The “Ole In” Brigade

Møllemanden

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If you can't as a Manchester United fan moan at 9 wins from 24 games, well, you can never moan. "Childish" to expect a top club to actually maintain some kind of standard, my lord.
You're allowed to moan or do whatever you want. But I am entitled to my opinion. It's gets boring and depressing watching all the "glass half empty" people in here.
 
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You're allowed to moan or do whatever you want. But I am entitled to my opinion. It's gets boring and depressing watching all the "glass half empty" people in here.
The glass isn't half empty is it though?

We are actually shite, our glass has a few drops left in it. If you think this season represents a half full glass, we call that delusion, I'd compare you more to the Black Knight @Møllemanden rather than simply an optimist.

 

WolfInSharp'sClothing

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Point number 1.

Ask yourself this, would Ole still be your manager if he wasn’t a fondly thought of ex player?

He absolutely wouldn’t be.

Ole is the perfect coach for Woodward.

Well thought of enough to be given some leeway, not strong enough to challenge what’s going on behind the scenes and not experienced enough for expectations to be too high.

So Woodward can get away with running a shit show off the pitch, whilst the fans are split over whose fault the club’s failings are.
 

Møllemanden

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We are actually shite, our glass has a few drops left in it. If you think this season represents a half full glass, we call that delusion.
I don't. The mentality of the fans is "Glass half empty". It's negative and trivial in here. The season is not over yet. And yes, it has been far from good enough. But man, it's f*cking depressing in here. It wasn't always like that.
 

peridigm

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Agree. Our season would be different if Pogba was fit for the first half of the season. Then McT is injured and now Rashford. It just keeps piling on. Ole is against all odds.
 

Escobar

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Moyes was way worse than Ole .. And the football was worse under LVG .. I was near suicidal after every home game for 2 seasons
You need to put your Ole glasses away. We are as shit as ever under Ole and point wise even worse. He is a real shit manager and he continues to put us in deep shit. Even his interviews are terrible nowadays. He should have been fired a long time ago but as long as the excuses stay as creative, he might stay
 

Tel074

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You need to put your Ole glasses away. We are as shit as ever under Ole and point wise even worse. He is a real shit manager and he continues to put us in deep shit. Even his interviews are terrible nowadays. He should have been fired a long time ago but as long as the excuses stay as creative, he might stay

It's the opinion of a season ticket holder I attend matches and I know the mood around the place .. The time under Moyes was bloody shocking he probably had 11 better players than Ole does now
 
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It's the opinion of a season ticket holder I attend matches and I know the mood around the place .. The time under Moyes was bloody shocking he probably had 11 better players than Ole does now
I'm a season ticket holder. My Dad is platinum, never misses a game the nutter, hasn't been since Everton he's so gutted by it all and the inaction of the board to do anything about this failing manager and club.

We still won more than half of our games under Moyes.
 

el3mel

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It's the opinion of a season ticket holder I attend matches and I know the mood around the place .. The time under Moyes was bloody shocking he probably had 11 better players than Ole does now
Not defending Moyes but that squad needed as much rebuild as the current one. Rio, Vidic, Evra and Giggs were past it. All of them left/retired after that season and those who left did nothing of note in their last 1 or 2 years remaining in football bar Evra. Scholes had retired after winning the league. Carrick was getting old and RVP spent the majority of the season injured. We probably had only Rooney and De Gea playing at high level this season. It was a squad that had one final push by Fergie to win the league and that was it for them, it was the end of their generation. LVG sold the majority of this squad in his reign here.

Moyes was acting like he had signed 6 years contract and he would have time to rebuild it but got the sack and I doubt anyone thought it would have been a good idea to give him more time or that he was capable of this rebuilding project so I don't get the notion Ole should now.
 

Tel074

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Every single statistic says that is not even remotely the case. You like Ole, that's the only difference.

I know lots of United fans almost suicidal now, every bloody week.
I don't like Ole I don't think he should be managing us at all but I'm not a idiot I attend games I can see with my eyes what is worse . The team Moyes had where the Champions and he ruined them in 6 months .
 

shaky

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Every single statistic says that is not even remotely the case. You like Ole, that's the only difference.

I know lots of United fans almost suicidal now, every bloody week.
The last season of LVGs tenure was far worse than anything we've seen this season. People have very short or selective memories. We lost 4 on the bounce to Wolfsburg, Bournemouth, Norwich and Stoke, and that was straight after 2 draws v Leicester and West Ham. Martial was playing up front in all those games interestingly enough. It's almost like we still actually need better, or at least uninjured players, to play well.
 

