[11101]

Everybody has an excuse for the next couple of games but I don't see anything changing with Martial. Across our forward 3 we need two 15 goal players, and one 20+ player. Rashford looks like he's going to be a 15 goal player from a wide position. Martial is our 9 so unless we can find another wide forward who can regularly score 20+, the onus is on him to be that guy. If he can't do that, and i don't think he can, we know he's not good enough on the right and it leaves his position in the team up for debate.

 

[Devil81]

Martial will pick up, I think he will start in Wednesday and be sharper. Some players need games and I think he's one of them.

He enjoys playing with Pogba as well, you could see that when he entered the game.

 

[Web of Bissaka]

The struggle is common, it's when we're up against park the bus team. Low block.

I much prefer if he and Rash swap positions vs that kind of teams.

Martial have this flowing sweeping dribble style that can unsettle defenses.
Rashford requires spaces for his burst style tricky dribblings.

Martial terrorizing defenses with his jinking mazy runs from the left, and Rashford in the box ready to pounce in goals from assists.

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

His strength is dropping deep and linking up with others. You can't really do that when your opponent is parking the bus. James on the right isn't helpful either.

 

[Bebestation]

Everybody has an excuse for the next couple of games but I don't see anything changing with Martial. Across our forward 3 we need two 15 goal players, and one 20+ player. Rashford looks like he's going to be a 15 goal player from a wide position. Martial is our 9 so unless we can find another wide forward who can regularly score 20+, the onus is on him to be that guy. If he can't do that, and i don't think he can, we know he's not good enough on the right and it leaves his position in the team up for debate.

That is where I disagree- if Rashford can be a 20 a season goalscorer from LW, Greenwood be a a 20 a season goalscorer scorer from RW ghen Martial can drop deep and link them two together aiming for 15+ goals a season too.

Just because he plays centrally doesn't mean he is our most dangerous forward - Rashford & Greenwood are but James keeps starting and doing crap all from RW instead.

The last shot of the game where Greenwood missed the inside post by inches is the type of thing James can do once every 3-4 games and him being unable to play as a forward effects wan Bissaka and Martials ability for movement and space alongside the ability to interlink with each other close up.

 

[11101]

That is where I disagree- if Rashford can be a 20 a season goalscorer from LW, Greenwood be a a 20 a season goalscorer scorer from RW ghen Martial can drop deep and link them two together aiming for 15+ goals a season too.

Just because he plays centrally doesn't mean he is our most dangerous forward - Rashford & Greenwood are but James keeps starting and doing crap all from RW instead.

The last shot of the game where Greenwood missed the inside post by inches is the type of thing James can do once every 3-4 games and him being unable to play as a forward effects wan Bissaka and Martials ability for movement and space alongside the ability to interlink with each other close up.

That's kind of what I'm saying, somebody in the front line has to step up if it's not going to be Martial. We should be expecting 50 goals from them. Rashford has broken 10 goals just once so far, and Greenwood is nothing but potential at this stage. Those two becoming 20 goal regulars is still a long way in the future. Somebody needs to pick up the slack in the meantime.

 

[lenny_1248]

If anything, Martial does not have enough shots, he just needs to generate more shots, be in dangerous positions.
He's brilliant finisher. It's beyond me how you can say that he's not a good finisher based on one missed chance. Are you mental?
BD playing against Leipzig, Haaland has just missed 2 good chances in 2 minutes. Sterling misses 2-3 chances per game. Again, Martial just needs to generate more chances, more shots.

 

[Murder on Zidane's Floor]

These things happen when Strikers hardly get any sniff, especially when playing against a deep and compact defense. What did Kane do tonight? Isn't he the type of striker you guys love bringing up as the standard bearer of what a striker should do. How do you explain his quiet game? Does this make him shit too?

I'd just look at a) how long has he been injured for and b) his goal return.

Kane was quiet because Mourinho set his side up to be negative and catch up on the break. He's also been out for a while. He also is a far better developed player and rounded striker who gets goals better than Tony.

 

[Santoryo]

I'd just look at a) how long has he been injured for and b) his goal return.

Kane was quiet because Mourinho set his side up to be negative and catch up on the break. He's also been out for a while. He also is a far better developed player and rounded striker who gets goals better than Tony.

Kane hasn't done anything in months while the ball bounces off him yet you're still showering him with praise. Had he been putting his current performances for us, he'd have been called a joke by most in here but because he plays for the opposition he gets overrated.

