One thing that very few can doubt, regardless of how good or bad you think Martial is, is the fact that Martial brings out the best from the others around him more than Ronaldo does. It's the one thing Martial has over Ronaldo for sure. If that is going to be sufficient for him to succeed, we will have to wait and see. It's a fine balance between having Ronaldo who will get you goals at the possible detriment to 3 or 4 key players around him or having Martial who won't give the same output, but will help raise the game of those 3 or 4 around him by 15-20%.
9
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 29
- Goals
- 9
- Assists
- 3
- Yellow cards
- 0
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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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Are you really comparing Martials poor performances for years with Rashford, Shaw, Bruno last season? This is one of the worst apologist's responses I've seen. Martial isn't an extreme talent, he has a talent. He's probably better off at Lyon or some midtable side who aren't trying/little chance for high honours.
We might be better off if he was at Lyon but that's not to say he would be as he's on an absolute packet that won't be replicated anywhere else. What's best for him is clearly to stay on his current contract. If he wasn't motivated at Sevilla there's little reason to think he wants to go to that tier of club again. I think he's in his optimal situation.
Also we simply can't shift him so all the talk of get rid prior to this summer was false hope. The club were pretty much resigned to keeping him. The only thing to hope for is that he improves, nothing else was realistic.
He's 26; he's not a young player. The club hasn't done him a disservice at all, he's a paid professional who hasn't been putting in a shift. He's had opportunity outside of the club and still failed.
Yes, that's where the poster got it from. And it's obviously wrong. Just look at where Bobby Charlton, famously our record goalscorer until Rooney surpassed him, appears on that list.
Martial is 25th or 26th, if I remember correctly.
He should still be top 20 though right? Unless Yorkie and RVP make a dramatic comeback
Yeah, average/mediocre is a fair summation of his overall United career to date. He’s a weird player though. He did have a spell where he looked absolutely world class. Which you don’t see from legitimately mediocre footballers. No idea what was going on in his head at the time but he really needs to find that energy again somehow. If not then yeah, he’ll go down as a flop. Whether that’s fair or not.
After the Greenwood bomb exploded he really became almost unsellable, regardless of form. Unfortunately, he went to Sevilla otherwise might have had a few attempts on making a return last year. As bad as Rashford was, Martial would've had a few games to try and be that second striker for Ronaldo
Was he not young when he arrived? Anyways, you didn’t really address my questions
I did answer it: he's had every opportunity, perhaps more opportunities that some only dream to have and has been paid very well. No manager would ask him to walk around and not put in effort.
The scenes when he outscores Nunez and Kane this season.
I am going to make a U-turn here, I am joining FC Martial as a full-time supporter.
If he can be arsed, he's brilliant
He's clearly a ridiculously talented player alright. It's his application and attitude that has been the problem.
If Woodward was still around Martial would be signing a new 6 year contract now and his wages doubled
Seems to have lost his close control. He's fortunate we don't have another striker, otherwise he'd be on his way out, he'll be gone next summer hopefully.
And most of the people in this thread would be celebrating it
This is not true though you can go look up youtube videos of one season wonders (where weirdly he doesn't actually feature). There are plenty of players who can have a world class season and never replicate it again. I get the feeling this may be Martials fate. He is not a bad player in the same way michu wasn't, its just he has never been able to do it more than once. Some of his other seasons have been fine, but not world class, which he was for a v short period. Nothing about the way he plays now looks like he did in 19/20.
People claiming he has got his pace back, etc, are seeing something I am not. Even that Liverpool goal he showed no acceleration, he did well to fend off the defender who he had about 3 yards on, and it was a nice finish, but there was no acceleration. In both 45 minutes his dribbling and close control is gone, from what we know he was like at his best.
Now tbf he has 2 goals in 90 minutes, the second one was a nice poachers finish. Is he better than ronaldo if he could get 10-15 goals? Maybe.. if we head any other choice I think he would be gone, but we know its not happening. So maybe an average Martial if he can do that this year will be enough, I don't think he is ever getting back to 19/20 levels, but maybe after all he doesn't need to.
I am now firmly in the "cross my fingers" camp, because even though I can't like him, maybe an average season of 10 goals is better than nothing.
Martial's non-penalty goals minus non-penalty xG.
