Maybe the owners didn’t fancy spending that much on him unless he added an -inho to his name?
You think it makes more sense for Pep to needlessly hype our purchase? I’d rather take Pep’s word and assume he rates him.
Ole Gunnar Solskjær | 2021/22 Discussion
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You think it makes more sense for Pep to needlessly hype our purchase? I’d rather take Pep’s word and assume he rates him.
The back and forth that never ends on this forum (and I realise that by posting I am a part of that) causes everybody to become agenda based at times.
The definition of a forum is: a meeting or medium where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged
I would say that the balance between ideas and views is now strongly tipped towards views rather than ideas, and by that I mean that the percentage of users that just pop in after a game and give their extreme (usually negative) view is rising, and those posters aren't here to debate, or to research an opinion before its written. They just want to vent. Everything is 'sickening', or a 'disgrace', and the team are 'bottlers' and whatever else. I don't think I'd have the patience to not just ban these posters, so its good that I don't own a forum. They add nothing in my view.
Just yesterday I wrote a post critiquing Rodgers European history. I couldn't really care less about him, or his CV, but it pissed me off enough to see so many fans, many of whom should know better, going to the extremes and posting their view that Rodgers is without doubt a better coach. Without that volume of posts I wouldn't have bothered, but now I'm trying to tear down a guy who I don't have strong feelings about just to make a point. It wouldn't be necessary if this forum was more about ideas and less about views. People would have looked into it themselves and maybe had pause to reconsider, rather than throw out a lazy opinion just because they beat us one time and their Ole=bad agenda leads them to jump in head first, and my Ole=not bad agenda forced me to respond.
Of course he rates him. It was probably Leicester's insistence of the money up front that put them off, or maybe Harry just wanted to come to us. They just spent over £100m on another two centre backs last summer, so they certainly have the money.
Personally I look at it with common sense.
Any discussion of chopping Ole at the moment is absolutely ridiculous.
The main argument for his sacking is because we aren't playing brilliant football constantly whilst mounting a genuine challenge.
That's a ridiculous expectation of him considering the starting point he had of 6th and the level of rebuild expected of him / the club.
Look, am not dumping on Ole here. He is a solid manager, but this is just simplyfing things and taking all credits from the managers. It is not rocket science, but it is definitely not that simple.
Zidane is also a very good tactician and like a player he has an excellent sense when the biggest games come. He is brilliant in terms of game management and changing the flow of the game. Underrated manager, although I agree you won't mention him if you name top 3 tacticians in the world probably. Great fit for Madrid though.
Di Matteo is an absolute fluke, so let's not even go there.
In the end, you need both great players and great manager. But, since manager is the one who picks them, has such an influence in buying them and in the end plays them the way he wants it, I would say he is significantly more important. Especially, in top clubs where you have big budgets and access to good/great players working with them on daily basis.
And as @Siorac said making them look pretty much irrelevant is really strange considering our history.
You see that's the thing, there's clearly conversation to be had about Ole and the majority can do so in a respectful manner. You're also correct about the negative posts after any result bar a win - however I'll counter that with some of the hysterical, hyperbolic posts after a win from the 'in' crowd. Let's be honest, plenty of these posts are made in bad faith and are equally as baiting as the negative posts. Literally the first post in here after our historic game against Southampton was something about 'Ole haters'. There are some that are far too invested in a 'side' but have no desire to air their opinions in a coherent, constructive manner. They're too busy playing their silly 'sides' war.
You made a good post yesterday about Rodgers and guess what, it was good because you stated facts and done so respectfully and not in a baiting manner. Compare that to a Rodgers post I called out yesterday in the Solskjaer contract thread which was hysterical, out of context and offered zero nuance. I think the levels of condescending, snidey posts about Solskjaer are overwhelming at this point and it's gone beyond reasoned discussion for some. There's still some very good posters I enjoy engaging with that are either totally supportive or have doubts.
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You don't need to have a giflord subscription to know that most of our conceded goals came from a bad defensive organization, a goalkeeper glued to his line and poor decision making. The type of mistakes that can't be recovered from with pace even if Maguire was lightning like James.
