I can see us dropping points even though away at Stoke in the winter months is much tougher, which is why Messi will never come to England.
FA Premier League
Stoke City 2:2 Manchester United
bet365 Stadium
- Kick-off
- Sat, 9 September 2017 @ 5:30pm BST
- Status
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Closed
Discussion Your Lineup Prediction
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- Status
If they play 3 at the back Jose could play 2 strikers. He also knows Zouma so probably knows what to expect.
We should win this and I just hope Mata is not playing away at Stoke.I think Jones is fit and Jose is just using the conference as a way to keep him away from the England team. Hope that's the case anyway because he and Bailly have been absolutely fantastic together.
Early Predicted Lineup:
________________________________________________________________________________
1. de Gea
25. Valencia 3. Bailly 4. Jones 17. Blind
31. Matic 6. Pogba
19. Rashford 22. Mkhitaryan 11. Martial
9. Lukaku
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Bench: 20. Romero, 12. Smalling, 36. Darmian, 21. Herrera, 27. Fellaini, 8. Mata, 14. Lingard
Predicteed Score: Stoke 0-3 Man Utd (Lukaku X2, Martial)
I've noticed that with the arrival of Matic, Pogba plays on the right of midfield, not the left has he used to.
I don't believe in that attacking lineup, no way Mourinho doesn't keep a truly attacking option on the bench.0-1 to United.
Agree. Can't see Rashford and Martial starting together. It'll be the ordinary line up with one of them starting on the left and the other getting the last 20 mins. It's working so far so why change it ?We know what to expect. If we go there and get beaten to 2nd balls and struggle to string a pass together I'll be annoyed. How they play is nothing new and we need to be ready to combat it.
This is why I Caf.
First time in many years I feel confident with coming away with a win. Not many teams can do this, even if Stoke are less intimidating as a team than in previous years. Do they still have Shawcross?Why do people think we're still turning up to a Pulis machine with Rory Delap throw-ins and Ricardo Fuller elbows? Stoke are a much softer team these days but they do have some genuine quality in attack and that's what we need to be wary off. We will still get plenty of the ball and should beat them.
Thought he played a bit more on the left against Leicester but he did switch throughout. First 2 games he did seem to favour the right though. Lingard still offers pace off the bench. I'm pretty sure we'll see that front 4 at some point in the season.
EDIT: Actually his heatmap for the Leicester game seems to suggest he did spend more time on the right so fair enoughLast edited:Our trickiest fixture so far and could be our first chance of conceding (considering how worried I was about our defense I can't believe we still haven't let one in). Still fairly confident personally, riding the hype train as far as it will take me.Will be our thoughest challenge so far. Stoke is always hard to play against and even harder to beat - especially away. So I think we should win this but we won't see a game as fluid as the first three.Another 4-0 please.I wonder if they will try to go at us and press or play defensively and counter attack usI think people overestimate their attack, they look like they should be fantastic on paper, but they rarely ever perform that way. I know it's the current Caf trend to shit on our fullbacks but Valencia and Blind shouldn't have much problem with them.
It's more their compact defense to be concerned about, but they have a weakness at RWB ( especially if they play Diouf there ) that we should be able to exploit with Rashford/MartialThis fixture has got 'nasty fecking chore' stamped through it like a stick of Blackpool rock. We're better equipped than last year, when we needed one of Rooney's final moments of class to wrest back a point, so I'm hopeful we can do the business. However, unoriginal observation though it clearly is, I don't see it being pretty.
If that's the case Martial or Rashford should be causing havoc down our left.10 fecking days before this is on. Its bloody fecking unbearable.We won the first three last season then lost the 4th at home to City. We need an even stronger start this season.
Not only did we lost points in that game, Mourinho lost his faith in the 4-2-3-1 that we started playing then for 5 games.Lost faith then after got back to it. Funny.
Yeah, absolutely. They played Bruno Martins Indi there on the weekend.
I actually thought it was longer! That's a bit of a relief
When is the next international break after this?
Beginning of Octoberfeck the international breaks. That's all.Whatever the result, whichever of Martial or Rashford comes off the bench will score a goal some time after the 80th minute. This is now the law.I hope this break doesnt curb our momentum like it did last season.
wtf that's ridiculously soonBeginning of October
FA official number 1: "Oh I know, let's have largely irrelevant International breaks throughout the season just to annoy them, and perhaps injure a few players in the process!"
