Naa, he did that from the first summer. Talking about high defensive lines and getting Maguire.
We are an awfully coached team
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
The difference in being an actual coach with ability (Klopp) and just being the owners yes man (Ole) was on show for all to see yesterday. If Ole was half the legend he thinks he is, he’d have handed in his resignation after that dire performance.
How much longer is this sh!t show going to continue?
How much longer is this sh!t show going to continue?
Yesterdays thrashing really highlighted how poorly structured we are and this is in year 3 of Ole's reign. We really need an elite coach to sort this mess out.
The thing is, we have been saying this weekly. As the games come, our performances seem to be getting worse.
Ole's luck was bound to run out, he has been living dangerously since Burney in 2019. He has had 3/4 results that keep him in the job for 6 months, then repeats.
After Burnley, Bruno came in and we had a bounce.
Post Covid, we had like a 3 game bounce then drew loads and lost EL and FA cup semi
He got a bounce post Leipzig with Everton result and beating CIty and Spurs in a week
Then he lived off that until the end of last season.
This season he got a 2 game boost with signings and now we are back to square 1, waiting for a bounce.
Talked about wanting to attack from wide areas and buying AWB who can’t attack. It was a weird window
It was from a tactical view, but not when the manager is a football simpleton. He knew his defense was weak and was desperate because he feared for his job, so he bought the best two defenders he could get from the PL, so that they also wouldn't need time to adapt.
Simple as that.
There is a big difference in a manager like Rinus Michel, Ferguson, Pep, and even Jose getting a help by a coach they know they can trust. They set the general guidelines, the coach are there to implement and acts intermediary to the manager. They set the routines and training according to the general approach. E.g. a tiki taka would require more off the ball drill and short passes drill. And should there be a problem, they believe the coach, they know the coach capacity and they know whether or not they can trust their input, to what extend he should listen to their input and the wisdom to know what's bollocks and what's a real valuable input.
It doesn't help if the manager is clueless, you can hire Pep as his coach and he still won't get result. So unless ole holds his hands up and leave everything else to his "wonder coach" and playing the body double there's no helping him.
He wont be asked if he'll leave his assistants or not. New manager will bring his own.
Not only an AM, he'll have to bring a whole new backroom staff.
I suspect McKenna and Carrick are a big part of this mess. NO way they're actually quality with the dross shown so far. They might not be the manager but if they're as good as we make them to be they'll make some inputs and it'll be visible on the pitch. The three of them are equally clueless I'd say. Sack them all.
We've become a mix of Ole's Cardiff City & Mike Phelan's Hull City.. 
Wasn't Kieran McKenna the one that really wanted Fred? I'd fire him for that alone.
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If a picture could describe this thread
There's a reason why most of us don't have any utd defender in our fantasy team.
He always has a "Act like you're know what you're doing" face on him when shown in the dugout.
Like me in some jobs I've had.
Ole is like a child. Tell them not to do something and they will go and do it.
That's the point. In the past, if the likes of Irwin or Neville went forward, someone would cover for them. Beckham went through loads of work. The whole team worked hard. Ole supposedly wanted this team to be the hardest working, fittest team, yet they look slow and lethargic, both physically and mentally.
I'm not a big tactics knowledge base but found these Tifo clips interesting. Perhaps some of you knowledgeable types might enjoy/take it apart.
That fails to meet the most rudimentary standards of accurate recollection.
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That all started with a front 4 who failed to press. I was watching the game with my daughter and the first thing I said when the ball got into the Liverpool midfield was "Look at how easy they beat that press!!" It left Fred and McTominay exposed while Wan Bissaka was out of position. The front 4 did a piss poor job of trying to at least look like they want to press and it's why I think Cavani and Martial should have started instead because of their work-rate up front. Added to that, McTominay isn't a good holding midfielder or DLP, he being played out of his natural position.
It started from their left side. Greenwood did a half arsed job of trying to show he is pressing. When you press you cut of the channels to pass. He went to the player leaving plenty of space for him to pass. That forced AWB to go to an area he doesn't have to go. That forced Lindelof to go to an area he doesn't want to go. It was like a pack of cards. Some are blaming Ronaldo for not closing down Allison. There is no way he can stop Allison passing the ball because Greenwood was not on his man and neither was Rashford.
I was thinking how have we become so open at the back this season. What has Ole done or hasn’t done ?
The simple answer to this is a player I think Ole didn’t want to sell, but was forced to after being forced to sign a player he didn’t want to buy.
Daniel James is the unsung hero Utd have missed. His work off the ball has been so underrated. Now that he has gone, Utd defending as a team has been shambolic.
He was the player that tracked back, he was the player that pressed, he was the player that stayed compact and he was the player who played for the team rather than himself.
Utd had only lost once in 25 games he started. The last clean sheet Utd have had was the one he played his last game. (Wolves away).
I think Ole really regrets selling him and has no player he can rely on to do that job. He would have made such a difference on Sunday instead of Greenwood. There is no way we would have been so open. Every team needs players like this. Without them the team structure falls apart.
The simple answer to this is a player I think Ole didn’t want to sell, but was forced to after being forced to sign a player he didn’t want to buy.
Daniel James is the unsung hero Utd have missed. His work off the ball has been so underrated. Now that he has gone, Utd defending as a team has been shambolic.
He was the player that tracked back, he was the player that pressed, he was the player that stayed compact and he was the player who played for the team rather than himself.
Utd had only lost once in 25 games he started. The last clean sheet Utd have had was the one he played his last game. (Wolves away).
