Has this season hit rock bottom for you yet? If no, what, in particular, will be the final nails in the coffin?

[Edy2]

We'll likely be out of both cups in a few weeks and 4th will be gone so there's that to look forward to. We'll end up reliant on Europa league so I'd be happy for the rest of the season to give plenty league game time to Williams, garner, gomes and Greenwood and see whether they can put themselves in the picture for first team next season.

 

[Dr. Dwayne]

I find it amazing the patience some have with this ‘project’.

3 times I have felt utterly deflated since Fergie. The Moyes 2-2 Fulham game, the LVG 3-0 loss to Stoke and last night. And as some people have said it wasn’t the loss it was the manner of the loss. It should have been 5-0 to City at half time whilst we yet again create nothing. So many games this season we have less than 2/3 shots on target.

We have reached stalemate and as much as I dislike Ole it’s not just down to him. I can’t believe he would be happy losing the players he did and then no players coming in. He’s been lied to by people above, no doubt about it. He’s pushing for signings this month. In his recent interview regarding Young he said we were looking to buy a couple of players. He’s trying to put the pressure on the board but they aren’t helping.

The Glazers, Woodward and Judge have fecked this club in less than 6 years. As a group of fans we NEED to get Woodward and Judge out the club. They are both parasites.

Why last night? You may recall City beating us 6-1 with Fergie in charge, which was infinitely worse.

 

[Stepney73]

I'd take a 12th place finish now and for us not to progress another round in any cup comp if it meant the Glazers would sell up before start of next season.

This shambles doesn't get better until they do. They can't undo what they've done without spending silly money and spending it well which they've proven they can't do.

Also rans FC until new owners come in.

100%

 

[GledTheRed]

Seasons over, injuries have taken the piss as usual. We won't win anything and will struggle for top six.

 

[iKeano]

I bottomed out last night.

Owners don't care.
Board don't care.
Manager cares, but is clueless.
Players don't care - despite what they churn out on twitter.

Our club has been reduced to a money churning golden goose and they're all suckling from its (currently-fat-but-soon-to-be-dry) teat.

Don't be fooled. None of them care.

 

[::sonny::]

The word end, should be the relegation in championship

But this won’t happen this year, but with this evolution in getting worse and worse year by year, could finalise it in a relegation in the future

Because they will create a team who can’t attack and who can’t defend

what do you expect?
we all know, 3 signings in august and contract extension for bailly, lingard, jones and mata

where do you want to go? Only in championship, it’s written

 

[Josep Dowling]

Why last night? You may recall City beating us 6-1 with Fergie in charge, which was infinitely worse.

That was a one off game. Evans was sent off which didn’t help and we were still fighting for the league and won the League Cup that season. It was just a bad defeat. What we have now is just a build up persistent crap football by poor coaching and tactics, lack of players and lack of quality.

Yesterday just confirmed we won’t achieve anything this season. It would have been a struggle with Pogba fit but with McTominay an important player and now Maguire, this season is a write off.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Seasons over, injuries have taken the piss as usual. We won't win anything and will struggle for top six.

Think we will always have problems until we sort out why we are getting all these injuries. It has been going on for years, there must be a common factor. Every player we sign turns injury prone as soon as they step in the door.

 

[Fortitude]

many fans now are younger and wont remember the bad times in the 70,s and 80,s when we were crap and Liverpool won everything... they will only have known the success through Fergies long long reign. No one has a Devine right to success. You have to earn it...

Fergie came in and changed everything from top to bottom, the youth policies, recruitment, training,, mentality etc etc... he is so missed. We need the next modern day Fergie... but remember it took Fergie a few years to get any success and many chanted Fergie out fergie out for 3 years. .... if the club had bowed down to supporters feelings fergie would have been sacked after 2/3 years and we wouldn’t have had such a glorious period Of success...

Food for thought.

I truly entered the fray in the mid 80's, as in, that's when I understood what a game of football was about as opposed to following specific players, and I think the ride we went on in the 80's was dynamic and exciting and we had players you could place your faith in - players who were an embodiment of what you believed the club stood for: Robson, Whiteside, Moses, Hughes, Strachan etc. for example. We were erratic and we underperformed, but we were also spirited and full of character.