We play a high line whenever were able to dominate. I have yet to see us get smacked around by our CBs' lack of pace. Onus is kinda on you to show us otherwise, unless you want to say I'm full of it, in which case I'll just agree to disagree.
They're not as slow as you're making them out be. It hasn't cost us. What about Maguire is hampering (or will hamper) us exactly?
You bringing up "Fergie or Wenger" proves my point. Wenger would've been fired had he taken over and not found a quick fix. Any manager in the world (that doesn't have the credit Fergie has) that would've taken over would be judged on immediate results. You're basically saying Ole should've risked getting fired in order to "not hamper us" long term. It's an unreachable standard. Remove your poor Wenger example and all you're really saying is: Fergie, fergie, fergie. Ole is no Fergie.
You blame Ole for looking for a quick fix (by buying Maguire), yet you don't give him credit for plugging the hole. I'm not sure every manager would've steadied the ship, let alone because we bought Maguire.
Also just a reminder that we've binned 80m purchases before.
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Did Potter have a good March?
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Ole drew 1 and beat City and Hammers.
Brighton lost to Leicester, then won last 2.
Based on 3 matches for each I believe.
Ole drew 1 and beat City and Hammers.
Brighton lost to Leicester, then won last 2.
They all had 2 wins 1 draw in the 3 available games. Edit: Potter had 2 win 1 loss yeah.
Link to voting and more description on all here:
https://www.premierleague.com/news/2075912
Ah ok, cheers lads. For some reason, I thought Brighton hadn't been doing so well lately.
Edit: cheers @roonster09 too.
Potter won 2 and lost 1. Rest all won 2 and drew 1.
ManUtd beat City and West Ham. Chelsea beat Liverpool and Everton.
I'm not sure that I agree with you there. Not that they don't exist, but that the balance is anywhere close to equal. We had the likes of Sammsky that used to go over the top and was banned for it, but I don't see the United forum littered with new 'we're all awesome' threads after we beat City to the extent that all the usual negatives ones are created or bumped 10 minutes into a game and then active for weeks.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel that I can name almost every poster on here that's been consistently defending Ole and the team, and then there's maybe 10% in the middle, and then the overwhelming rest seem to be negative.
You’re doing it again..
No that's not my point. Obviously the manager matters although it mattered more years ago when they were in charge of transfers. Fergie built an empire and accumulated great players and was great at motivating players to play beyond themselves.
Nowadays the manager still gets final say but after accumulating by far the best squad in the league, it's fairly handy to just not get in their way and bounce up and down on the sidelines like a baldy cheerleader.
Back to Ole. He is doing as well as he could with the players he has and the funds that have been made available to him.
Not dumping on managers. Below basically sums up my view in managers.
Fergie might win the league with our current crop. He was a great manager and didn't necessarily need to have the best squad to win the league. 2003,2011 and 2013.
Pep 100% would not win the league with our crop. He's always had, by a country mile, the best squad wherever he's been and couldn't motivate a weaker squad the way Fergie could.
Ole won't either. He'll need better players because he isn't Alex Ferguson either. I've no problem giving Ole the time and money because he's displayed the common sense and mental balance to handle the job. And he's a bloody decent bloke.
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He has a Solly(d) March
I think that's wishful thinking on your end. I can think up 3 posters off the top of my head who are pro-Ole but aren't pleasant to engage and are very snidey and baiting. Sammsky1 was the worst but an honourable mention to other banned posters who were pretty bad too; GoldTrafford99, FatherWolff and Class Of 63.
I'm also not so sure the posters that have offered unwavering, unequivocal support of Ole from day one should receive badges of honour. I mean, I'm still very on the fence about him and he's certainly never fully won me over. I did want him out at one point, but looking at the bigger picture, I can acknowledge the positives and I try my best to be rational - so on that basis he certainly deserves to be here next season. But nevertheless, there are questions to be asked of him and he has shortcomings.
I also think the negativity is blown out of proportion at times too. It's literally a small minority that are extremely vocal. The preceding hours after a match aren't the best time to gauge opinions and often after the dust settles, people will be more rational. For me, the majority of posters are fine, and their views are fairly balanced. I guess though it's all about perception, and your threshold on what you construe as negativity may differ from mine.