FA official number 2: "Yeah, that'll learn 'em not to diss our refs"
FA official number 3: "Yeah!"
FA official number 4: "Yeah!"
FA official number 5: "Yeaaaahhhh!"
Or something like that.
How on earth can World Cup qualifiers be irrelevant? I'm as annoyed at international breaks as he next man, but everyone wants to sit back and watch the World Cup in the summer, but the teams shouldn't be playing games to get there if we all had our way.
With international tournaments every two years, they are a necessary evil.
Strange that the F.A now decide when every team in the world plays qualifiersThe "bet365 Stadium"? Feck me, that's grim.With the international breaks they ought to play 3 matches, and then this would cut down the number of stoppages. Using England For example they would meet up on a Mon with the int team. Play Fri - Tue- Fri then meet back with club side on the Mon. This would give the club side 5/6 days work with the players before the game. At the moment they meet up on the Mon, play Fri -Tue, have a wed warmdown/discussion, and then meet club side Thur. leaving the club 2/3 days only before the next game. As it stands now this gives a team playing Utd/another top team, a real advantage if a lot of their players aint on international duty.Im going 1-3 with this. I think following the intl break, it will disrupt us, and we will score late on 70/75 mins? after being 1 down from the first half. Then another 2 will quickly follow. This will be our first real test, as its a decent team away, and after the intl break, with little prep.
International breaks are great! The key is in the name, use the time to actually have one yourself. I am in Crete until the day before the Stoke game and then in Barcelona for the matches in OctoberBeginning of October
Same story. Rashford vs Martial. At least this is a good thing
Consensus is pretty much 50-50. Only very few of them see both of Rash/Martial starting. I would like to see both of them starting, but I don't think it will happen.
Judging from their performance, I have no idea who will be starting, and I don't think anyone can have very high conviction. Performance wise, they both definitely deserve to start, just the tactic/system doesn't allow them. The caf will melt-up if Jose plays both of them.Stadiums named after sponsors make my arse twitch.
Stoke away is always difficult, I think they will score first, and early. But we'll win 2-1."Let the horses run freely"
-------------Lukaku----------
Rashford----Mkhi-----Mata
--------Matic-----Pogba-----
Blind--Jones--Bailly--Valencia
55/45 on Rashford/Martial as LW- Status
Man of the Match
Runners-up
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11%
Marcus Rashford
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8%
Henrikh Mkhitaryan
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7%
Romelu Lukaku
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7%
Antonio Valencia
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7%
Paul Pogba
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6%
Nemanja Matic
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2%
Anthony Martial
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2%
Matteo Darmian
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1%
Eric Bailly
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1%
Ander Herrera
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1%
Phil Jones
Player Ratings
Total Average Rating
Highest Rated Player
Lowest Rated Player
Compiled from 548 ratings.
Score Predictions
769,24,54
- Man Utd win
- Stoke win
- Draw
Detailed Results
- 32% Stoke 0:2 Man Utd
- 20% Stoke 1:2 Man Utd
- 13% Stoke 0:3 Man Utd
- 10% Stoke 1:3 Man Utd
- 9% Stoke 0:1 Man Utd
- 5% Stoke 1:1 Man Utd
- 3% Stoke 0:4 Man Utd
- 2% Stoke 0:5 Man Utd
- 1% Stoke 0:0 Man Utd
- 1% Stoke 1:0 Man Utd
- 1% Stoke 2:1 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 1:4 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 2:0 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 1:5 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 4:0 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 3:1 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 5:0 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 2:3 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 5:5 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 2:5 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 3:0 Man Utd
- 0% Stoke 3:5 Man Utd
Match Stats
- Stoke
- Man Utd
- Possession
- 37% 63%
- Shots
- 10 18
- Shots on Target
- 5 8
- Corners
- 5 11
- Fouls
- 10 10
Referee
Neil Swarbrick
Man Utd Lineup
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replaced by Anthony Martial
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replaced by Jesse Lingard
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replaced by Juan Mata
