Anthony Martial | Sevilla loan watch

Sassy Colin

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Remember when Rashford, Martial and Greenwood were the future? Now it looks like they’ll all be gone within the next couple of seasons.
I remember when, between them, during COVID, they were instrumental to an exciting end to the season and a very satisfactory FF season.

They were supposed to be the future.

What a senseless waste :(
 

Adisa

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Considering his wages, we'd be lucky to get £20m for him.
 

Kaushal

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Remember when Rashford, Martial and Greenwood were the future? Now it looks like they’ll all be gone within the next couple of seasons.
It was always a flimsy trio without any real talent or substance/attitude behind it. Reminds me of the Milan trio of Shaarawy, Balotelli and Niang in early 2010’s where Galliani said Milan got the best future forward line and it is sorted for the next decade and he can die in peace now or something like that. He didn’t but that front line did very quickly just like ours.

The point is either you are insanely talented where you gonna still shine even though you don’t work hard as others like laudrup, R9, hazard etc or you are just abit talented but combine with fierce effort and hard work to become a superstar. Decent amount of talent and pathetic attitude and laziness is gonna take you to only one place and that’s not up.
 
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amolbhatia50k

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It was always a flimsy trio without any real talent or substance/attitude behind it. Reminds of the Milan trio of Shaarawy, Balotelli and Niang in early 2010’s where Galliani said Milan got the best future forward line and it is sorted for the next decade and he can die in peace now or something like that. He didn’t but that front line did very quickly just like ours.

The point is either you are insanely talented where you gonna still shine even though you don’t work hard as others like laudrup, R9, hazard etc or you are just abit talented but combine with fierce effort and hard work to become a superstar. Decent amount of talent and pathetic attitude and laziness is gonna take you to only one place and that’s not up.
Martial and Greenwood in particular were both immensely talented. Martial's natural talent on the ball is absolutely fantastic. He just seemingly doesn't have the right mentality or ethic to make anything much of it. Greenwood had absolutely everything to be a top class attacker and a rare ball striking ability. Obviously he turned out to be a shitbag.
 

tjb

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I remember when, between them, during COVID, they were instrumental to an exciting end to the season and a very satisfactory FF season.

They were supposed to be the future.

What a senseless waste :(
The truth is, I think as fans, we actually overrated their impact even then. Greenwood always showed the raw ability, but hadn't completely developed it to a point where it could be consistently impactful, he was the only one who could have been great imo.

Rashford's injuries have hurt him and he did show the capacity to play well despite the team not being great, but he still had so many key deficiencies that he never worked on. His ability to exert energy right now is exposing the fact that he needed to use so much to be impactful in any way. The key to getting a consistently good player out of him may be to focus his energies on becoming a specific type of player rather than simply just letting him play. I wouldn't completely dismiss him since he has shown how willing he is to sacrifice for the club in the past and has performed decently prior.

Martial was never as good as our fans projected. The problem for me was, similar to Amad who I hope will turn out much better, there was never a real sample size to justify the transfer or him coming straight into a starting position. Similar to Renato Sanches, he'd really not played a lot of football before we poached him and we treated him like he was a key player before he was anywhere near a consistent performer. He had so many gaps in his game which he never developed. His motor was horrible, his off the ball movement was horrible, his dribbling is very onesided ( almost one footed), his shooting was very one dimensional ( which is why the idea of him being a good finisher was always ludicrous), his heading was average, his hold up play was very average and he didn't have the quick burst of accelaration that would consistently take him past the opposition, he wasn't creative or a good passer of the ball either. This all meant that fans saw him deliver a few set skills a few times and ran with it, without him truly having the skillset to be a star performer. It exposed how much weight fans tend to put on skills such as dribbling as opposed to other skills that are required by even a basic footballer. Like Rashford, Martial came at a time when we were desperate for any light at the end of the tunnel for our attack. He had very limited experience, but his competition was nil. He was a first team player without needing to do anything. Under the same circumstance, Amad and Hannibal would have been first team starters like Rashford and Martial were at the time. That's how bad we were and this has been the consequence of that.
 

tjb

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Martial and Greenwood in particular were both immensely talented. Martial's natural talent on the ball is absolutely fantastic. He just seemingly doesn't have the right mentality or ethic to make anything much of it. Greenwood had absolutely everything to be a top class attacker and a rare ball striking ability. Obviously he turned out to be a shitbag.
I don't think he was great on the ball. He had one dribbling type and a bit of balance and that was it. He literally can't play to his right which is why he looks so terrible on the right flank. His passing wasn't great either. People always tried to compare him with Henry. Henry had electric pace both on and off the ball. He technique, strength and control were similar to Pogba. His creativity and flair were at the very top levels of the game. Martial never had that physicality, motor or mental awareness and he still doesn't have those attributes.
 