And yet under Niko Kovac, Bayern performed far worse than under Hansi Flick. Under Guardiola, they played markedly different football than before and after.
I like this
There is this prevailing idea that if you stand by your manager no matter what, that automatically makes you a better fan. This thinking is more prevalent amongst fans of certain clubs, and United is one of them for obvious reasons. How often do you see something like "well if you don't support the manager, then perhaps you should find another team to support", or "you're not a real fan then" or words to that effect? The cult of the manager, type of thing. You're not a true fan unless you back the manager 100%.
Now, being supportive of your manager and standing by him is obviously completely fine. If you think he's doing a great job and you support him and want him to stay, then great. Nothing at all wrong with that, of course. Conversely, if you think he's not good enough then that too should be fine. I just don't like this "well, you're not a real fan" retort that you often see.
Agreed and that's the kind of behaviour I'm calling out.
I've seen some reasonable criticisms of him being met with the kind of retorts you mentioned. This is why I have an issue with this false belief that people that criticise him are the issue. It's very clear that the other 'side' resort to posting things that are just as bad as the posts/posters that they like to call out. Obviously I have zero issue with the extreme element being called out as their constant negativity in every single thread is nauseating.
Few things to debunk here: 1. 'Giving and going' isn't purely an indication of ability. Contrary to what you seem to think, they are aspects of the sport that can be taught/improved upon. Sterling has come leaps and bounds under Pep from an offensive stand point since moving to City.
Rashford is better when we counter attack because simply put, this team as a whole is fecking shite when we try to play otherwise. The whole team looks poorly drilled when we don't have the space - one or two players, I'd understand, but the whole squad and we need to start pointing fingers elsewhere. You need quick, one touch passing, movement off the ball and structured counter pressing etc. to break down teams - those are all aspects of the game that we still highly struggle in imo. If we had a dollar for every time Bruno aimlessly pressed by himself, whilst everyone else watched or for everytime we concede posession when pressed ourselves.
Mctominay not being KDB isn't the point, you're missing the point here. The point is, even though KDB has been largely injured and average this season - they've still looked incredible, because of the coaching and the system in place, letting others thrive. You replace one player from our first 11 and we suddenly look to take a severe hit. Leicester etc. can manage to make squad players look very competent, it's unacceptable we can't.
You're also comparing players which are nothing alike to suit your agenda. Players like Bruno and Pogba are more than comparable to their midfielders but aren't nearly as dominant in our side as our team as a collective unit isn't nearly as dominant due to poorer coaching. It's not just about personnel.
Also the fact that he will dominate with that City team is based on what exactly? This is a manager who over his career averages under 2 points a game, hasn't won a trophy in half a decade and despite spending what's approaching 3 years here - still has huge question marks over the team's collective coaching. I'd flip your argument and say, had Pep gotten the amount of time Ole has with this squad, we would have already won a title.
Lastly - you're talking about how players like AWB aren't in the same category as Cancelo etc. technically, completely ignoring the fact that our current manager signed him. If anything, that should be a red flag to you, that someone you don't consider to be in the top tier technically, but instead, a more defensive minded player, was a priority for Ole.
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Yes. United were in dire need of a better CB and he was available given the step up from Leicester. Is he perfect? No. Did United overpay? Probably, but they would have been worse off without.
But it's not. I'm quite Ol-in, but it's not because I feel that I am supporting him because "it makes me a better fan" or anything. There is progress under him and that's the only reason.
If you go into the posting history of most people who are supporting Ole right now, I'm quite certain a lot of us would have turned on Mou fairly early. I was on the fence since the 0-0 at Anfield and completely Mou out since the Newcastle defeat. I'm quite sure a lot of fans who are currently Ole in would have been Mou out since before the Sevilla press conference (which is when a significant number of people switched sides)
And worth noting that this "get behind X or you're not a real fan" never seems to extend to the players. They are always fair game, for whatever reason. Suggesting that a player should be sold: fine. Suggesting that a manager should be sacked: plastic entitled fan.