I think Ole really regrets selling him and has no player he can rely on to do that job. He would have made such a difference on Sunday instead of Greenwood. There is no way we would have been so open. Every team needs players like this. Without them the team structure falls apart.
We are really missing Cavani leading the line. If you have any ambition of pressing more, our entire team would use him as the queue to go.
Interesting theory. Could it be that Bielsa saw in James? Yes Leeds are struggling but it's got to do with the absence of Bamford.
Beyond the lackluster pressing, our wide forwards do not track back at all or keep tucking in narrower and leave the wide areas completely open for opposition fullbacks to exploit. I’m not sure if it’s a deliberate tactic but it’s turning out to be a embarrassingly bad choice.
Some people do not know the importance of coaching and how bad/ good coaching is influencing the individual performance.
An example: Salzburg won the Austrian league, but was far from perfect. They conceded 33 goals and in the CL and EL Salzburg failed because of defensive problems. J. Marsch was seen as a good manager and sold to Leipzig (good deal for Salzburg, Leipzig now has the problem) and Leipzig is struggling. M. Jaissle became the new manager, he solved the defensive problem, but not with the same players. They sold one of their starting CB, the replacement broke his ankle, CB Nr.3 is also injured. Now a pairing of Woeber, who failed at Ajax and Sevilla, and Salzburgs CB Nr. 4, who they tried to sell in the summer, are the core of the defence now. But they perform, conceding under under a goal per game. Why? Because the manager changed the formation, stabled the so called "Restverteidigung". As a team there work together and it helps every player to perform.
United is struggling now for years under Ole to keep a clean sheet. A good manager can change this.
An example: Salzburg won the Austrian league, but was far from perfect. They conceded 33 goals and in the CL and EL Salzburg failed because of defensive problems. J. Marsch was seen as a good manager and sold to Leipzig (good deal for Salzburg, Leipzig now has the problem) and Leipzig is struggling. M. Jaissle became the new manager, he solved the defensive problem, but not with the same players. They sold one of their starting CB, the replacement broke his ankle, CB Nr.3 is also injured. Now a pairing of Woeber, who failed at Ajax and Sevilla, and Salzburgs CB Nr. 4, who they tried to sell in the summer, are the core of the defence now. But they perform, conceding under under a goal per game. Why? Because the manager changed the formation, stabled the so called "Restverteidigung". As a team there work together and it helps every player to perform.
United is struggling now for years under Ole to keep a clean sheet. A good manager can change this.
The thing that shocks me the most with our positioning is that the mistakes we make are incredibly fundamental, to the point where any footballer, amateur or professional would know that this is not how to position on the pitch.
Players don't track back, they roam out of position at random, they don't cover eacother, they close down the same man, they don't have any understanding of roles within a formation.
The fundamental issues are becoming so blatant that it is shocking that any team of footballers would make them. How bad does the coaching have to be for professionals to literally forget the basics of football?
OK so we suck at pressing, but why do we have to suck at something as simple as keeping formation and covering positions. These are schoolboy errors.
Not sure why he decided to apply high pressure against a team like Liverpool when applying pressure isn't even practiced in training.
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This is the last one I'll post for today. I like Ole but I hope we can relieve him of his duties soon before things get even worse.
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So a manager that wants to play pressing football does not train the players on the press, yet expects them to press one of the best teams without any training. How else did he think this will go?
1. You do not train players on pressing
2. Do not have players to press - Front 4, AWB, McTominay do not know how to press properly.
3. CB's drop deep when the rest of the team presses leaving acres of space in midfield
This manager has no clue on the players weaknesses.
1. You do not train players on pressing
2. Do not have players to press - Front 4, AWB, McTominay do not know how to press properly.
3. CB's drop deep when the rest of the team presses leaving acres of space in midfield
This manager has no clue on the players weaknesses.
If you only saw that picture you could be forgiven for thinking maybe it's late in the game and United had pushed forward and were being caught short at the back, 5 minutes from the end not 5 minutes in.
Ouch if true.
Jesus if that is true the dudes that said that have a brass set of balls. I don’t disagree but you’d word that differently surely and try to sugarcoat it a bit.
All these signs were there during the Leeds game, and it’s the same issues repeating over from last season. I also refuse to believe that Greenwood and Rashford are that lazy that they wouldn’t track back or put in effort against Liverpool as two Manc lads. They surely had been asked to stay forward and let Robertson and Trent go.
Although surely as a player at somepoint during the game you say to yourself this isn’t working and start getting back in to help. Or someone be it your fullback or a CM tells you to get back and help. I can’t imagine the likes of Keane allowing what happened Sunday.
I had thoughts that was the case, that the players didn't seem to have ideas on how to press properly as a unit. Then we have players like McTominay who is supposed to be one of the fittest players in the squad barely running to cover especially during the L'pool counter attacks. I would understand if someone like Greenwood who probably has low stamina (just guessing, no facts to back up) to not be pressing all the time, but to have McTom to just jog around really infuriates me. I mean, just looked at Fred (trying) covering up multiple positions at one point of the game.
But I guess one of the articles was right where the players were just confused, that's all. Me too really...
Wow - Did you see that Wolves game?
Yeah. The last game we kept a clean sheet.
Even from the perspective of someone who thought we were undercoached, that's madness.
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Even from the perspective of someone who thought we were undercoached, that's madness.
It's suicidal. In this day, many teams are well versed in provoking space (short passing to give opposition a false sense that they can challenge for the ball, but in reality being lured into shadow chase. Then come the line breaking pass/ killer pass). Doing what is written there made sense what happened against Liverpool, and it can't be more wrong. Many of our players got strung along toward the ball by Liverpool, then they just broke just apart at our back.