NoLogo

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Martial and Greenwood in particular were both immensely talented. Martial's natural talent on the ball is absolutely fantastic. He just seemingly doesn't have the right mentality or ethic to make anything much of it. Greenwood had absolutely everything to be a top class attacker and a rare ball striking ability. Obviously he turned out to be a shitbag.
I think all three of them were let down by their mentality and a seemingly missing structure that could keep young players down to earth. I feel like the early hype around these players in the press and social media really got their heads, they all thought they were already made players and undroppable when the truth was all of them still had a long way to go to get to the elite level. Of course, they started moping as soon as they weren't first picks anymore, how dared these managers dropping absolute superstars like them, but their reaction to the challenge of being dropped shows us all we need to know about these players, they aren't fit to wear the shirt.
 

Bebestation

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We just don't train and improve players.

I think there is a more improved way to improve players than the time when SAF was improving players every season.

I feel like we don't use stuff like data etc to help improve our players and they just all kind of stagnate.
 

Varun1

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It was always a flimsy trio without any real talent or substance/attitude behind it. Reminds me of the Milan trio of Shaarawy, Balotelli and Niang in early 2010’s where Galliani said Milan got the best future forward line and it is sorted for the next decade and he can die in peace now or something like that. He didn’t but that front line did very quickly just like ours.

The point is either you are insanely talented where you gonna still shine even though you don’t work hard as others like laudrup, R9, hazard etc or you are just abit talented but combine with fierce effort and hard work to become a superstar. Decent amount of talent and pathetic attitude and laziness is gonna take you to only one place and that’s not up.
Ah, revisionism.

Mason and Marcus certainly had/have the talent, but not the attitude to go with it. In Marcus's case, maybe it's the poor coaching.
 

redIndianDevil

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The truth is, I think as fans, we actually overrated their impact even then. Greenwood always showed the raw ability, but hadn't completely developed it to a point where it could be consistently impactful, he was the only one who could have been great imo.

Rashford's injuries have hurt him and he did show the capacity to play well despite the team not being great, but he still had so many key deficiencies that he never worked on. His ability to exert energy right now is exposing the fact that he needed to use so much to be impactful in any way. The key to getting a consistently good player out of him may be to focus his energies on becoming a specific type of player rather than simply just letting him play. I wouldn't completely dismiss him since he has shown how willing he is to sacrifice for the club in the past and has performed decently prior.

Martial was never as good as our fans projected. The problem for me was, similar to Amad who I hope will turn out much better, there was never a real sample size to justify the transfer or him coming straight into a starting position. Similar to Renato Sanches, he'd really not played a lot of football before we poached him and we treated him like he was a key player before he was anywhere near a consistent performer. He had so many gaps in his game which he never developed. His motor was horrible, his off the ball movement was horrible, his dribbling is very onesided ( almost one footed), his shooting was very one dimensional ( which is why the idea of him being a good finisher was always ludicrous), his heading was average, his hold up play was very average and he didn't have the quick burst of accelaration that would consistently take him past the opposition, he wasn't creative or a good passer of the ball either. This all meant that fans saw him deliver a few set skills a few times and ran with it, without him truly having the skillset to be a star performer. It exposed how much weight fans tend to put on skills such as dribbling as opposed to other skills that are required by even a basic footballer. Like Rashford, Martial came at a time when we were desperate for any light at the end of the tunnel for our attack. He had very limited experience, but his competition was nil. He was a first team player without needing to do anything. Under the same circumstance, Amad and Hannibal would have been first team starters like Rashford and Martial were at the time. That's how bad we were and this has been the consequence of that.
Hindsight is 20/20, but Martial was extremely talented when we got our hands on him. I'm not saying he was perfect but which young talent is? His finishing was excellent, his hold up play was excellent, especially when compared to Lukaku. He had good passing as well if I remember correctly. The major flaw with him was his lack of movement and his work ethic, but our movement has been crap since the end of SAF period, the lack of movement stems partially from coaching as well and has been fixed by no one yet. It's always been stagnant, predictable and slow.

My point is, I don't think the fans overrated Martial, he was a genuine talent and had an amazing first season, he has since lost his way.
 

Oranges038

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We just don't train and improve players.

I think there is a more improved way to improve players than the time when SAF was improving players every season.

I feel like we don't use stuff like data etc to help improve our players and they just all kind of stagnate.
Or maybe the club targets, signs and keeps the wrong players, with the wrong mentality.

Rather than seeing it as really the start of the real test of their abilities.

Too many of these players, Martial included. Have seen getting to Utd and getting a big fat pay day as the end of the road. As a result, they rested on their ability to get to that point and didn't kick on as expected. They just put their feet up and didn't work anywhere near as hard as they should.
 

lsd

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You just know there will be posters saying Ten Hag can get the best of him and we should keep him
 

Gandalf

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You just know there will be posters saying Ten Hag can get the best of him and we should keep him
Reality is that we may have to. I cannot see any clubs bidding for him and if there was interest it would definitely be on the proviso that he took a significant cut in his salary which Is not something I think he would be inclined to do. For obvious reasons I don't like Coutinho but to be fair to him he has seemingly taken a 70% cut in wages to sign permanently at Villa because he wants to play, I don't see Martial doing the same but we can hope.
 

hobbers

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Reality is that we may have to. I cannot see any clubs bidding for him and if there was interest it would definitely be on the proviso that he took a significant cut in his salary which Is not something I think he would be inclined to do. For obvious reasons I don't like Coutinho but to be fair to him he has seemingly taken a 70% cut in wages to sign permanently at Villa because he wants to play, I don't see Martial doing the same but we can hope.
Yeh the only way we're getting rid of him this summer is either buying out his contract to the tune of £12m or so. Or offering to pay over half of his wages to entice some offers to take him on loan.