Losing and not being successful is one thing, but feeling like the team and coaching staff isn't one you can believe in in something else entirely, for me.

I think also, in the 80's and possibly 70's (I don't know) growing up in a period where I had no clue of what it was like to experience being a top dog, ignorance was bliss - there was no great height we'd fallen from to make the lows as they are now where we've gone from literal best in the land, and at one time, the best in the world, to a club struggling with all its might to try, somehow, crawl across the line for 4th.

If I felt Ole was working toward a defined system of play that we would eventually get right, I don't think I'd see it as a rock bottom in the current climate of all things considered, being a decimated squad and the rest of it. I do find it unsettling and dispiriting to see us look like we don't know what we're doing out there.

I've known plenty of lows over the last 49 years, but this does somehow feel different. I think it's because nobody at the club (owners, management, players, many fans) seems to be that bothered; they're all content to just muddle through and believe things will improve if they just wish hard enough.

I started going to games regularly and following the club seriously at exactly the same time Wilf McGuinness was being thrown under the bus by Sir Matt and the Edwards family, having inherited an ageing team and being given no support whatsoever in being allowed to rebuild it. Ole has received far more support than Wilf did, but it does all rather feel the same.

Agree with the bolded. We've sunk into, and accepted, a malaise that, with our resources, shouldn't have been possible. The radio silence from those at the top is not reassuring either.

@simplyared & @pascell not going to quote you, but agree with some of what you've said.

 

[ravi2]

I've known plenty of lows over the last 49 years, but this does somehow feel different. I think it's because nobody at the club (owners, management, players, many fans) seems to be that bothered; they're all content to just muddle through and believe things will improve if they just wish hard enough.

I started going to games regularly and following the club seriously at exactly the same time Wilf McGuinness was being thrown under the bus by Sir Matt and the Edwards family, having inherited an ageing team and being given no support whatsoever in being allowed to rebuild it. Ole has received far more support than Wilf did, but it does all rather feel the same.

Its different because for the first time, neither the owners nor the manager are competent enough to guide the club through this turmoil and there is no end in sight to where rock bottom actually is.

 

[Dr. Dwayne]

That was a one off game. Evans was sent off which didn’t help and we were still fighting for the league and won the League Cup that season. It was just a bad defeat. What we have now is just a build up persistent crap football by poor coaching and tactics, lack of players and lack of quality.

Yesterday just confirmed we won’t achieve anything this season. It would have been a struggle with Pogba fit but with McTominay an important player and now Maguire, this season is a write off.

To be fair it was only United fans who thought we'd achieve anything this season. Ever opposition fan I spoke to in real life said we're clearly in transition and won't be top 4 contenders for two to three years. We've only ourselves to blame for the optimism.

 

[ravi2]

What will be the final nail in the coffin for me?

Getting knocked out of the Carabao cup - nope
Getting knocked out of the FA cup - nope
Getting knocked out of the Europa League to a last minute Lukaku winner, who celebrates in front of the travelling United fans - nope

Losing the fourth and final CL place on the final game of the season by a point after realising we entered the season with a skeleton squad, dropped points to West Ham, Bournemouth, Southampton, Newcastle, Villa, Sheffield, Palace, Wolves and Watford before the halfway point, watching the likes of Lingard starting regularly whilst the thought dawns on me that we could've sacked Ole at any point during this before Pochettino signed a new deal with Bayern, whilst watching Liverpool lifting the PL trophy for the first time in 30 years as Martin Tyler's eulogy is drowned out by the sound of Steve McManaman furiously masturbating, whilst the camera pans to a smug Michael Oliver smiling in VAR HQ as he disallows a last minute United equaliser away to Leicester for offside by drawing some lines which merge together and some bullshit version of Pythagoras' theorem - yes.

I wonder how SAF and Sir Bobby would feel when they see Liverpool win the league this year. SAF worked tirelessly to get Livers off their perch and now its theirs.
I can only only SAF still has influence at the board level to at least question Woodward as to what the feck he is doing.

 

[momo83]

I am genuinely surprised at how we're sitting at 5th place and we've been so bad this season. We've had quite a few performances which made me question if we'd make the top half of the premier league table by the end of the season.

