He played a bit more of a tectical role tonight. If anything tonight shows that he can relied upon in different situations whilst still posing a threat. City nullified him by cutting off the supply lines in the second half and not allowing him to leave his defensive position as we couldn't work counter attacks.
9
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 42
- Goals
- 8
- Assists
- 8
- Yellow cards
- 3
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
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I'd add that if the referee hadn't been trying not to card people and let the game get away from him, he likely would have drawn at least one yellow as Zabaleta couldn't stay near him without fouling. And if we'd had the ball, he'd have torn him apart.
Im not saying he didnt defend, he did. But when he faced Sterling, I thought Sterling was faster, stronger and quicker in his reactions.
He's not a left winger.. This season seeing him there keeps reaffirming my belief he's a 9 and should play has a 9 if you want to get the best out of him. We need real wingers on both flanks, in my opinion.
He handled Sterling pretty well, better than Darmian did
He started well and was causing them problems. But then he dropped deeper and did a job for the team. There was one point where city attacked and fellaini just... stood and watched. Martial did the job for him and you could see Jose clapping him for his work.
Yep and badly.
On Martial not sure why anyone is having a go at him tonight, the last few weeks on here the biggest criticisms of him have been his lack of work rate and the idea that he isn't following Mourinho's instructions. Well tonight he worked his balls off protecting Darmian and stuck to the game plan which was obviously to keep it tight.
He lost the ball a lot and was a little off the pace, but I think he tried his best, he worked for the manager and that is a big plus for me, he worked his socks off. He won't always be in that role, but for now, backs against the wall he worked hard for the team. Great to see, even if his performance wasn't that great.
I wasn't criticising his performance. I felt he done the best he could asides one lapse early on where Aguero hit the post he done a job.. That is what I feel you will get out of Martial on the left is a , "job" he's so much more of a threat through the middle.
I never you said you were mate, the 2nd part of my post wasn't aimed at you it was just in general. I think i actually agree he's a striker and thats where he should be played.
That was true in the second half (and even then he wasn't close to the worst offender). He was great in the 1st half though, from an attacking sense, and given our gameplan.
So basically we play with 9 players in our own half and still people want Martial or Rashford or Mkhitaryan single handedly go forward where City had at least 5 or 6 players every time and produce magic? I hate when people say this is what happens when you play so much Fifa but this is exactly the result of playing so much Fifa.
Thought he had a really good first half. Second half was way too sloppy though and got rightly subbed. Got really hard for him though as he had a wall to dribble past, just like how Miki and Rashford did nothing in the second half.
Whenever he, Rashford or Mkhi had the ball they were alone, needing to dribble past Citys entire defence in order to do something. These horrible tactics aren't fair to judge all 3 of them on.
This. But still Martial almost made it work on a few occasions with his dribbling. I really don't see how he's getting any criticism. I remember maybe two or three occasions where he gave it away too easily but other times he was completely isolated and nobody would have kept the ball in those situations.
I agree. Martial's job was more about workrate and helping out that creating. As we hardly managed to go forward, it was tough for him
People are deluding themselves if they think Martial's job was to track back and "do a job" on Sterling, when we have Lingard, Young and even Rooney available for selection.
He was clearly picked to provide an attacking threat that those 3 can't provide and he failed to do that. Gave possession away sloppily, wasn't decisive on the ball and he did nothing in the second half - we may as well have played Shaw.
His failure to help keep the ball for the team is one of the reasons we couldn't get out of our box.
He tracked backed well and work hard when he wasn't having a good time - the bare minimum we should be expecting from any player in the team.
He was clearly picked to provide an attacking threat that those 3 can't provide and he failed to do that. Gave possession away sloppily, wasn't decisive on the ball and he did nothing in the second half - we may as well have played Shaw.
His failure to help keep the ball for the team is one of the reasons we couldn't get out of our box.
He tracked backed well and work hard when he wasn't having a good time - the bare minimum we should be expecting from any player in the team.
Top player that I hope is still here next season.
I have no doubt he'll be here.
The midfield failure to keep the ball and maintain a little bit of control is the reason why our attackers struggled, they were either not receiving the ball or not receiving it in good conditions.
Needs to improve massively. Not a good option when the team is under the cosh. Doesnt like tracking back and struggles to retain possession. Better used in games where we will have most of the possession. Felt we should have gone with Lingard last night
I didn't see any evidence of that yesterday. He tracked back tremendously all game.
You are basically spouting nonsense. He tracked back all game long and did it well.
I said he doesnt like tracking back. Yes he did it more than normal last night and I applaud his effort and work rate. I was just saying that he is more suited to being left higher up the other end where we can hit players on the break. Nothing wrong with what I said
For every player on the caf there are a few standard stereotypical 'used to be true, so I'll use it when he has a bad game' complaints ready to be unleashed when said poster is having a tantrum. Some use it even without seeing the game. For Martial it's "didn't track back“, "bad attitude" and the most popular of them all: "horrible off the ball movement".
Like quality of your posts.
Big difference in saying someone doesnt like tracking back, as opposed to saying he didnt track back. His attitude was great. You can see he is putting the work rate in and it will benefit him in the long run
No doubt our midfield failed to keep the ball as well - that will happen with Fellaini in there.
Martial gave the ball away the most of any player; he had the most amount of misplaced passes. The fact is, he had the most touches of our front 3 and done as much as Mkhitaryan with it (nothing). He took very little risk when he did have it, going for the easy option 99% of the time. He had a couple of good runs early on - then it petered out as the game got harder and he started to hide. No one would bet on him not running past Zabaleta once in one half of football.