 

[Murder on Zidane's Floor]

Kane hasn't done anything in months while the ball bounces off him yet you're still showering him with praise. Had he been putting his current performances for us, he'd have been called a joke by most in here but because he plays for the opposition he gets overrated.

Jesus. The man outscores Martial on every metric.

 

[Skeezix]

He has done well in the Tottenham game and forced some fine saves from Lloris.

The service to our strikers was really poor until Pogba and Greenwood came on.

 

[Craig Ward]

That is where I disagree- if Rashford can be a 20 a season goalscorer from LW, Greenwood be a a 20 a season goalscorer scorer from RW ghen Martial can drop deep and link them two together aiming for 15+ goals a season too.

Just because he plays centrally doesn't mean he is our most dangerous forward - Rashford & Greenwood are but James keeps starting and doing crap all from RW instead.

The last shot of the game where Greenwood missed the inside post by inches is the type of thing James can do once every 3-4 games and him being unable to play as a forward effects wan Bissaka and Martials ability for movement and space alongside the ability to interlink with each other close up.

To be fair to James, he's better off the left flank.

James is never going to cut in off the RW and curl an effort with that precision on his weaker foot. Greenwood can because he is more naturally left footed.

The comparisons to James and Greenwood are a bit unfair and makes James out to be worse than he is.

I dont think James playing RW effects anything Martial does. Martial will always be inconsistent, thats just the type of player he is. He'll either be great or he wont.

 

[Craig Ward]

He has done well in the Tottenham game and forced some fine saves from Lloris.

The service to our strikers was really poor until Pogba and Greenwood came on.

Done well?

He was hardly in the game at all. He made Lloris make one save but it wasnt the best effort in truth.

I cant think of anything meaningful he done all game.

Fernandes played him in but he took too long to get a shot away, which was blocked easily.

He was bang average all game

 

[Womp]

I've said it before, I think he will be the only one who won't make it of our attackers. Too talented to be a bench player but not good enough/fecked enough to be a starter.

Think it's just too little to late for Tony. He's been here for years and hasn't developed at all. If anything you can argue he's regressed. His movement has been a known issue since he's been here, yet he doesn't seem to be getting better at it at all. Compare that to Rashford who a few years ago was considered far inferior yet has slowly but steadily improved over the years.

Think/hope our settled attack in the future will be Greenwood or another striker, rashford and sancho with players like James etc. as useful squad players.

 

[Hammondo]

His movement is still a bad weakness.

 

[pratyush_utd]

Martial bashing has started early? It was first game back and none of our players looked good in that game. It seems like some people are just waiting for him to have a bad game to come moan here about it.

 

[romufc]

Martial bashing has started early? It was first game back and none of our players looked good in that game. It seems like some people are just waiting for him to have a bad game to come moan here about it.

He got himself into 2 positions and got chances. The bashing has started yet no one is looking at Rashford who had a shocker. If Martial was the one to fluff the chance from Pogba pass he would be getting alot more stick than Rashford.

There is clearly an agenda against Martial.

 

[Sky1981]

A better striker would move off the ball more and lifted the teams up. Martial stinking the place with his im too lazy to run without balls.

Granted a team of lingard and perreira isnt ideal but martial himself isnt helping.

He scores 11 this season because we play counter attack allowing him space to run to.

When we start playing better and team starts to buckle up he wont gonna get that much space. He needs to get dirty and fought with defender shoulder to shoulder instead of hiding around in empty spaces looking for balls to his feet.

The higher up the table we go the less he'll contribute simply because being an underdog with counter mentality suits martial best.

 

[romufc]

A better striker would move off the ball more and lifted the teams up. Martial stinking the place with his im too lazy to run without balls.

Granted a team of lingard and perreira isnt ideal but martial himself isnt helping.

He scores 11 this season because we play counter attack allowing him space to run to.

When we start playing better and team starts to buckle up he wont gonna get that much space. He needs to get dirty and fought with defender shoulder to shoulder instead of hiding around in empty spaces looking for balls to his feet.

The higher up the table we go the less he'll contribute simply because being an underdog with counter mentality suits martial best.

You are kind of contradicting yourself. 1st you say Martial is lazy and doesnt run without the ball, then you say our counter attack allows him to run into space?

If he doesn't run, he cant get into those spaces.

So you saying the 11 goals he has scored are all counter attack goals? United have scored 5 counter attack goals this season and Martial has scored 11 of them?

 

[Bebestation]

To be fair to James, he's better off the left flank.