Look at the teams around us, it’s very fine margins between 5th and 10th

 

[Josep Dowling]

To be fair it was only United fans who thought we'd achieve anything this season. Ever opposition fan I spoke to in real life said we're clearly in transition and won't be top 4 contenders for two to three years. We've only ourselves to blame for the optimism.

I never expected much, especially after our lack of transfers in the summer. But you still hope you would see some progress which we haven’t at all. And that’s with buying a CB for a world record fee. It’s truly mental.

Fairly sure I said we would finish midtable before the season started. I still think we will.

 

[Denis' cuff]

Not signing a single player in this January transfer window.

This. If we don't buy players we desperately need now, we never will (Euros will be the excuse in summer) As if we need any further demonstration of the club's intention to spend as little as possible because they have no ambition whatsoever, on the footballing side. Just looking at the line up now, makes me despair and it'll get worse. Somebody said "can't believe we are still fifth..." We won't be 5th for long. The last two games that we drew and lost were cup games. With the latest injuries, that would now be a further 5 pts dropped and that is just the present. The future is worse.

 

[Stookie]

I think the loss to West Ham was the lowest point for me and it’s just kinda stayed there. One of the worst performances I’ve ever seen from a United team. The wins against Spurs and City just gave another false dawn. For the first time ever since I supported United I am completely indifferent to them winning losing drawing. Mainly losing and drawing to be fair.

 

[Maluco]

I think the big fear is that we are staring at the abyss and things could get a whole lot worse.

The quality in the squad is lessening year upon year, and it’s being excused through different excuses. Lukaku not being replaced was a massive sign that something is wrong.

The worrying thing for me, would be accepting a top half finish this season, players like pogba leaving without replacements, and the club trying to suggest the plan is to replace them with young up and comers. Fans might buy into that, but it may be too late by then.

I think a rebuild needs to start now while there are still 5-6 players that can contribute to a CL qualifying squad. If not, very soon, we could have a team of Lingards and Joneses, and be sitting here lamenting the fact that we could go down, in disbelief that it has come to this.

We need direction and investment and we need it now.

 

[dove]

We did hit rock bottom, now we are just digging deeper.

 

[theklr]

When we crash out of Europa League and no chance of getting 4th. Another year without CL will hurt this club in so many ways.

 

[RedDevilRoshi]

The West Ham & Newcastle away games in late September/early October was the final straw for me. Felt the club had really dropped down a whole new level and accepted its mediocrity label.

 

[Dr. Dwayne]

I never expected much, especially after our lack of transfers in the summer. But you still hope you would see some progress which we haven’t at all. And that’s with buying a CB for a world record fee. It’s truly mental.

Fairly sure I said we would finish midtable before the season started. I still think we will.

I disagree on the progress. There's been some, albeit not as much as we'd like as fans. We have our moments but inconsistently. I think it's much harder for United because we're everyone's biggest game of the season, even City and Liverpool.

A lot has gone sideways, though and the board need to take a good hard look at themselves and who they've chosen to lead things here.

 

[DickDastardly]

I wonder how SAF and Sir Bobby would feel when they see Liverpool win the league this year.

Yes, this, all the way.

Let's see how we react to this!

They will win it this season, that's a fact, let's just see how the top brass react to that.

The facts are - this squad is not good enough.

If you compare our players with Shittys, we are far worse in every position.

You could say you can work with De Gea, Maguire, Wan Bissaka, and the top three of Martial, Rashford and Greenwood.

That's still 5 top shit players we need to fill out the gaps.

And we need to fill them with great young players.

 

[chromepaxos]

I'm struggling to understand the drama queens on here seeing a first-half against City - a world-top-3 team - as their ultimate low point in supporting Utd. Are you 14 years old? Do you guys really not remember the Moyes team punting in dozens of aimless crosses? Or LVG's teams forever passing ball sideways and back again?

And don't even talk to me about the games with Jose in charge in which you could actually see his sabotage in action, when the only strategy on view was his dash for a payoff. At least Ole's team is (mostly) fun to watch and is likeable. The a-holes have been kicked out, talented youngsters brought in, and we are at least trying to adopt speed and attack into our gameplan - this is a massive upgrade on the previous five seasons, and if you can't see the improvement in our play this season, then I feel sorry for you.

