof gets involved to break it up:

Pogba was going to floor Lingard there if not for the Ice Man.
Look at the size of his spit after that, so frustrating to watch this unfolding and it's actually our own club's social media showing it all publicly.
 

Tiber

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feck em. I'm tired of hearing the moans of this failed squad. Time to shut up and start running... a lot
 

SirAF

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Oh your Higness, the Baron of Munich, your expectations that someone has to provide you sources to refute your unfounded opinions is absolutely amusing, considering the subject at hand is our club that we follow on a daily basis and it involves, somehow, the league that said team participates in every single season of football.

The mere fact that you believe to know more about it than United fans is insulting. It's common logic among the whole league and other fanbases that we have been the laziest team in the last 3 years.
This.
 

matt23

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If some of our more precious flowers are upset about having to run around a bit, it really wouldn't surprise me at this point, nor would it surprise me if they decided their best course of action was to moan to a journalist or their agent about the injustice.

At the end of the day, I think most people who have watched this club over the past few seasons know we have a huge culture problem, and the idea that every single one of those spineless sacks of spuds we saw phone it in last season were just going to idly sit by and watch their culture of minimum effort - maximum reward be dismantled by a manager that has earned more respect from the clubs fan base than any of them will ever experience at any club, without a few hissy fits here and there.. was never going to happen.

I'd put decent money on being able to guess at least one or two of the players that could potentially be involved in trying to undermine any culture change at the club that seemingly rewards hard workers over god given talent, and I'd probably hazard a guess that at least two of them occasionally play for the same national team.
 

He'sRaldo

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I think this is a great post, and a nice starting point to discuss a topic that often gets trivialised.

You see this on this forum all the time, most people have strong emotions but not all have the heart or brain to express it. Phrases and generalisations gets repeated as some sort of relief which reinforces and creates further agendas. Sadly, a lot of general opinions formed is often in the hands of these journalists who literally feeds of creating negativity to then get money from running headlines. You don't need a tinfoil hat to legitimately be frustrated about United, but a lot of the negativity could be avoided also if people woke up a bit to some of the stuff the media comes out with.

I agree with the OP, it might seem trivial at first, but give it a few months and I wouldn't be surprised to see a pretty crazy article like this suddenly get reread as the straight gospel.

I think it is funny how journalists read these forums to see the most aggravating concerns from fans, and reinforces this throughout their articles.
Yup, in this very thread we see people ignoring the point of the thread and showcasing exactly what you described.

I won't be surprised if journalists

a) Roam the forums and post controversial posts
b) Capitalize on subsequent emotions by writing articles based on very little

Thereby creating a cycle of negativity based on very little. These days credibility is a trivial matter anyway, so people tend to believe whatever affirms their current views.
 

Jazz

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Didn't they complain about double sessions during LVG's tenure? Who is it I wonder..?

Anyway, I believe OP is just saying let's not feed the agenda of the press and I totally agree. They influence fans more than some would like to admit and it just creates an even more toxic atmosphere.
 

passing-wind

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It doesn't matter, the same players that have failed under three managers are here to fail under a fourth. The most paid players at the club Pogba, Martial, De Gea (offered 350k) and Sanchez. Only Rashford is the English individual earning in this top bracket so it's a contravening statement.
 

Focusmate

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The media help drive the narrative and they seem to be targeting United. Anything United drives more clicks, but it seems to be an increasingly hostile media narrative.
As much as Mourinho needed to go last summer / Autumn the unpleasantness, hostility and word twisting of his comments was unprecedented and more worthy of a national hate figure.

Since he was sacked the media have increasingly targeted Pogba which has become more and more unpleasant and have started undermining Ole too.
I wish it didnt matter but sadly it starts to drive the fanbase narrative. I guess now we arent looking like winning anytime soon this is the only media angle?
 
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Jazz

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The media help drive the narrative and they seem to be targeting United. Anything United drives more clicks, but it seems to be an increasingly hostile media narrative.
As much as Mourinho needed to go last summer / Autumn the unpleasantness, hostility and word twisting of his comments was unprecedented and more worthy of a national hate figure.

