AgentSmith
Full Member
- Joined
- May 13, 2019
- Messages
- 1,557
I appreciate the sentiment of trying to take a step back from the raw emotion of a one-off match to look at the season more broadly. I agree that there’s been tangible progress this season and we have the basis of a young team filled with quality that’s ready to take the next step with the aid of proper investment this summer. Ole has earned the right to be here next season and to be given the funds he needs this summer.
Having said that, I think you’re off in your assessment of the game. Villarreal have some good players and Emery is clearly a better manager than his Arsenal reign would indicate but it feels odd to praise our comfortable 2nd place as an indicator of progress but then ignore that they finished 7th in one of the weakest incarnations of La Liga for some time. This was a Villarreal team that we are comfortably better than and they played like they knew that fact. If you removed the colours of the shirts and the context of the occasion it would look like United and Burnley were playing. We just couldn’t break down a low-block defence that relied on set pieces as their main attacking threat (a depressingly reliable approach against us).
I also don’t see how keeping Rashford on at the expense of Greenwood was the correct decision. It’s a fair comment about they’re not being an obvious attacking sub to make but it was abundantly clear what we were doing wasn’t working. A change up (like the one Ole ended up doing in the 100th minute...) to the system was worth trying much earlier because of the ineffectual nature of the current system.
It’s a strange season to assess made stranger by the performance last night because it embodied a lot of the long-standing critiques of Solskjær as a manager;
- an inability to break down low-blocks
- poor in-game management
- not performing on the big occasion
But in large part we‘ve shown improvement in breaking down low-block defences this season and no manager has won more games by virtue of their substitutions’ goals than Ole.
We’re a strange team to assess given the inconsistencies and contradictions that seem to occur game to game, and I think Ole as a manager that reflects that. Neville’s ‘odd bunch’ comment probably summed it up best as an assessment of the team.
Having said that, I think you’re off in your assessment of the game. Villarreal have some good players and Emery is clearly a better manager than his Arsenal reign would indicate but it feels odd to praise our comfortable 2nd place as an indicator of progress but then ignore that they finished 7th in one of the weakest incarnations of La Liga for some time. This was a Villarreal team that we are comfortably better than and they played like they knew that fact. If you removed the colours of the shirts and the context of the occasion it would look like United and Burnley were playing. We just couldn’t break down a low-block defence that relied on set pieces as their main attacking threat (a depressingly reliable approach against us).
I also don’t see how keeping Rashford on at the expense of Greenwood was the correct decision. It’s a fair comment about they’re not being an obvious attacking sub to make but it was abundantly clear what we were doing wasn’t working. A change up (like the one Ole ended up doing in the 100th minute...) to the system was worth trying much earlier because of the ineffectual nature of the current system.
It’s a strange season to assess made stranger by the performance last night because it embodied a lot of the long-standing critiques of Solskjær as a manager;
- an inability to break down low-blocks
- poor in-game management
- not performing on the big occasion
But in large part we‘ve shown improvement in breaking down low-block defences this season and no manager has won more games by virtue of their substitutions’ goals than Ole.
We’re a strange team to assess given the inconsistencies and contradictions that seem to occur game to game, and I think Ole as a manager that reflects that. Neville’s ‘odd bunch’ comment probably summed it up best as an assessment of the team.