You'd be correct, coaching staff as a whole but the managers specifically. They are the head coaches after all, or should be, at least.
This is it. At the very least give him a complete team to fight the almost perfectly built bombproof City squad before you go all out calling for him to be fired and for us to rip it up and start all over again. Has progress been enough from the terrible place we were in to give him better players and more time. Yes, definitely. Now, especially after last summer, it’s 100% on the club to give the manager and the fans a more complete and competitive roster that can play in more than one way and that has more than one or two major threats. If they don’t and we continue to fail it’s more their fault than any manager. Ole has our best players flat out run into the ground to get us this second and we are still too far off. When he rotates (Matic especially) it’s always a complete disaster as the drop in quality and energy is too much. If we get more quality in the squad that will almost certainly make the coaching look better. You can only coach the players you have. Remember us with Smith in midfield under the best manager of all time. The coaching didn’t look too hot around then either did it? At the end of the day it was all sorted through intelligent recruitment and continuity. Ole will know this first hand.
How can a team look good without a proper striker for most of the season or without any creative outlet across the front 3? Dan James probably has more attempted assists than martial and Greenwood combined in about 1/4 of the games. Rashford can be as injured or as wasteful as he likes because there is literally nobody else. We didn’t get Sancho and buy for the future instead? Ok. Sounds to me like the board are happy with top 4 this year and to keep building slowly, I’m sure that’s not what Ole or the squad wanted to hear either but we have fans then acting all entitled when it’s clear we are still in the middle of setting up the squad and the owners set the pace at the end of the day.
How can a midfield function without a player setting the tempo and protecting the defenders? Fred seems to be the only one that even attempts to do this but he’s a tiny box to box player and he’s been fully run into the ground. The fact we started the season with Matic in midfield sums us up this seasons objectives once again: top 4 and that’s about it. Also the Pogba situation has been allowed to rumble on behind the scenes. That’s also on our owners. Ole has managed well despite the above factors.
Our defenders then are always injured but we give Bailly and Jones new deals? Placeholders until youth break through? Who knows really. Once again It sounds very like they were probably just happy with top 4...
Does all this not scream just get top 4 and you’ll have done your job. He’s currently exceeding those expectations due to whatever external factors but I don’t know how our fans can deny the team spirit is much better and we look closer than we have since 2018. It’s a younger squad and we are slashing the wage bill. At the end of the day you can only beat what’s in front of you and you can only coach the players the owners give you. if we’d bought Partey and Jota instead of Amad and VDB we wouldn’t have been far off this year at all. That’s how fine the margins are in hindsight.
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And will certainly continue to do so.
Hypocrisy, plain and simple. Look through some of our player threads and you'll regularly see some pro-Ole posters ripping players to shreds. These same posters would get very tense over any criticism of Ole. The whole place is riddled with hypocrisy and agendas.
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Can't say I have. The last time I saw "go support Liverpool" it was fully justified and had feck all to do with the manager. Basically some guy saying he was a utd fan for 3 years but was considering supporting a different team because our football was dire.
If they're so common it should be easy to find examples, preferably ones where the poster didnt get banned. It's the basis of your grievance and sounds straw man-like.
Honestly your post reads a like safe way to smear "the ole in" crowd without giving them a chance for a rebuttal.
Feel free to vent, but it's not exactly encouraging good discussion.
It is, though. If you're not doing it, then fine - I'm obviously not talking about you. This is very much a thing. To be fair, some of the posters on here who were very much that, have been banned. But it's not just on here, it's in other spheres, too. There is a very old school, "top red" (for lack of a better term) attitude that very much is the "if you don't stand by your manager, you're no true fan" This is very much a thing that exists, and it particularly exists in the United fanbase. Again, for obvious reasons.
Again, I'm not sure if you misconstrued what I was saying. I'm not saying that just because you stand by your manager you automatically think like this. There's absolutely nothing wrong with standing by your manager. It's the attitude above I'm talking about.
One, I'm not venting. And as I said above to another poster, this is very much something that exists. Not just on here, but in general. Particularly for this club. I used to watch various fan channels (don't anymore) and this attitude is rife.