He was underwhelming.
If that's the quality of discussions you can come up with then you are better off staying on 5 likes son
Everything is wrong with what you said, we were under the cosh and he contributed greatly to our clean sheet by tracking back brilliantly.
Very nicely put.
It was so weird watching us attack. Only Martial, Rashford and Mkhi were venturing ahead and our midfielders were going ahead only when they were absolutely sure that there was no chance of a counter. How are 3 players going to produce anything without any help from others. Kept thinking that there will be one move where all our players will go all out and cause City some problems, but it never happened.
Why are you contradicting yourself in the same post? Sometimes I doubt people watch the game itself.
The reason Martial was dispossessed so many times as you said is that he took many risks but ultimately would end up being against two or even three defenders with his back to the goal, since it was the only way he was receiving the ball given that our CMs were incapable of any through ball all game.
Past Zabaleta? Tell me more than two occasions all game he was worked out to be up against Zabaleta alone, while facing their goal then we can have this discussion again.
When the post is rubbish it has to be highlighted.
I thought he worked hard but you can tell he hates jobs like that. Unfortunately they have to be done sometimes so he needs to get used to it and learn to relish it. I still love him
Fair play don't you get 5 posts a day? 3 have just gone on telling somebody they have shit posts
He quite probably doesn't like tracking back. I doubt any forward player does, but it has to be done if you're one of the wide forwards. Welbeck didn't like tracking back, and was one of the reasons he left because he wanted to play more central without that defensive responsibility. It certainly didn't stop him from tracking back and pressing tirelessly when he was asked to do it though. He still does it when out wide at Arsenal now.
He certainly put the work in last night, though he has looked a little lazy this season overall. Last season, I thought his tracking back was very good, so it's strange he hasn't done it as much this year, and had to be continually prompted to do it. He's certainly better and more effective at it than Mkhi.
He certainly put the work in last night, though he has looked a little lazy this season overall. Last season, I thought his tracking back was very good, so it's strange he hasn't done it as much this year, and had to be continually prompted to do it. He's certainly better and more effective at it than Mkhi.
In all honesty Sterling is both faster and quicker, yet Martial did awesome job shutting him down alongside Darmian.
It all goes down to our tactics yesterday, we went there not to concede and try to make something from nothing on the counter with Mikhi, Rashford and Martial.
Before wondering if people are watching games, maybe you should learn to read; and understand what words like contradiction mean before using them.
I never mentioned the amount of times he got disposessed while dribbling (because he hardly dribbled). I specifically mentioned his passing stats (which were the worst in the team) because the conversation was about how he failed to help the team keep the ball, contributing to us being under the cosh for long periods of the game - this is a fact. His passing was crap, the stats back this up. He made very few "attacking" passes, going for the easy road (usually sideways) and was still sloppy in that regard. He had very little influence in getting us up the field after the first 5 minutes.
You can make as many excuses for him by blaming the midfield as much as you like. If you don't position yourself in a way to recieve the ball and do damage to the opposition, then quite simply, you will be ineffective going forward. He had the ball the most of our front 3. He hardly made any runs, with or without the ball (outside the first 5 minutes), looking to hurt the City backline; and nothing at all in second half.
The mentioning of him not running past Zabaleta once in the second half was there to highlight just how little he did to help create for the team - because we all know he has the ability to run rings round him but yet it never happened. But you can replace Zabaleta with anyone if you like. He didn't set himself up to take risks and run past players.
If we wanted to set up with 2 left backs, we had 3 available players who would have done that role better.
Bottom line; he was a non-entity going forward.
Fantastic, you again decided to ignore the point I was making that Martial was having two or three players on his back every time he got hold off the ball.
For your reference he and Rashford were making plenty of runs in behind only for Fellaini to put his head down and opt for the safest option, it was frustrating to see from outside perspective. Carrick once pressured was slow to react and passed it backwards or sideways due to him missing out on that second were he could have, alternatively, put any of our forwards through.
After making the run he would drop off straight away to receive the ball but this time with many players around him.
It's insane that there are people with this line of thinking. In fact, players of the similar talent in Sane and Sterling failed to take advantage of having their fullback supporting them on plenty of occasions, while mostly being left out one against one with Darmian or Valencia.
And yet there are people criticizing our forwards in a game like this were we literally just parked the bus with no intention to our attacking play whatsoever.
There's a difference between tracking back and playing as a second full back though. It must be pretty discouraging if you're a winger, and your manager has more belief in the opposition full backs ability to attack than your own ability to attack them on the flank.
It's so obvious why we struggle to score goals - our own fullbacks don't commit down the flank afraid of some of cannon fodder wingers in the league, but not only that at times our forwards are also back because we're afraid of some average fullback tearing up our flank. We're hardly facing prime Dani Alves, Roberto Carlos or Marcelo?
Sometimes you just gotta say it. Even occasionally I make FM references even though I know its just a game. Going back to Martial, he was given a tactical role and reverted back to his "less threatening" self as it is easy to become isolated on the wings and we allowed City to dominate, literally dominate. I think people maybe thought we would do what Chelsea did when they robbed them at the Etihad with 2 break away goals. Difference is they had target man in Costa, who done brilliantly at hold up play.He showed on Saturday he has good striker movement, so people are just goldfish
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