Gator Nate

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I've become agnostic on the whole thing. Changing managers isn't going to resolve anything. There are too many injuries to key players. The squad needs replacing. The ownership, that also need replacing, won't do what needs to be done.

Every manager possible would have been facing Wednesday night with the same problems as Ole, and I'm not convinced any of them would have done any better.

All that said, we're still sitting 5th in the league on goal differential, still in both domestic cups, and into the EL knockout stages. For all of the hypothesizing as to how things could have gone worse (but didn't) and how things could go wrong (but haven't yet), you cannot take any of that away from him.

Is Ole the right guy for the job? Probably not.

Could the right guy, whoever he may be, get the job done given all the other things we know about the club right now? Probably not.

At least you aren't diddling over whether to ditch your #1-draft-pick quarterback who just became the founding member of the 30/30 club (30 touchdowns and 30 interceptions).
 

Giggsforever

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Yeah weird why are people whining and moaning. The team is doing great, football is fun and results have been good this season. Wonder why they're moaning. Ole's at the wheel.
What did you expect, really? We have had 3 managers that have made a combination of bad and short term signings. The squad was in a mess, it was incredible. Now we finally have a manager that is tearing it a part and trying to build something new by giving young players a chance and buying young and good players (and he could have had better support than Ed and the owners). It was always going to get worse before it start improving.

Why the hell would we hire a manager to rebuild the team and sack him before he gets a chance to build it? I understand expectations at the club, but he did get the job when the club was at a real low point. The nature of the modern game and the impatience with managers is unreal. That being said, I would expect Ole to make the signing needed for us the next two windows (this one included) to take a huge step forward next season, only then should we judge him and talk about changing OUR manager.
 

C'est Moi Cantona

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Mourinho spent nearly 500 mil on transfers. How did those work out? He wanted an unlimited budget despite squandering our money.
Not really much point in raking this up again, but Jose had just finished second, and then wanted a CB to help us kick on, he was refused one, and so at that point didn't fancy it with a squad he knew that couldn't compete, things got nasty, everyone blamed him, and Woodward got away unscathed again.

Now look at us, I hated Jose, but he was clearly right.
 

el3mel

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What did you expect, really? We have had 3 managers that have made a combination of bad and short term signings. The squad was in a mess, it was incredible. Now we finally have a manager that is tearing it a part and trying to build something new by giving young players a chance and buying young and good players (and he could have had better support than Ed and the owners). It was always going to get worse before it start improving.

Why the hell would we hire a manager to rebuild the team and sack him before he gets a chance to build it? I understand expectations at the club, but he did get the job when the club was at a real low point. The nature of the modern game and the impatience with managers is unreal. That being said, I would expect Ole to make the signing needed for us the next two windows (this on included) to take a huge step forward next season, only then should we judge him and talk about changing OUR manager.
How was the squad in a mess when they handed Ole his job by that honeymoon period that lasted 2-3 months ? He didn't get the job due to his amazing CV or history of rebuilding team. He got it thanks to having an initial 3 great months and these were under the squad he just inherited. Was the opinion during that period that the squad was a mess and we needed to sell half of it, or that they were good players being held back by the previous managers and needed few key additions ? How can the squad and results regress so much from his initial 3 months to the current level and still be labeled a rebuilding job ? We are regressing the more his reign goes on.

I'm not expecting a title challenge. I'm expecting decent level of football played and not losing to teams in the bottom half of the table. Is that impossible to achieve ?

Beside, why are we assuming this mysterious rebuild project is gonna be a sure success under Ole ? Why don't we put in our mind the possibility that we might give him 4 years and 500m to spend and still ends sucking hard and the next manager comes and decides the players he signed are mostly not good enough so time for yet another rebuild and all these previous years were total waste ? He had spent 130m on defense in his first summer and we're still leaking goals left, right and center and barely getting any clean sheets, with our 80m defender having an average season. Imagine if the next manager comes on and decides to play with high line and finds our main defender to be as slow as snail so benches him for good, that'll be 80m wasted in that "rebuilding project".

What's he doing that no other manager will be able to do in this mythical rebuilding job anyway ? Selling old players and playing 2 youngsters regularly (not many youngsters, no, only 2, Greenwood and Williams) ? That's about it ? Has he done anything else ? Has he implemented a good enough style for the future ? no, this counter attacking style isn't going to be our long term style. Has he put up a good base for any upcoming manager ? No, the next manager will find the squad in a hot mess that needs loads of money and not just that but needed to be spent absolutely spot on to make it any kind of close to top 3.
 