17/18: +1.5
18/19: +3.9
19/20: +6.9
20/21: -2.5
21/22: +0.6
The thing about his 19/20 season is that even at the time there was an obvious element of unsustainability in his finishing. That was always likely to be his peak season in that regard at least, so a drop-off should have been expected (albeit not as bad a drop off as we saw).
For context: Ronaldo has never overperformed his npxG by that much or more, nor has Benzema, nor did Aguero, nor Son, nor has Haaland in his time in Germany, Kane has once in his career, Salah has once in his career, etc. In terms of finishing it would have been a once-in-a-career season for some of the best goalscorers around, let alone Martial.
17/18: +1.5
18/19: +3.9
19/20: +6.9
20/21: -2.5
21/22: +0.6
The thing about his 19/20 season is that even at the time there was an obvious element of unsustainability in his finishing. That was always likely to be his peak season in that regard at least, so a drop-off should have been expected (albeit not as bad a drop off as we saw).
For context: Ronaldo has never overperformed his npxG by that much or more, nor has Benzema, nor did Aguero, nor Son, nor has Haaland in his time in Germany, Kane has once in his career, Salah has once in his career, etc. In terms of finishing it would have been a once-in-a-career season for some of the best goalscorers around, let alone Martial.
How did you calculate it?
And on open play Ronaldo outperformed his xG by 7.21 goals in 14/15, Kane by 6.54 goals in 16/17, Lewandowski by 7.27 in 20/21.
Our success this season is heavily dependant on him turning up for us. This is encouraging simply because Martial's best seasons came when he was the main striker after our big name players left.
15/16 - RVP Falcao and Hernandez left and we had virtually zero strikers before he came. 17 goals.
19/20 - Lukaku and Alexis left and Ole opted to put His faith in Martial. 25 goals.
4 seasons with competition - useless.
2 seasons without competition - terrific.
15/16 - RVP Falcao and Hernandez left and we had virtually zero strikers before he came. 17 goals.
19/20 - Lukaku and Alexis left and Ole opted to put His faith in Martial. 25 goals.
4 seasons with competition - useless.
2 seasons without competition - terrific.
So he scored more when he played more in the centre basically?
Disagree with your response to the poster. I think we can disregard Bruno frim the equation as its too small of a time frame his career here to compare. But he is as talented as Rashford and Shaw in my opinion and his career has followed a similar trajectory. Looked very promising in his first few months here, went off the boil, seems to have probelsm with attitude and desire and really only had one very good season in several at the club.
Dont get me wrong, I was of the opinion we should have sold Martial just as I am Rashford, for some reason I still think Shaw can still do something here, not world class but a quality left back. But all three have had question marks over there heads for some time. They all have good ability but is there anybody confident that over a season the fitness, work ethic, drive, focus can be maintained by any of them to translate in to performances and a really good season. Matial has only got the number of goals in one season here we really require from a striker so I dont thave faith, but I also have little faith in Rashford producing consistently and with the right intelligence over a season on the left wing.....neither player are midtable players, but neither are world class either ability wise in my opinion, they are all talented players who should have don efar better than they have, but elite players ability wise I think is part of the reason we have been dissapointed by them.....neither of the attacking two are
Saw a couple of your posts and its really nice to see a poster who goes the depths of finding your own stats. Modern football and decisions from the clubs are heavily based on stats, so its nice to see a poster using stats too. Theres enough of gutfeeling football einsteins on this forum, so its nice with some fresh clean air. Cheers.
Haha can’t tell if this is a pisstake
I’m sure I saw you write something similar the other day, but the only time that Liverpool player got close to him or gaining any ground on him was when Martial slowed himself down to prepare for the shot. Also hes Running with the ball when the Liverpool player is in a flat out sprint. Martial is only 26 so it’s unlikely he has really lost any dynamism. Football is also not really like the olden days when defenders were all Maguires that any Tom dick or Harry could run away from.
ETH's fluid passing style will suit him way more than counter attack did but do we really think he can be our main striker after all these years? I hope im wrong but I give it until December before his stellar start is over and he starts losing his way.
After the Sevilla stint, he might have realised the need to get his career in right path and work for it.
If he could fit in well to the new managers philosophy, we could see a different Martial this year.
Lets see whether Martial or Rashford can make it this year.
Interesting to see what ETH can do. Injuries, Ronaldo, Position available etc could play a crucial role.