Is it all great? No. And Ole is perhaps not the right bloke, but get a grip, people. With the squad available Ole only had one tactical choice to make: play the same way as we beat City earlier in the season, or drop Lingard in favour of Matic. Given that we want him to take a positive "Utd-way" approach, going with the attacking option doesn't seem completely stupid. Pep changed things and so Ole changed things at half-time.

All you drama queens destroying Ole for his naivety in the City game: other then playing Matic for Lingard from the start, on the morning of the game what would have been your amazing, game-changing strategy?

 

[Revaulx]

Even when the Doc took us down into the 2nd division it felt better than what it does now. Somehow we knew we'd bounce back and we sure did that with with a young team of players the likes of Coppell, Hill and Pearson. Together with Sammy Mac, Buchan etc. they all understood what the club was about. Players who come here now seem to get infected by some fecking virus and become mediocre. We have become painful to watch and we're rapidly losing our identity. Watched utd for 55 yrs and never felt as disillusioned as I do now.

By the time we actually got relegated we’d clearly started to improve and play attractive football, so the general feeling was one of optimism despite the humiliation of the actual relegation. I’m not sure things would have been so positive had we been relegated a season earlier.

The improvement came pretty much out of the blue as well; in the Doc’s first 12 months we’d been a team of cloggers. A couple of lowish-key midfield signings made the difference: Daly and McCalliog. Let’s hope Van De Beek has a similar effect...

 

[Popcorn]

For me, rock bottom with LVG was watching a game late in his tenure , where we were 0:1 down with a few minutes to go and just watching our Center backs pass it to each other till the final whistle went.

I am in the Ole out camp but at least the football is more entertaining (in my opinion). Rock bottom for This season is possibly seeing the club give up on top 4 by not buying any players this Jan and probably another couple of injuries. The rhetoric of “rebuilding “ without actually doing so is grinding.

I don’t mind losing matches . But with this squad and manager I worry that it is not the size of the dog in the fight, but the size of the fight in the dog.

 

[ravi2]

I'm struggling to understand the drama queens on here seeing a first-half against City - a world-top-3 team - as their ultimate low point in supporting Utd. Are you 14 years old? Do you guys really not remember the Moyes team punting in dozens of aimless crosses? Or LVG's teams forever passing ball sideways and back again?

And don't even talk to me about the games with Jose in charge in which you could actually see his sabotage in action, when the only strategy on view was his dash for a payoff. At least Ole's team is (mostly) fun to watch and is likeable. The a-holes have been kicked out, talented youngsters brought in, and we are at least trying to adopt speed and attack into our gameplan - this is a massive upgrade on the previous five seasons, and if you can't see the improvement in our play this season, then I feel sorry for you.

Is it all great? No. And Ole is perhaps not the right bloke, but get a grip, people. With the squad available Ole only had one tactical choice to make: play the same way as we beat City earlier in the season, or drop Lingard in favour of Matic. Given that we want him to take a positive "Utd-way" approach, going with the attacking option doesn't seem completely stupid. Pep changed things and so Ole changed things at half-time.

All you drama queens destroying Ole for his naivety in the City game: other then playing Matic for Lingard from the start, on the morning of the game what would have been your amazing, game-changing strategy?

Most of the posts seem to be calling out Woodward, not Ole. Most sensible folks here seem to understand what the root cause of our issues is.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

Most of the posts seem to be calling out Woodward, not Ole. Most sensible folks here seem to understand what the root cause of our issues is.

There is no 1 root cause.

It's a myriad of things.

There's not 1 singular problem at the club. It's load of problems.

The easiest fix at the moment is to get an actual competent manager in.

 

[tenpoless]

Yes, rock bottom. Result wise I thought it wouldn't be this bad. Worse than David fecking Moyes. We haven't been great and entertaining with the performances either. And knowing We'll always attempt to do the same thing in every game, there's nothing to look forward to.

 

[tenpoless]

I'm struggling to understand the drama queens on here seeing a first-half against City - a world-top-3 team - as their ultimate low point in supporting Utd. Are you 14 years old? Do you guys really not remember the Moyes team punting in dozens of aimless crosses? Or LVG's teams forever passing ball sideways and back again?