DixieDean

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I don't know why people bring up injures as an excuse. Correct me if I'm wrong but haven't all mangers at Utd in recent years had such a fate?
 

joso157

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Except we didn't. If anything, this is an emotional comment not based on what actually happened on the pitch.
I'm one of the few who is still on the Ole in side, but let's be honest, we nowhere near tore them apart. Stats: Shots: 23-11, Possession: 72-28, Corners 16-3.
Most of those shots were pot shots from outside the area, don't tell me you weren't buzzing after that first half, which takes a decent performance. Ok, wrong choice of phrase but I mentioned one game, not an entire season of dross which is not true is it. The way that game panned out, we should been out of sight by half time, then we defended like a proper team in the second half, with de gea having one save of note to make. We're still the only team to take points off Liverpool, that wasn't a poor performance either.
 

noodlehair

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The idea that anything quasi “Ole - Out” related is more “emotionally” based than the idea of putting our blind faith in an ex-player with no qualified managerial experience, who would’ve never gotten close to the job otherwise and has won less games than Burnley this season, to rebuild us over several seasons with no money in a manner no major club has done in several decades is frankly through the looking glass- level bonkers...

We seem to be at the “flagrant projection” point of the cycle...but cool beans guys... carry on...
Just seems like the normal thing on here where people go to the extremes of both sides of the argument to me.

Don't think you can sit here and say Ole has done a good job at this point, but don't think you can really sit here and say letting Woodward sack him and replace him with whatever the next flavour of the month is will be the answer either.

A lot of the arguments in this thread make very little sense when you start to break them down. They are just people convincing themselves everything is down to Ole, in the hope this means sacking him will be an easy fix to all our problems, most of which have been ongoing for the last 6-7 years.

Solutions like "if we get someone like Klopp and give them x amount of money"...I mean, ok, but we wont get someone like Klopp, and even if we did, and did give them the money, Woodward is the one in charge of getting in players, and he's very skilled in fecking it up, or signing completely different ones to who the manager wants.

I like Ole, but if the club had a plan, and decided to get in someone better suited to enacting it, well that's how it goes. Football is a ruthless game and Ole can't really argue he's done enough to convince the club to stick with him...but the club doesn't have a plan, or even a clue. It's quite important they get one before starting over again for the 5th time in 6 years. Not sack the manager who you've put in an impossible position and therefore immediately put the next one in the exact same position...which will have a severe impact both on who we can get as manager and how much chance they'll have of succeeding.

The bit I don't get how people miss is that this is exactly how we ended up with Ole in the first place...because we sacked Jose when everything was such a fecking mess that no one with any actual pedigree or who didn't love the club would have touched us.
 

jamesjimmybyrondean

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Just seems like the normal thing on here where people go to the extremes of both sides of the argument to me.

Don't think you can sit here and say Ole has done a good job at this point, but don't think you can really sit here and say letting Woodward sack him and replace him with whatever the next flavour of the month is will be the answer either.

A lot of the arguments in this thread make very little sense when you start to break them down. They are just people convincing themselves everything is down to Ole, in the hope this means sacking him will be an easy fix to all our problems, most of which have been ongoing for the last 6-7 years.

Solutions like "if we get someone like Klopp and give them x amount of money"...I mean, ok, but we wont get someone like Klopp, and even if we did, and did give them the money, Woodward is the one in charge of getting in players, and he's very skilled in fecking it up, or signing completely different ones to who the manager wants.

I like Ole, but if the club had a plan, and decided to get in someone better suited to enacting it, well that's how it goes. Football is a ruthless game and Ole can't really argue he's done enough to convince the club to stick with him...but the club doesn't have a plan, or even a clue. It's quite important they get one before starting over again for the 5th time in 6 years. Not sack the manager who you've put in an impossible position and therefore immediately put the next one in the exact same position...which will have a severe impact both on who we can get as manager and how much chance they'll have of succeeding.

The bit I don't get how people miss is that this is exactly how we ended up with Ole in the first place...because we sacked Jose when everything was such a fecking mess that no one with any actual pedigree or who didn't love the club would have touched us.
Interesting take. So what do you suggest should happen if Ed and the Glazers are not going anywhere
 
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Solutions like "if we get someone like Klopp and give them x amount of money"...I mean, ok, but we wont get someone like Klopp, and even if we did, and did give them the money, Woodward is the one in charge of getting in players, and he's very skilled in fecking it up, or signing completely different ones to who the manager wants.
You say that noods but the club pretty much ticked off a wishlist of managers favourites for 4 years for both LvG & Mourinho at a considerable cost to the club.
 