If he could fit in well to the new managers philosophy, we could see a different Martial this year.
Lets see whether Martial or Rashford can make it this year.
Interesting to see what ETH can do. Injuries, Ronaldo, Position available etc could play a crucial role.
He doesn't seem to have that elite dribbling and close control that he used to have, to me it's clear that he peaked early and is now on a downward slope. At the moment the Ten Hag system is and probably will continue to make him look better than he is, but I certainly don't think we can rely on him as our main forward this season
I would love to bet on him as so many here seem to be doing. But his mentality and physique are just too suspect. The season is long. He will inevitably disappoint unless EtH is literally wizard material. We shall see.
He’ll do well if Ronaldo leaves as he seems to play a lot better when he has that security/backing, like he did under LVG or when he was our only striker after Ole sold Lukaku. Seems to crumble at the first sign of competition though.
Same but there is a possibility that ETH will get the best out of him because the style of play is exactly the type Martial excels in
Trajectory: I'm not sure you really looked at this. Martial started okay (1 season), he largely dropped off other than 2019-20. Whereas Marcus has increased each year, with Martial only out preforming Marcus in two seasons (in goal terms). Martial has only once gone above 20 goals per season. One of the most glaring issues with Martial is his overall contribution tackles, blocked shots, interceptions. clearances, head clearances and assists. They aren't anywhere near what Marcus contributes. In other words, Martial scores less and contributes less defensively. We've seen that many times on the pitch. That trajectory hasn't changed for Martial it, it's his goals that have decreased or maybe hit his level of around 10 per season. That is his bread and butter for his job and he just doesn't do enough, never has really.
The comparison with Shaw is somewhat impossible to comprehend give Shaw had such a bad injury.
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This is one of those thing thats starting to become a fact because people are repeating it. Its not competition but rather the simple fact that when he plays more he does better. Is Benzema scoring more now for Madrid because he has no competition upfront or because he is the main man?
In 17/18 he started on the bench and was doing well everytime he came on. Jose rewards him by signing Alexis Sanchez. The whole caf was convinced Sanchez was coming to play on the right because Martial was good enough on the left.
The one season Tony cant be saved from is 20/21. He was horrible in that season and was trusted as the main guy.
its not. It takes time to find stats, it takes 2 seconds to blame it all on Ashley YoungHaha can’t tell if this is a pisstake
Personally I’d rather not see any stats than see them thrown about without the proper context.
An in form Martial is a very useful player to have in the squad. He's technically excellent and offers something that others don't. He can link up well with playmakers like Bruno, Eriksen and Sancho, and should suit a team playing a possession based style.
The same problems will emerge if he's first choice striker though. The willingness to make runs in behind and move defenders around, the desire to get in the box, aptitude to press the opposition, the physicality and fight to compete for aerial balls both in build up and in attacking crosses. It's why we signed Cavani in the first place. If Ronaldo does go then a new number 9 should be the highest priority.
If hes happy and committed to being a squad option, competiting for both CF and LW spot, playing 30 minutes some weeks, 60 minutes other weeks, he'll be very valuable. If he's unhappy with that situation we will see sulky Martial again. The talk on forums is always obsessed with the tactics and signings a manager makes, but the most important skill set a manager needs is man management and the ability to motivate individuals and foster a team spirit and work ethic. All of our previous managers since SAF have failed in this regard, and getting a tune out of players like Martial who are or have been on the fringes may ultimately be what determines whether or not ETH is successful here.
The same problems will emerge if he's first choice striker though. The willingness to make runs in behind and move defenders around, the desire to get in the box, aptitude to press the opposition, the physicality and fight to compete for aerial balls both in build up and in attacking crosses. It's why we signed Cavani in the first place. If Ronaldo does go then a new number 9 should be the highest priority.
If hes happy and committed to being a squad option, competiting for both CF and LW spot, playing 30 minutes some weeks, 60 minutes other weeks, he'll be very valuable. If he's unhappy with that situation we will see sulky Martial again. The talk on forums is always obsessed with the tactics and signings a manager makes, but the most important skill set a manager needs is man management and the ability to motivate individuals and foster a team spirit and work ethic. All of our previous managers since SAF have failed in this regard, and getting a tune out of players like Martial who are or have been on the fringes may ultimately be what determines whether or not ETH is successful here.
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