As for the bold part, what are you even talking about? I'm posting on a public forum. There's ample opportunity for a rebuttal. It's not as if I made a comment and turned replies off. I also made sure to say that this isn't an attack on people who stand by the manager.
And as for the last part, I guess you're the arbiter of good discussion considering your flawless posting.
Yes, that's another word that gets thrown around a lot
It only applies to a small minority, thankfully.
I went full on Jose out a-few games into his 3rd season when he turned into a toxic prick. I was a loud annoying dickhead in my views and very vocal. But I couldn't stand seeing what he was doing to the club. Before that, I still supported him but obviously wasn't happy with certain elements of his management.
When Ole arrived it was like a breath of fresh air and I loved his first few months. However, hand on heart I wasn't overly excited by the time he signed a contract as I felt things weren't looking as rosy. From around October 2019 up until the end of that year I became quite anti-Ole. I was honestly just pissed off with everything got to do with the club and still had those negative memories of the Jose reign. However, I came to the realisation that I was acting like a toxic prick and I wasn't offering any valid, coherent points. I took a long hard look at my posting style and realised I needed to get out of the toxic mindset I was in. While I didn't think he was doing a good job, he wasn't actively harming us like Jose.
I spent a-lot of time reading positive viewpoints about him and came to the conclusion - that although he's not perfect - a lot of my negativity was misplaced and stemmed from the Jose era. Since then I've tried to be balanced and fair and to see the perspective from both sides. I don't agree with a-lot of pro-Ole posters and think they put too positve a spin on things, but I can engage politely with the ones who aren't hysterical and hyperbolic. Conversely, some of the negative views on him are way too OTT. I'm on the fence in a sense but if you pushed me on it, I would say I'm veering more into the negative regarding my views on him as a manager. In saying that, I do think he's done enough to be here next season and hopefully we can kick on even more. Winning the EL would be a lovely bonus this year too.
Hey! I know I'm a fecking idiot, there's no need to rub it in.
You have ample opportunity to call out posters that think they're superior fans because they're Ole in.
You're saying a certain percentage of Ole in fans are morons (those that make the comments you've described).
It's hard to reply to that as a in Ole person. You'll just say something to the effect of: "Nah, you're not one of them. I was talking about those other people (that share your view)", no?
Basically you're criticising morons for being morons. What does it have to do with Ole in?
I feel like I've seen just as much, if not more "standards (of Ole in fans) have dropped", or "we're happy being the new Arsenal" (if you're Ole in) than the comments you've described.
All of these comments are just insults imo.
I think you're conflating people who support the manager vs people who support the manager but like to act as though it makes them better fans. The latter I mentioned do so in a blase manner by speaking to people who criticise him as if they're not fit to support the club. The two are different things. Just like there's people who are critical vs people who are critical but monoplise every thread with negativity.
And as for your last sentence, bingo! Insults are insults whether you are pro or anti-Ole.
It's a pet peeve of mine simply because it makes no sense. We can't 'earn' our teams' successes. We can't work hard for it. We can just sit around and hope, and offer some suggestions as to what should be done. Entitlement simply doesn't come into it.
Thats a thing, its their manager, has nothing to do with United. We are not dealing with a same poster who behaved, acted in the same manner, hold all managers at the same standards. Would still find that kinda acolyte delusional behaviour weird but at least you can respect the fact that poster is that way because they are all United managers at the time.
We had the same bullshit during JM just posters name were different. Even till this day you could see them pop from time to time in JM thread or you could see them having a go at Ole, while holding him to completely different standards vs time when they were spouting nonsense to defend their cult leader Jose, or if Poch would become a United manager tomorrow, we would have Amadeus preaching about supporting United manager = supporting United, while at present he has a pop at Ole here and there with ez.
You're right.
Shite (or not...can't decide) username, good poster.
You should be promoted - don't know what crap you've pulled in the past (see you joined years ago), but you've made some good posts recently.
Ten likes are enough for promotion, right? Get on it, modmins/scouts - this fecker's on nine.
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