And don't even talk to me about the games with Jose in charge in which you could actually see his sabotage in action, when the only strategy on view was his dash for a payoff. At least Ole's team is (mostly) fun to watch and is likeable. The a-holes have been kicked out, talented youngsters brought in, and we are at least trying to adopt speed and attack into our gameplan - this is a massive upgrade on the previous five seasons, and if you can't see the improvement in our play this season, then I feel sorry for you.

Is it all great? No. And Ole is perhaps not the right bloke, but get a grip, people. With the squad available Ole only had one tactical choice to make: play the same way as we beat City earlier in the season, or drop Lingard in favour of Matic. Given that we want him to take a positive "Utd-way" approach, going with the attacking option doesn't seem completely stupid. Pep changed things and so Ole changed things at half-time.

All you drama queens destroying Ole for his naivety in the City game: other then playing Matic for Lingard from the start, on the morning of the game what would have been your amazing, game-changing strategy?

You are the drama queen and the 14 years old. Do you really have to defend Ole here? when there are already thousands of Ole threads? Go to Ole In thread and write your heart out there.

 

[ravi2]

There is no 1 root cause.

It's a myriad of things.

There's not 1 singular problem at the club. It's load of problems.

The easiest fix at the moment is to get an actual competent manager in.

There is not one singular problem I agree, but the issues mainly stem from bad leadership above Ole's level.
A competent manager would do a bit better but would eventually run into the same issues the last 3 managers before him had.

 

[ravi2]

You are the drama queen and the 14 years old. Do you really have to defend Ole here? when there are already thousands of Ole threads? Go to Ole In thread and write your heart out there.

I have doubts that poster is an actual United fan

 

[Foxbatt]

Look at the newspapers. They are saying that we have become a laughing stock around the world. They say the richest club in England can only afford to get a Cardiff reject as a manager.

 

[croadyman]

It occurred to me, whilst watching City toy with us in a manner akin to a cat with a half dead mouse, that I was numb to what was happening on the pitch - at some point in the first half of watching us bumble and stumble with all the bluster of an academy game, it dawned on me that I hadn't felt like this about a United game since Mourinho's last few months in charge.

See, defeats, even hammerings aren't what triggers that feeling of resignation, rather, when your team is completely bereft of creativity, competence and certainty (see what I did there?) only for the camera to then pan to the men coaching them who look like rabbits in headlights, that it dawns on you... that the hope, optimism and mild dosage of naivete you have despite it all is not kicking in. 'Funny' because as United fans yourselves, you'll have recollections of feeling this way possibly three other times since SAF retired, and from those past experiences, it seems a certainty that once the nadir is touched down upon, the position of the current manager, for you, is now untenable.

It feels, by our lack of transfer activity to this point in the month, that the squad woes will be compounded with no bolstering during this window - perhaps I'm wide of the mark here, and we will go out and make a few signings, but, as I see it, a squad in our predicament, with its season hanging by a thread, needs to have players wrapped up and being integrated into the squad as soon as humanly possible - eight days into the winter window, and not a single concrete link to any player does not suggest those in charge are in agreement. You'd like to think there's some serious foraging for agreements on deals being worked away furiously in the background, away from prying eyes, but even that notion seems hopelessly optimistic, doesn't it?

I think most of us are grown up enough and manager-weary enough after so many failures to have an objective, non-hysterical discussion about this - perhaps, for you, there are still reasons to be positive and you've reasoned with yourself that injuries, bad luck, a patchy period or what have you are the source of our woes, which you [truly] believe are temporary? Perhaps, you still believe in us picking things up and attaining either 4th or the Europa to qualify for next season's Champions League, or, the old, very United traditional faith and focus on the kids developing consoles you?

For myself, the worry, as I've posted up threads about in the past, is overspill - where the lack of planning and contingency from the disastrous season immediately carries over into the new one is becoming one of the biggest concerns. Now is the time to bed [some] new players and/or staff, during the period of little to no expectation, so that they can get themselves up to speed with the league (if they've come from elsewhere), their surroundings under less scrutiny and pressure with the hope they're some way down the line to being bedded in and ready to go by the times August, and the new season, rolls round. Any new manager gets a period to look at the squad this way, too, and make calls with certainty on who does and does not fit his vision for the supplemental players in the team he wants to start his season with whilst having a clear idea of what's needed for the summer window, too.