JPRouve

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Interesting take. So what do you suggest should happen if Ed and the Glazers are not going anywhere
Do what all clubs do, try to find a better manager. Most clubs have these bad periods and the suits rarely leave.
 

joso157

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Remind me again of what happened in the rematch a few weeks later when Pep adapted to what we did in the first match and Ole had no clue how to adjust the entire match. That's the definition of "tore apart"

We can agree that player recruitment has been poor, but a reminder that Ole said it was his choice to spend the budget on the players he did, and be rid of the players he wanted to be rid of with no replacements, the squad is on him. And a vastly better manager would be getting a better tune out of it.
See, in my eyes, that was an exact replica of the game prior, as good as they were in that first half, we were equally that good in the first half of the previous game. Then like them in that game, we came out in the second half, Ole had identified the tactical flaw, and we got a goal back but ultimately it was too little too late.

Listen, I'm not saying its blown my mind this season, but there has been some real positives, granted some real negatives too, but not the whole season. I genuinely don't think there's anyone out there available, who could do any better with this current squad right now, (and I mean right now, with injuries to Rashford, Pogba and McTominay) and I think fundamentally Ole has his first choice team, which, if that was available for, let's say, 90%+ of the games so far, we'd be in the top 4 without doubt, but its been nothing close to that and the issue is only that first 11 are capable of playing that style.

Recruitment wise, If you break it down, Lukaku wanted out, Sanchez has been terrible, Smalling wanted more regular football, Valencia was done, Young wanted a new opportunity, Darmian was dead wood, so all good business or unavoidable. In terms of bringing players in, from the reports I read on the BBC, It was a case of, the money is there, but the if the first choice options weren't available, did we want quick fixes, to which he declined...theres every chance of ending up with another Sanchez scenario so its understandable, right? Also, I don't think in his wildest dreams he would've imagined Pogba being out for so long, Martial out for so long, now Rashford. So wan-bissaka and Maguire were first choice, no problems there. James, I think, was intended to be a squad player but injuries have forced his hand. Other targets were mooted, nothing came through...so I get you're point, but the names were there, the board just couldn't get it over the line...and this window has highlighted that even more so. You've got Liverpool with their only target, done and dusted before the window even opens, like us when David Gill was there, then you've got us with Woodward, haggling over the price of our main target AFTER we've agreed it with a week left of the window, and with someone who is easily worth what sporting are asking, but happy to spend 30 mil maybe more on a 16 year old from Birmingham who no doubt could be unbelievable in a few years, but not right now. So where's the logic there?
 
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Foxbatt

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LVG was boring as hell in the latter part and Jose completely lost the plot. But to say that they were as bad as Ole now is being utterly ridiculous. Both of them won trophies in their short time. In fact in their first season LVG got us into the CL spot and in his second year he lost the CL spot on goal difference. But he won the FA Cup that year. Jose won the EL in his first year. If Ole wins anything like that then he has equalled them but so far he has not done anything to be even close to either of them.
 

Gehrman

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Not really much point in raking this up again, but Jose had just finished second, and then wanted a CB to help us kick on, he was refused one, and so at that point didn't fancy it with a squad he knew that couldn't compete, things got nasty, everyone blamed him, and Woodward got away unscathed again.

Now look at us, I hated Jose, but he was clearly right.
I agree, but tell me how many of Jose's transfers + wages that were worth the money

Pogba?
Sanchez?
Baily?
Lindehof
Mhiki?
Zlatan - free agent
Fred?
Matic?
Dalot?
Lukkaku?

Don't you think this has an impact on our team that we've spent shitloads with getting little in return.
 

red woppit

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LVG was boring as hell in the latter part and Jose completely lost the plot. But to say that they were as bad as Ole now is being utterly ridiculous. Both of them won trophies in their short time. In fact in their first season LVG got us into the CL spot and in his second year he lost the CL spot on goal difference. But he won the FA Cup that year. Jose won the EL in his first year. If Ole wins anything like that then he has equalled them but so far he has not done anything to be even close to either of them.
Under LVG and Jose I stopped watching United because the football was so bad, if you think the football under Ole is worse, then that's your opinion, but I watch United under Ole, and to me the football is much better, but the squad is very poor, and without three of his major players, they are struggling to create much in the final third. We had chances against Burnley, but didn't take them. If you said that Matic, Mata, Jones and Lingard would still be in the the team at this stage of the season, then you wouldn't have been believed, yet there they were on Wednesday, just shows what a weak squad we have.
 

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Having Lukaku for one more season till we get a replacement next summer next summer is of course far better than having absolutely no one.

