I've said this before but I'll say it again, some people, many people on this forum and across our fan base want United to play with an objective system. They want player X to pass to player Y in a certain situation, to move from place A to place B when given the ball whilst player Z moves to another location waiting for the ball to be given by player Y who only has player Z in his mind. There is room in these forms of systems for some player expression, but that expression is for the most part muted for efficient play style. There are some really important things to remember with this concept though and the first most important of them being that in a system such as this, every player is simply a cog in a wheel, easily replaced for another system player who can come into the game and perform an exact role which compliments or shifts the behaviour of the other cogs on the field in a certain situation. Players know that at 1-0 down with a shift from player Y to player P their system has moved to either a more defensive or more offensive setup which informs them of the behaviours they are to employ in the oncoming phases of the game.
If this is the style of play that you're looking for then I'm unsurprised when there are those who call for the end of Ole's time at Manchester United, he doesn't coach this way and likely never will.
There is of course another system of play, in this form of system the players are given their starting roles and encouraged to remain in certain areas of the field, A left back for instance will be encouraged to either sit back and wait for the opponent to drive forwards before engaging with them and setting up a counter, or asked to drive up the field for width allowing the left winger, inverted winger, inside forward et al to cause problems in the middle of the pitch. In this system the behaviours of certain players are coached individually, each behaviour in set to allow for expression and as many have put it on the forum causes teams to look like they're waiting for individual brilliance to come up with something special.
During Sir Alex's time as a manager he employed the secondary system. Irwin and Neville were never instructed directly that they MUST give the ball to Giggs or Beckham respectively, instead they were encouraged to play to their strengths as players with the knowledge that each respective player on the pitch would do their bit to open space, drive the ball forwards, or simply score goals (Hughesm Berbatov and van Nistelrooj come to mind here). In truth. there were times during Sir Alex's career that fans and other coaches alike called this system archaic and demanded a modern adaptation of this game to a more formulated structure. These calls were mostly from those who enjoyed tiki taka football or Wenger's passing setup at Arsenal, yet it was never part of the makeup of a Manchester United side. We are, were and developed as a counter-attacking team with strong wingers and a central block that remained stoic throughout a 38 game season. There were good and bad games but the fans knew that through 38 games, quality would no doubt shine through and the team would be there or there abouts at the end of the season.
Sir Alex had issues with Guardiola, Wenger, Mourinho and plenty of others who played football in the more efficient first style, he in time developed certain counter measures for each team or would come to reflect on decisions he could have made instead. Mourinho at Chelsea saw the emergence of Darren Fletcher as the most prominent midfielder to counter balance Essien, whilst Evra and Brown were considered regularly as wingbacks to stretch his team against Terry and Carvalho or negate Ashley Cole who bombed through much of Europe at the time. With Wenger in the early years the force of Keane was used in the centre of the park to create issues between a Vieira and Petit centre line that sat back to spread the ball to Parlour and leave Wright with no options further forward. In fact, Keane became such an important part of this game every year that it would lead to much of the player base elevating Keane to legendary status. When Arsenal moved to Fabregas later in Wengers time, Keane who had got older and no longer had the legs, was still employed in many Arsenal games this time to shadow and bully Fabregas who was the essential pivot. Keane's simple elegance in these games was his ability to remove a central part of the system team's development through the pitch. Isolation of these players would often leave the team devoid of answers, make them (certainly arsenal) look bulliable and mean that Ferguson's trust in his players core abilities would often pay dividends as they carved out wins despite the odd hick up. To further this point on Arsenal, when Carrick signed, the majority of fans didn't want the signing because our midfield was going to be forced to play into these teams more often, gifting them the ball and hitting them on the counter in new ways as we no longer had the central piece of the puzzle we had relied upon for 10 years. As for Guardiola, Ferguson is noted as saying his regret here is still not using Park, in fact Ferguson believes that the use of Park against Messi would have done exactly the same thing as we had seen Keane do against Fabregas years earlier. Messi might be a skillful player, one that looks like the ball is glued to his feet, yet if Park had been employed effectively, the pivot would have been broken up and allowed for United to counter more effectively have neutralised their biggest threat. Whilst many of us (myself included) may disagree that Messi was the only problem on that field, it is no doubt comforting that Sir Alex believed it to be our biggest issue.
There is nothing wrong with either system, in fact both systems have through out time been shown to be effective in different leagues and with different managers but both styles have their place. Ole grew up at Manchester United and watched Sir Alex adopting these tactics and gaining results for a long time, despite the more methodical systems around him. It isn't unreasonable to believe that his style and concept of football management was grown from this and certainly when watching the game on a Saturday I personally see more of the second type of football on show than the first and I for one don't have issues with that, even if it means that sometimes we lose games where we should win.
We have no divine right to win the league, we are a football club that has been managed by a plethora of talented managers who play system football, be they the Doc, Atkinson, van Gaal or Mourinho none stuck. They didn't fit with the club, they didn't fit with the fans and they don't fit with our brand. Ole might not win the league, hell we might spend the next 10 years fighting for 2nd place but I very much doubt it. Yes we have issues playing against a low block formation, for many this is because we have yet to find the player who can be our Carrick, Scholes, Ince or Keane... hell even a Fletcher might do it. Yet there are those who complain that we still aren't a system team, we don't have the chess like proficiency of City, Liverpool or Chelsea and they wonder if we ever will. I don't think it's needed, nor do I think it's wanted by many of us. We want to see individual players come out and make things happen, we want the thrill of Ronaldo, Giggs, Kanchelskis bombing down the wings making things happen and we don't want to give up on a manager that wants that too just because results don't always favour us. The replacement of Fred in particular will be a massive change for United today, personally I think a partnership of Rice and McTomminay would do exactly what we want and need in this way and will be slightly upset if as seems likely, we don't get him.
The knee jerk isn't knee jerk though, people are now completely divided on style lines having spent so much time being coached via the media that system play is the only viable solution and those managers who employ something else are archaic, old fashioned managers that cannot win. Strange how head to head though, each of those system teams are nullified on a regular by our team, it is instead those in the middle of the league which cause United so many problems. Someone needs to step up and thus far we have failed to either sign or create someone who has done just that in the centre of our midfield, it'll come, it always does. Until then, enjoy the wins and rue the losses but blaming our manager seems at least to me, silly.