Since he was sacked the media have increasingly targeted Pogba which has become more and more unpleasant and have started undermining Ole too.
I wish it didnt matter but sadly it starts to drive the fanbase narrative. I guess now we arent looking like winning anytime soon this is the only media angle?
They have been driving their hostile narrative since LVG..... it's just getting worse.
Although Pogba is being a bitch at the moment, some of the stuff against him was media driven. It's really hard to deal with.

Us fans need to stop reading shite and letting it affect us. Old lady like me hasn't visited the sports pages for a long time. Anything with United in their articles I move right on by. Some of our fans need to do this.
 

Leftback99

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Other than Pogba I can't imagine our distinctly average 'foreign contingent' complaining about anything. They are all completely spineless.
 

Gasolin

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Other than Pogba I can't imagine our distinctly average 'foreign contingent' complaining about anything. They are all completely spineless.
There is Lukaku, Anthony (even though I love and rate this guy)... who knows. But yeah, Pogba, if he's the one, needs to redeem himself towards the club and Ole and the other players. That's complete non sense.
 

andersj

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Yup, in this very thread we see people ignoring the point of the thread and showcasing exactly what you described.

I won't be surprised if journalists

a) Roam the forums and post controversial posts
b) Capitalize on subsequent emotions by writing articles based on very little

Thereby creating a cycle of negativity based on very little. These days credibility is a trivial matter anyway, so people tend to believe whatever affirms their current views.
I would be surprised if they post much. Maybe the most useless of them.

The first reply in this thread almost sounded like a buthurt journalist. They are always so selfserving and selfprotecting that they immediately jump the to the gun if anyone voice any criticism of them.
 

Wheato

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These storm in a tea cup type stories have been gathering in pace over the last week. I have noticed them popping up out of the blue. Over the weekend, at least 4 newspapers ran with stories that Pogba was on strike and nobody at the club can locate him. Then behold, he miraculously appears with the squad flying out to Australia. And nobody calls them out on it. They print lies and BS and people lap it up. Even people on here. Now they seem to have a beef with OGS. I suppose he is an easy target, being such a nice guy. They are only reporting things that we all knew last season. The team was unfit. We were being out worked by every other team in the league. If he is working them hard, then he is doing his job and fixing the mess that he inherited. We as fans need to stand firm and back our manager to the hilt. Never waiver, never give up on him. He has more chance of being successful if we all stick by him and call these journos out when they make up lies and continue to perform a witch hunt against our club, our manager, our players and our fans. Lets not add any fuel to the fire and support the team no matter what.
 
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Gasolin

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These storm in a tea cup type stories have been gathering in pace over the last week. I have noticed them popping up out of the blue. Over the weekend at least 4 newspapers ran with stories that Pogba was on strike and nobody at the club can locate him. Then behold, he miraculously appears with the squad flying out to Australia. And nobody calls them out on it. They print lies and BS and people lap it up. Even people on here. Now they seem to have a beef with OGS. I suppose he is an easy target, being such a nice guy. They are only reporting things that we all knew last season. The team was unfit. We were being out worked by every other team in the league. If he is working them hard, then he is doing his job and fixing the mess that he inherited. We as fans need to stand firm and back our manager to the hilt. Never waiver, never give up on him. He has more chance of being successful if we all stick by him and call these journos out when they make up lies and continue to perform a witch hunt against our club, our manager, our players and our fans. Lets not add any fuel to the fire and support the team no matter what.
Amen is the only thing I will add on this one. For once, I have the feeling something is going to work in the right direction.
 

roseguy64

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I think this is a great post, and a nice starting point to discuss a topic that often gets trivialised.