And anyway this is a contradictory point. You're blaming Woodward for not securing replacement for Lukaku after selling him then saying Lukaku wouldn't have made any difference anyway had he stayed. How is that ? Why did we need a replacement for Lukaku then if he's that useless and his presence doesn't make much difference ? Try to organize your points a little bit I suggest.

And Ole might be that naive. How do you know ? Have you set down with him and talked together about his opinions re the squad ? Maybe, yeah maybe he thought we'll be totally fine with Greenwood coming up from the academy to take Lukaku's spot. Did we target any top strikers in summer ? No we didn't. Only one was Mandzukic, a 34 years old who wouldn't have been anything more than a bench option, and the link didn't last 1 week and we didn't try to sign anyone else. Everything points to the fact Ole viewed Lukaku as a mere bench option and wasn't concerned about letting him go even if we didn't get a replacement, because at no point in summer did we show any urgency in any striker negotiation.

Just listen to the guy today saying Klopp got 4 years so he needs time. He's not believing he's under risk. He's totally delusional and believing that this is a job for multiple upcoming years and he's in no hurry to win at present, so saying he's wanting to put pressure on himself looks pointless to me. He doesn't look like he's under any pressure to lose his job whatever the current results. He believes he'll get 2 or 3 more years and it's a long life project.

At the end I have Ole's quotes to believe and he says he has a final say in every transfer and if he's lying then it's another story that's actually doesn't give him any sort of credit or excuse.
We agreed that Lukaku would have been a bench option under Ole, he would hardly be the saviour of our season regardless of our differing opinions on how he came to leave. What we do agree on is that he should have been replaced at least for the sake of squad depth and rotation.

At least 90% of people would refuse to agree to losing their no. 1 striker without having been assured the club would replace him. I find that being the far more likely scenario with Ole last summer also, say what you like but he's no fool.

Like I say transfers are not simple, the buying club were offering a very decent amount of money for Lukaku and that option would not have been there a year later. Conte was desperate for him and the time was right to sell on the basis we would find a replacement.

The fact you rely on press gossip to try to prove your point regarding who we were linked to shows the naivety in your opinion.
 

hobbers

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You're allowed to moan or do whatever you want. But I am entitled to my opinion. It's gets boring and depressing watching all the "glass half empty" people in here.
The glass is obviously not half empty, it's just empty.
 

joso157

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haha, anyone with any sense remaining knows Ole made it crystal clear to Lukaku that he wasn't wanted. Yet somehow it's used to defend Ole selling him without getting a replacement in, infuriating.
In the interview on Sky this week, he says he went to Ole :

" I think I had to rediscover myself. Last year was difficult for me on the professional side, because stuff was not going how I wanted and I was not performing as well.

So I had to find it within myself what was lacking and came to the conclusion that it was time for me to change environment.

I made my decision around March, and I went to the manager's office and told him it was time for me to find something else.

I wasn't performing and I wasn't playing. I think it was better for both sides to go separate ways. I think I made the right decision. "

To me that sounds an awful lot like a player asking to leave, no? He wasn't performing so Ole wasn't playing him...
 

Lara lhg

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I wanted to post a link to Nick Cave’s song Lay me low, just could not execute it on my IPad. Sums up our situation in my op.
 

noodlehair

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Interesting take. So what do you suggest should happen if Ed and the Glazers are not going anywhere
I don't think the Glazers are going anywhere but I don't think Woodward being shifted or at least having to take on board that he doesn't know what he's doing is out of the question.

It wont happen if you allow him the easy option of just repeating what he's done the last three times over again though. He'll take it. He'll sack Ole, replace him with Pochettino, and in a year or 2 years time we'll be having this debate again. I'd put money on it.

I think Woodward obviously wants to do well but I think he thinks like a lot of people on here. Just looks for the easy reactionary solution all the time, with the added bonus being that this allows him to not look at or lay the blame with himself. We know he doesn't like accepting fault due to his silly excuse making press releases every time he fecks something up, but the heat is really on him this time and the chance is there to force the club into going about things differently, so at least whoever the manager is might have a chance of things being different.

We can argue all day about how much blame Ole should take, or what manager would or wouldn't do a good job here, but what's beyond doubt at this point that Woodward isn't doing a good job, and whoever the manager is has to contend with that until it changes. It's a pretty big thing to contend with as Woodward is literally their boss and among other things is in charge of which players they sign/keep/move on, how much those players are paid, etc. It's quite a big deal. We don't have the second highest wage bill on the planet because four managers in a row wanted all our players to be overpaid/under motivated.