James is never going to cut in off the RW and curl an effort with that precision on his weaker foot. Greenwood can because he is more naturally left footed.

The comparisons to James and Greenwood are a bit unfair and makes James out to be worse than he is.

I dont think James playing RW effects anything Martial does. Martial will always be inconsistent, thats just the type of player he is. He'll either be great or he wont.

Ofcourse it does.

Martial likes the ball to feet and all James does is whip a cross in from RW because he cant cut in.

There was a beautiful article about how James was holding back the position of Martial and wan Bissaka due to his inability to cut inwards and how he was playing more like valencia which was on the athletic who used stats to say that when we played Rashford, Martial and Greenwood together that we were good as Liverpool's attack.

They said that both in stats but all the difference in positions that a player like Martial takes when Greenwood is cutting in on his left foot 90% of the game in comparison to James being pushed away from the goal towards the touch line which does nothing but cause a gap between the striker and the RW.

If Martial was Ighalo, Aguero, Haaland or whoever - daniel james only being able to cross wouldn't matter because Martial would try to score off of them but Martial is a support striker playing deep off the box trying to interlink with other forwards like Firmino does. That's why our attack is as good as Liverpool's when we play the right players like Greenwood and Martial together because they interlink- James trying to cross balls in to Firmino from RW would lead Liverpool to be one of the lowest goal scored by a team in the league, but it's not that case because Salah instead is a goalscorer. Like what would Firmino do with the RW crossing of James? He isnt the best goalscorer when the best goalscorers are clearly out wide in that team.

Daniel James even as a LW is questionable because Martial is better than him, if we buy Sancho he is better than him, if we buy Grealish he is better than him.

I didnt understand why we bought a right footed RW in the first place and all it has done is hoarding up our LW even more.

 

[Sky1981]

You are kind of contradicting yourself. 1st you say Martial is lazy and doesnt run without the ball, then you say our counter attack allows him to run into space?

If he doesn't run, he cant get into those spaces.

So you saying the 11 goals he has scored are all counter attack goals? United have scored 5 counter attack goals this season and Martial has scored 11 of them?

Run as in off the ball movement. You run to drag defenders all over the space.

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

Martial style is compared to Firmino alot but does Firmino's game suffer when teams sit back against Liverpool?

 

[Shark]

He got himself into 2 positions and got chances. The bashing has started yet no one is looking at Rashford who had a shocker. If Martial was the one to fluff the chance from Pogba pass he would be getting alot more stick than Rashford.

There is clearly an agenda against Martial.

There definitely is an agenda. Could have easily had two goals against a parked Spurs defense if not for both a amazing save and a bit of rustiness to allow Dier to get in that last ditch block. Kane who is apparently streets above Martial had zero chances like that, didn't even threaten. Son barely had a sniff either aside from his header.

Mad posts in here.

 

[romufc]

There definitely is an agenda. Could have easily had two goals against a parked Spurs defense if not for both a amazing save and a bit of rustiness to allow Dier to get in that last ditch block. Kane who is apparently streets above Martial had zero chances like that, didn't even threaten. Son barely had a sniff either aside from his header.

Mad posts in here.

You forget Kane and Son were rusty, that is why they didn't perform. They haven't played football for 3/4 months. So Kane and Son were rubbish, excuses are they are rusty. Our striker who had better chances needs to be replaced? I am trying to make sense of things here.

 

[Mr Smith]

His movement is still a bad weakness.

For me, this is his flaw. Too often he stands still in the box, and I keep remembering Chicharito, and how many goals he would get from just a half-yard of movement. I guess the question is, can you teach that? Because he has all the other attributes. Technique, strength, pace, link play, and deadly finishing.

I really think the criticisms of him in the Spurs game are harsh, and his productivity genuinely has improved this season, but I think what he lacks in his movement will keep him off being a top, top striker.

 

[Foxbatt]

You can't get Martial to play like Hernandez. They are different kind of players. Martial looks lazy for 85 mins of the game but can score out of nothing. On another day Loris would not have made that outstanding save and he would have scored.

 

[Bebestation]

Martial style is compared to Firmino alot but does Firmino's game suffer when teams sit back against Liverpool?

Firmino's game would suffer alot of he played with a RW who played only on the touchline and crossed in.

Firmino would not be able to play deep and would have to be more clinical and predatory in the box to interlink with a RW like Daniel James.

For all his great effort he is also lucky to have Salah and mane making runs off of him trying to finish chances off on their Left foot and Right foot Respectively rather than James who couldn't do jack but dribble further away from goal and cross whilst Martial sits deep.