No club is going to offer him wages that are even a fraction of the ~£22m we're still due to pay him over the next 2 seasons, even though we'd let him leave for no transfer fee.

As per we have Ed, Judge and Ole to thank for this.
 

Black Adder

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Hindsight is 20/20, but Martial was extremely talented when we got our hands on him. I'm not saying he was perfect but which young talent is? His finishing was excellent, his hold up play was excellent, especially when compared to Lukaku. He had good passing as well if I remember correctly. The major flaw with him was his lack of movement and his work ethic, but our movement has been crap since the end of SAF period, the lack of movement stems partially from coaching as well and has been fixed by no one yet. It's always been stagnant, predictable and slow.

My point is, I don't think the fans overrated Martial, he was a genuine talent and had an amazing first season, he has since lost his way.
Well put. He did have very good season 19/20 but that was mostly that as his true impact goes when it comes to his time here. Shame he never built on what IMO was brilliant natural football talent he had.
 

mitchmouse

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The truth is, I think as fans, we actually overrated their impact even then. Greenwood always showed the raw ability, but hadn't completely developed it to a point where it could be consistently impactful, he was the only one who could have been great imo.

Rashford's injuries have hurt him and he did show the capacity to play well despite the team not being great, but he still had so many key deficiencies that he never worked on. His ability to exert energy right now is exposing the fact that he needed to use so much to be impactful in any way. The key to getting a consistently good player out of him may be to focus his energies on becoming a specific type of player rather than simply just letting him play. I wouldn't completely dismiss him since he has shown how willing he is to sacrifice for the club in the past and has performed decently prior.

Martial was never as good as our fans projected. The problem for me was, similar to Amad who I hope will turn out much better, there was never a real sample size to justify the transfer or him coming straight into a starting position. Similar to Renato Sanches, he'd really not played a lot of football before we poached him and we treated him like he was a key player before he was anywhere near a consistent performer. He had so many gaps in his game which he never developed. His motor was horrible, his off the ball movement was horrible, his dribbling is very onesided ( almost one footed), his shooting was very one dimensional ( which is why the idea of him being a good finisher was always ludicrous), his heading was average, his hold up play was very average and he didn't have the quick burst of accelaration that would consistently take him past the opposition, he wasn't creative or a good passer of the ball either. This all meant that fans saw him deliver a few set skills a few times and ran with it, without him truly having the skillset to be a star performer. It exposed how much weight fans tend to put on skills such as dribbling as opposed to other skills that are required by even a basic footballer. Like Rashford, Martial came at a time when we were desperate for any light at the end of the tunnel for our attack. He had very limited experience, but his competition was nil. He was a first team player without needing to do anything. Under the same circumstance, Amad and Hannibal would have been first team starters like Rashford and Martial were at the time. That's how bad we were and this has been the consequence of that.
I never overrated them - I said Martial and Rashford would never score enough goals to have us challenging for trophies, particularly not the PL. Just not natural enough in front of goal. Greenwood, I reserved an opinion on because of his age but did say he would never been a top scorer in a season but might be a good "back up" to that role. We still don't know what will happen to him so I won't say any more
 

Telsim

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Christ almighty... I have no idea how we are going to get rid of him. His contract is a travesty courtesy of Joel and Ed.
 

Solius

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He'll somehow start the first game of the season.
 

Godfather

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Really thought he'd do better there. What a disaster and we still have, what 3 more years left on his contract? Man...
 

Rightnr

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I'd love to sell him but at this point we might have to keep him because who'll pay his wage and any sort of decent fee?

This is looking like Glazer and Woodward's 2nd biggest mistake.
 

romufc

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I remember Martial FC saying how he was going to tear it up away from United.

I still see people say he can be used next season.

He should be in the 100% out list. We need to stop going into seasons hoping he comes good.
 

El-Manos

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I'd love to sell him but at this point we might have to keep him because who'll pay his wage and any sort of decent fee?

This is looking like Glazer and Woodward's 2nd biggest mistake.
It's Van Gaal who brought him in. He looked like a big talent, wouldn't really blame them on this one. It just did not work out.
 

Leonzo1

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I'm just here to remind everyone that this clown has a Balo'n Dor clause in his contract.
 

Rightnr

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It's Van Gaal who brought him in. He looked like a big talent, wouldn't really blame them on this one. It just did not work out.
Hard disagree. He was set to leave under Mourinho and he would have been right to do so and we would have been wrong to let him do so at the time.

However, because of what happened he got given the 250k/week for 5 years and this has been clearly communicated as a Ed Glazer decision. He's even said it himself Martial is his fave player, a new Ronaldo even (obviously dumb comparison).