You see this on this forum all the time, most people have strong emotions but not all have the heart or brain to express it. Phrases and generalisations gets repeated as some sort of relief which reinforces and creates further agendas. Sadly, a lot of general opinions formed is often in the hands of these journalists who literally feeds of creating negativity to then get money from running headlines. You don't need a tinfoil hat to legitimately be frustrated about United, but a lot of the negativity could be avoided also if people woke up a bit to some of the stuff the media comes out with.

I agree with the OP, it might seem trivial at first, but give it a few months and I wouldn't be surprised to see a pretty crazy article like this suddenly get reread as the straight gospel.

I think it is funny how journalists read these forums to see the most aggravating concerns from fans, and reinforces this throughout their articles.
Agreed. Gets to the point where I'm defending a player, players, the board, etc. against ridiculous criticisms when there are plenty of legitimate grievances out there.
 

Irrational.

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Pogba was going to floor Lingard there if not for the Ice Man.
Look at the size of his spit after that, so frustrating to watch this unfolding and it's actually our own club's social media showing it all publicly.
Bunch of fecking kids. (Mentally)
 

Alabaster Codify7

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These storm in a tea cup type stories have been gathering in pace over the last week. I have noticed them popping up out of the blue. Over the weekend, at least 4 newspapers ran with stories that Pogba was on strike and nobody at the club can locate him. Then behold, he miraculously appears with the squad flying out to Australia. And nobody calls them out on it. They print lies and BS and people lap it up. Even people on here. Now they seem to have a beef with OGS. I suppose he is an easy target, being such a nice guy. They are only reporting things that we all knew last season. The team was unfit. We were being out worked by every other team in the league. If he is working them hard, then he is doing his job and fixing the mess that he inherited. We as fans need to stand firm and back our manager to the hilt. Never waiver, never give up on him. He has more chance of being successful if we all stick by him and call these journos out when they make up lies and continue to perform a witch hunt against our club, our manager, our players and our fans. Lets not add any fuel to the fire and support the team no matter what.

I never support ANYTHING 'no matter what'. If common sense tells me that what I am defending or believing in is wrong, I will stop. I can think for myself, as can the vast majority of supporters on this board.
 

He'sRaldo

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The media help drive the narrative and they seem to be targeting United. Anything United drives more clicks, but it seems to be an increasingly hostile media narrative.
As much as Mourinho needed to go last summer / Autumn the unpleasantness, hostility and word twisting of his comments was unprecedented and more worthy of a national hate figure.

Since he was sacked the media have increasingly targeted Pogba which has become more and more unpleasant and have started undermining Ole too.
I wish it didnt matter but sadly it starts to drive the fanbase narrative. I guess now we arent looking like winning anytime soon this is the only media angle?
They have been driving their hostile narrative since LVG..... it's just getting worse.
Although Pogba is being a bitch at the moment, some of the stuff against him was media driven. It's really hard to deal with.

Us fans need to stop reading shite and letting it affect us. Old lady like me hasn't visited the sports pages for a long time. Anything with United in their articles I move right on by. Some of our fans need to do this.
Agreed. Now more than ever I wish we had someone who can create a siege mentality against the media like Jose could, or someone who can manipulate the media as well as SAF or Klopp. Get all the fans in the right direction even if it is a delusional one, instead of all this constant nonsense.
 
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He'sRaldo

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I would be surprised if they post much. Maybe the most useless of them.

The first reply in this thread almost sounded like a buthurt journalist. They are always so selfserving and selfprotecting that they immediately jump the to the gun if anyone voice any criticism of them.
I think they post but you're right, probably not the most known journalists. In the past, I've read first-hand reports of journalists being ordered to stir trouble on forums and such, and then using it to create articles which will get a lot of clicks. That or scouring forums for topics to create clicks from. And that's without taking into account all the twitter nonsense.

I have no doubt things like that happen on this forum as well; I just wish people were more mindful of what they read, especially now. There's no doubt that the current narrative around the club has been influenced at least partly by the media, so we can indeed see how powerful it is.
 