Imagine Alexander Arnold overlapping with daniel James inability to cut in? Wan Bissaka is much better when Greenwood plays, Martial is better when Greenwood plays and the whole team is.

 

[Craig Ward]

Ofcourse it does.

Martial likes the ball to feet and all James does is whip a cross in from RW because he cant cut in.

There was a beautiful article about how James was holding back the position of Martial and wan Bissaka due to his inability to cut inwards and how he was playing more like valencia which was on the athletic who used stats to say that when we played Rashford, Martial and Greenwood together that we were good as Liverpool's attack.

They said that both in stats but all the difference in positions that a player like Martial takes when Greenwood is cutting in on his left foot 90% of the game in comparison to James being pushed away from the goal towards the touch line which does nothing but cause a gap between the striker and the RW.

If Martial was Ighalo, Aguero, Haaland or whoever - daniel james only being able to cross wouldn't matter because Martial would try to score off of them but Martial is a support striker playing deep off the box trying to interlink with other forwards like Firmino does. That's why our attack is as good as Liverpool's when we play the right players like Greenwood and Martial together because they interlink- James trying to cross balls in to Firmino from RW would lead Liverpool to be one of the lowest goal scored by a team in the league, but it's not that case because Salah instead is a goalscorer. Like what would Firmino do with the RW crossing of James? He isnt the best goalscorer when the best goalscorers are clearly out wide in that team.

Daniel James even as a LW is questionable because Martial is better than him, if we buy Sancho he is better than him, if we buy Grealish he is better than him.

I didnt understand why we bought a right footed RW in the first place and all it has done is hoarding up our LW even more.

Sorry but i disagree.

Martial as a No.9 should be able to attack crosses in the box as well?

I agree Greenwood and James offer different things from the RW position. Both are also very young and learning.

Wan-Bissaka isn't an attacking/overlapping full back anyway, so i don't understand how James holds him back. Regardless of who plays RW - Wan-Bissaka will never overlap into the RW space/bomb on. He's not that sort of fullback.

Martial has to influence games more - he should read play better. He cant just go missing for 90 mins and have no criticism - apart from "well ts james's fault cos he just crosses the ball" what utter rubbish

I understand there are different types of forwards and Martial is better at some things than others, but the main issue with Martial has always been consistency.

He's not a top level forward, whether its LW or Striker because of his consistency. Simple as that.

If he is going to be our main central striker moving forward, he has to learn when to come deep and when to attack space/crosses. He has to be better than what he is now

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

Firmino's game would suffer alot of he played with a RW who played only on the touchline and crossed in.

Firmino would not be able to play deep and would have to be more clinical and predatory in the box to interlink with a RW like Daniel James.

For all his great effort he is also lucky to have Salah and mane making runs off of him trying to finish chances off on their Left foot and Right foot Respectively rather than James who couldn't do jack but dribble further away from goal and cross whilst Martial sits deep.

Imagine Alexander Arnold overlapping with daniel James inability to cut in? Wan Bissaka is much better when Greenwood plays, Martial is better when Greenwood plays and the whole team is.

Ole has to start playing Greenwood. Daniel James is part of the reason we can't beat a low block. And Greenwood compliments Martial much more

 

[Craig Ward]

Firmino's game would suffer alot of he played with a RW who played only on the touchline and crossed in.

Firmino would not be able to play deep and would have to be more clinical and predatory in the box to interlink with a RW like Daniel James.

For all his great effort he is also lucky to have Salah and mane making runs off of him trying to finish chances off on their Left foot and Right foot Respectively rather than James who couldn't do jack but dribble further away from goal and cross whilst Martial sits deep.

Imagine Alexander Arnold overlapping with daniel James inability to cut in? Wan Bissaka is much better when Greenwood plays, Martial is better when Greenwood plays and the whole team is.

Take your Dan James bashing and agenda and bore off. Talking absolute drivel.

Martial needs to perform better and be more involved. He's a different kind of player to Firmino anyway and your going way off topic with the Dan James hate.

Martial is inconsistent and will always suffer because of that. End of story

 

[romufc]

Ole has to start playing Greenwood. Daniel James is part of the reason we can't beat a low block. And Greenwood compliments Martial much more

After the impact him and Pogba had Vs Spurs, I would be annoyed if they both didnt start Vs SU.

Greenwood just gives us the threat on the right that James doesnt.

 

[Silas]

Take your Dan James bashing and agenda and bore off. Talking absolute drivel.

