Very interesting points, and recognizeable. A few questions:
Build-u: Are you sure about us playing 3-1-6 much in build-up? I remember seeing it clearly in some preseason games (can’t remember which), with eg. Mainoo falling back into LCM position to make play, with a CM or LB going up into midfield and Mount and Bruno (or Mejbri?) going further ahead. But when season started, what I saw mostly was a FB tucking into CM with Casemiro (or going wide sometimes with Mount staying back sometimes) and one staying in the three in the build-up phaze, I believe.
The Brentford mistake was eerily like the one we had vs them last season when De Gea played Eriksen up. The issue in both situations is that the meeting player (Eriksen/Casemiro) should very clearly ping it back to the keeper to spread it wide on one touch, whereas in both cases Eriksen and Casemiro tried some very unsubstantiated stuff, prob due to a) not trusting de gea’s one-touch and b) Case recieved the ball from a centrally placed Maguire who clearly shouldn’t have played him up there with the wide options not being in place. I’m not sure that the build up phaze is so different from what worked ok last year, but there are no consistent relations in the back five this season, which introduces misunderstandings and then uncertainties and then errors.
Second question is about press: How does Ten Hag want us to press (tactical) and how do the players mange to press (performance)? Last year, pressing improved in small leaps during the first two thirds of the season. The system seemed rather consistent, with man-man marking except the front three, where striker and one of the wingers would cut lanes from keeper or one of the CB’s (probably decided before the game which). The qualified risk was that the winger cutting lanes inward had to be prepared to sprint back towards his opposite FB if he was bypassed. The timing, distance and speed of this pressure and regrouping was the difference between creating huge chances and being run over and picked off. Antony did this much more consistently than Rashford, Sancho and Bruno, not surpringly. When one or more players started to veer off from the press system, the same thing happened that happened at home to Liverpool under Solskjær (0-5), when some players overpressed (typically Bruno) and some underpressed in the same situations, typically the defenders and, placing the midfielders in impossible choices. Given that the system works very well when executed right, but is vulnerable to unsynchronicity and stress - is it not rather a symptom that we must be more consequent about the current press tactic rather than change it up, when so many players are either new to it (Højlund, Mount, Pellistri, Amrabat) or vulnerable to it when the collective is insecure (Rashford, Bruno, Casemiro, Eriksen)?
Third question is about the midfield roles. Is it really the case that there have been two 10’s? To me it seems that Mount has been playing a fairly typical 8 role so far in terms of spaces and tasks. He is not a McTom who barges or shoots, he rather presses and passes. After something like five games at the club, I think he’s picking up speed alot faster than several previous midfield purchases like Fred or Mkhitarian.
To me, all tactical mainlines have strengths and weaknesses, and it’s the collective performance of them that decides what will work more than wether the tactical set-up is ‘objectively good’ or not. This season, there are many factors operating simultaneously to undermine the collective performance (injuries, new players, injuries, individual weaknesses, injuries, Glazer-style preseason, injuries, new relations around central roles, injuries, scrutiny, injuries, players buckling under or affected by scrutiny (Greenwood, Sancho, Antony, Maguire, Rashford) and injuries. To me, that makes it impossible to say at this point how much of the tactics are just unfeasible, and how much of it will be just brilliant given a little time, patience and semi-normal circumstances. What do you think about these interactions?