This thread might be seen as premature given we've Liverpool and a return leg vs City plus the replay vs. Wolves on the horizon, and not least, the Europa campaign still to go, but how many proverbial cuts from the thousand are needed for you to feel as though things need to be put to bed now? How was it for you with Moyes, LVG or Mourinho? Did it only kick in once we were out of the cups, or when 4th was a mathematical impossibility, or is it for you like it is for me, where if the games feel like Groundhog Day, you've felt like that's enough now? I don't care for the Ole in/out hokey cokey fractious civil war on here, nor do drubbings particularly influence me, but I find it galling when the opposition have no regard for us, almost to the point where the threat is seen as so miniscule that they've switched off, mid-game, assured it's over - at that point when you look at your own team and can see where they're coming from, I know I've reached the end of my tether.

tl:dr: When is enough for you - what are your personal triggers that say a manager's time is up?

I will take each of the three managers individually and tell you what was my breaking point for each one of them

Moyes - Would definitely be after we had suffered two 3-0 defeats to Liverpool and Man City at Old Trafford in March 2014

LVG - Without any shadow of a doubt it would be after we lost at home to Norwich in December 2015 which was on the back of a defeat to newly promoted Bournemouth

Mourinho - I was fuming after what he said in the post match press conference after the Sevilla game but the breaking point was that dour 0-0 draw with Palace in November 2018

I am not going to lie my patience is being severely tested by some of Ole's decisions recently particularly when he has been keeping faith with Lingard despite his head clearly not being in it due to his personal circumstances. I want to keep faith with him until the end of this season but I could reach a breaking point before then if we suffered any really humiliating defeats where there is absolutely no fight and desire from the players.

 

[mav_9me]

I have been Ole out for a while now.

What's next for me is united out of my life if we don't buy a midfielder. If the club doesn't care about the season enough to buy a midfielder or two, why the feck am I going to watch them like a fecking idiot. 19 yrs later I will stop watching united.

 

[shahzy]

I stopped caring a long time ago. Havent missed this many games for years. Whats the point really

 

[Winrar]

We did already hit some sort of a low not just this season but for the entire club I feel. Sue me for saying this, but my apathy for this club has gotten to the point where I wouldn't even care that much if Liverpool thump us 8-0 in a few weeks time.

Owners themselves clearly care more about how many sponsorship deals they can secure than our dire performances. Hypothetically, if us getting relegated somehow made Glazers more money, they would subtly try to do so. Nothing will fundamentally change how this club is run until Woodward and the Glazers get the feck out.

So why do I still support this club then? Emotional version of a sunk cost fallacy I suppose. But I do lament that the once great club that I loved watching has fallen to this degree while our rivals pull away to the top.

 

[MrVolley]

1. 5-0 loss/28% possession at Anfield ,
2. Contact extension for Phil Jones
3. Signing Kurt Zouma for 85 million in this transfer window

Unless the above 3 happens, I'm going to join the deluded "Ole at the wheel" crowd. On that note RIO! WHAT A TIT!

 

[NewGlory]

If the morons in charge don't buy 2-3 key players in the winter transfer window (and it looks like that is exactly what is happening) we can easily see a long stretch of losses, the way we saw last year towards the end of the season, and then we can easily finish somewhere below 10th place. I doubt we will get relegated, but 10th–15th place is a disgrace, especially given this year everybody is struggling and we had genuine shot for top 4, despite everything. So that would be a rock bottom.

I have given up any hope that we will win Europa League, so any hope for Champions League next year - also gone. Which means any hope of signing and attracting any half-decent players - also gone. Recipe for future rock bottoms.

 

[Nevilles.Wear.Prada]

For those Ole In fans? Maybe relegation to League 1 would really give them something to think about.

 

[Hughes35]

Nope, there is yet further to go. We have more tough fixtures coming up and still have two more cups to crash out of.

Things will get worse in the next two / three months. The only good thing is we all expect it get worse. It was the hope that hurt, it's all ok now.