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He'sRaldo

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These storm in a tea cup type stories have been gathering in pace over the last week. I have noticed them popping up out of the blue. Over the weekend, at least 4 newspapers ran with stories that Pogba was on strike and nobody at the club can locate him. Then behold, he miraculously appears with the squad flying out to Australia. And nobody calls them out on it. They print lies and BS and people lap it up. Even people on here. Now they seem to have a beef with OGS. I suppose he is an easy target, being such a nice guy. They are only reporting things that we all knew last season. The team was unfit. We were being out worked by every other team in the league. If he is working them hard, then he is doing his job and fixing the mess that he inherited. We as fans need to stand firm and back our manager to the hilt. Never waiver, never give up on him. He has more chance of being successful if we all stick by him and call these journos out when they make up lies and continue to perform a witch hunt against our club, our manager, our players and our fans. Lets not add any fuel to the fire and support the team no matter what.
Agreed.
 

Drz

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I find the claims particularly outlandish given what Ole said in his first interview (something along the lines of we focus more on ball work and that he doesn't send them just running around like in the old days).
 

Smores

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Sounds like what happened with Moyes to be honest, he came in and said they all needed to run more and they didn't like it.

To be honest i take any claims about our training with a pinch of salt until i here a player say it, you only have to look at last year for how little everyone actually knows.

The criticism of Jose at the start of the season was that he apparently just did physical work and wanted work horses for players and yet by the end suddenly it was that he didn't do enough. Our fans will jump on any narrative that suits that particular week and the media play to that.
 

Wheato

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To talk about not supporting something unconditionally.
So what is the point of being a fan if you don't support them unconditionally? Are you a mercenary? Do you need payment for your support? Or is it something that you offer when you feel like it? Maybe if you have a bit of time after doing the washing up. Can we count on your support between 6:30 to 7pm on Wednesdays and Fridays? What is the point of being an anything, a fan, a brother, a father or even a human being if you don't support anything unconditionally. Has it taken you 3,121 posts on a Manchester United forum to come to the realisation that you don't really know why you are here at all?
 

Jazz

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Agreed. Now more than ever I wish we had someone who can create a siege mentality against the media like Jose could, or someone who can manipulate the media as well as SAF or Klopp. Get all the fans in the right direction even if it is a delusional one, instead of all this constant nonsense.
The worst thing is that it upsets player performances. Yes it is partly to blame imho. The more you feel the hostility from the fans the worse you'll perform. I think that's one of the reasons players seem to fold when the opposition scores. I'm personally thinking, 'oh shit, the press will murder us, some fans will go nuts on social media etc etc' and I can feel myself getting unhappy and tense. So therefore, I cannot imagine that this doesn't affect most of the players.

Listening to Navratilova, and she explains how your arms feel heavy when you're nervous, affecting your serve; how the feet don't move etc etc. The point being, the more you have to deal with psychologically, the worst it gets for performances and I believe we've been seeing that.

The press has worsened ever since we sacked Moyes. It's like they're butt hurt their little 'friend' was no longer there to provide info/gossip which they would then use in their articles thus giving them clicks and making money.

Their constant negativity is a serious problem in my opinion. Only an SAF could change the narrative so the fans don't let the media influence them.
 

haram

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I dont know why people are name dropping Lukaku. Bandwagon brainwashed thinking.
 

tenpoless

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If running is bad in football then eating is bad in eating competition.

Most likely some gobshite shit-stirring journalists are at it again. ManUnited news still sell and the worse it is (for ManUnited), the more money They'll make.
 

WR10

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It’s simple. Players will run into the ground for you if they believe in you.

This is not a debate about run or don’t run or British or continental.

This is a debate about highly influential players being influenced by Ole.

Answer is no. Herrera left at first chance and now pogba/lukaku will leave soon too. All that will be left are a bunch of yes men well geared for mid table mediocrity
 

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If running is bad in football then eating is bad in eating competition.

Most likely some gobshite shit-stirring journalists are at it again. ManUnited news still sell and the worse it is (for ManUnited), the more money They'll make.
Cruijff: The ball is faster than the legs.