Martial needs to perform better and be more involved. He's a different kind of player to Firmino anyway and your going way off topic with the Dan James hate.

Martial is inconsistent and will always suffer because of that. End of story

How dramatic. Where's the 'hate'?

 

[Craig Ward]

How dramatic. Where's the 'hate'?

Read his posts

 

[Shark]

Take your Dan James bashing and agenda and bore off. Talking absolute drivel.

Martial needs to perform better and be more involved. He's a different kind of player to Firmino anyway and your going way off topic with the Dan James hate.

Martial is inconsistent and will always suffer because of that. End of story

Again as many sensible posters on here pointed out, he could have had two goals the other night, so now is not the time to be bringing up consistency when pretty much every attacking player in the top 6 has been out of sorts in one way or another. Why are you even bringing up consistency like, we're one game into months of no football.

 

[Craig Ward]

Again as many sensible posters on here pointed out, he could have had two goals the other night, so now is not the time to be bringing up consistency when pretty much every attacking player in the top 6 has been out of sorts in one way or another. Why are you even bringing up consistency like, we're one game into months of no football.

Martial has always been inconsistent, it wasn't a comment based off 1 game.

Martial isnt as good as people seem to think

 

[Raven]

Take your Dan James bashing and agenda and bore off. Talking absolute drivel.

Martial needs to perform better and be more involved. He's a different kind of player to Firmino anyway and your going way off topic with the Dan James hate.

Martial is inconsistent and will always suffer because of that. End of story

Crikey.

Are you suggesting that having a better RW wouldn't help our striker perform? I like Dan James but he's currently nowhere near the level of a Man Utd starter. I'm more than happy for him to come off the bench as another option against tired legs or as cover for smaller games.

I think it's pretty clear that we're searching for another goal scorer on the right side. Currently Greenwood is our best option there and the stats back that up but it's also reported that we're after Sancho. You'll notice that we haven't been linked with a Striker since Halaand really and I think that's because Ole realises that the CF position is not a priority.

 

[He'sRaldo]

The way I see it, both Bruno and Martial came alive when Pogba and Greenwood came on. Bruno got more penetrative passes and thus more possession, and Martial got more chances.

Martial was unlucky to be subbed as our strongest team was on, but before then his good movement got him a few good chances. I don't see why Bruno was rated much higher except that he was allowed to finish the match with Pogba, Martial was our 2nd best attacker after Greenwood IMO.

And besides, this isn't the game to judge. End of the season with all the context in place is the time, not after returning obviously rusty from a long break. Unless you simply always thought Martial wasn't good enough and you're simply using this game as part of that evidence, then fair enough but the reasoning is flawed.

 

[Shark]

Martial has always been inconsistent, it wasn't a comment based off 1 game.

Martial isnt as good as people seem to think

Name me an attacking player in what is still a very young squad, that's consistent. I agree we require more consistency across the board but I'm not going to go into Rashfords performance thread for instance and use it as a stick to beat him with after months of no football. I'm sure Spurs fans aren't laying into Kane or Son too much either for them being anonymous, which Martial wasn't.

 

[POF]

He's such a frustrating player. When he's having an off day his involvement in the game is almost non existent.

He is so talented there's always a chance he could produce something but when he's not playing well his level is far too low for a top team.

 

[Craig Ward]

Crikey.

Are you suggesting that having a better RW wouldn't help our striker perform? I like Dan James but he's currently nowhere near the level of a Man Utd starter. I'm more than happy for him to come off the bench as another option against tired legs or as cover for smaller games.

I think it's pretty clear that we're searching for another goal scorer on the right side. Currently Greenwood is our best option there and the stats back that up but it's also reported that we're after Sancho. You'll notice that we haven't been linked with a Striker since Halaand really and I think that's because Ole realises that the CF position is not a priority.

As i've said previously, James is better of the LW and does what we can off the RW.

We haven't had a RW for years, thats another topic altogether.

This is a thread about Martial.

Martial is inconsistent and when he's not at it, he's non existent in games. Thats regardless of who else is playing. He's a classic hot or cold player. Thats my issue with him. When he isnt bang on top form, he might as well not be playing because he doesn't contribute in other areas.

I understand the viewpoints that strikers needs supply etc etc but that doesnt effect my viewpoint on Martial. My issue with Martial is consistency. Always has been.

He's super talented and a great dribbler. He can finish, he can link play. He's a good striker, but a level below what we ideally need there. He's not shown signs of improving the consistency either