Are we a CDM short of being an elite team?

[Alfie092]

For a top quality starting 11 we are a number 6 short where us as fans can be confident of challenging for the league.

For an "elite" side, I say that includes quality in depth with our bench players and I feel we are slightly weak in that department still. We could do with 2 midfielders, a backup CB and arguably an attacking RB (Dalot may or may not be the answer).

Imagine we added Neves, Saul and Kounde (who won't be guaranteed to start for Chelsea if he moves) to this team. That instantly gives us a team imo on par, if not potentially better than the very best in Europe with the likes of Man City, Chelsea, PSG and Bayern. These other teams mentioned have incredible depth in midfield where they can freely rotate and still have enough quality starting, even if we signed just Neves, we are 1 midfield injury away from reverting back to McFred, hence why we need 2 midfielders!

 

[jackal&hyde]

Because a 4-3-3 along with a 3-4-3 opens up triangles/rondos which helps a team's build up phase. The Dutch used the formation(s) for many years for those reasons.

And with the players that have been signed, we need to see a cohesive attacking plan starting from deeper with connectivity. And if Bruno is allowed to just free roam without providing a vertical pass option by dropping deeper, then that will be a sackable offence too because it will mean the midfielders will have to take unnecessary risks with their passing.

On the Bruno aspect things will change a bit I think because he is no longer the sole responsible for creativity, with Sancho and Pogba pushed up (when McTom comes back) acting as playmakers as well. So he will be pushed up more, not less. Together with the CF being the main goal threat.

4-2-3-1 is a very solid system when and if the pivot is functioning, like McFred. One sits, one makes runs. Last season McTom got something like 8 goals and this season Fred started well (first game). Unfortunately we only have 2 players capable of this, but apart from one player missing, we have most parts in play for the system. That can not be said for the 4-3-3. If you want to see what happens when a bad manager tries to force a system on the wrong set of players look at Arsenal.

I still hope that the plan for DVB is to be prepared for the double pivot and we will see him take the role sooner rather then later.

 

[Escobar]

Looks like he put all his hopes on McTominay to perform the role well

 

[sullydnl]

It may be that with Ronaldo easing the burden of goalscoring off Bruno we see him move to a slightly deeper role to help out midfield?

 

[Adnan]

On the Bruno aspect things will change a bit I think because he is no longer the sole responsible for creativity, with Sancho and Pogba pushed up (when McTom comes back) acting as playmakers as well. So he will be pushed up more, not less. Together with the CF being the main goal threat.

4-2-3-1 is a very solid system when and if the pivot is functioning, like McFred. One sits, one makes runs. Last season McTom got something like 8 goals and this season Fred started well (first game). Unfortunately we only have 2 players capable of this, but apart from one player missing, we have most parts in play for the system. That can not be said for the 4-3-3. If you want to see what happens when a bad manager tries to force a system on the wrong set of players look at Arsenal.

I still hope that the plan for DVB is to be prepared for the double pivot and we will see him take the role sooner rather then later.

The 4-2-3-1 Is a good formation which has been used by Ajax and Bayern to good/great success. But the difference in those teams was that the likes of Muller and VdB dropped deep to provide the vertical passing option and thus a midfield two turned into a midfield 3 with real connectivity. Bruno against Wolves didn't provide that at all and I can only assume it was some sort of plan but it ended up isolating the midfielders.

The best teams are those teams who have high functionality from back to front.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

This is a strawman.

Nobody in their right mind can look at that midfield and think it's remotely good enough to win a league title. Even if we signed a midfielder that is by no means a guarantee of winning the league when the competition is Chelsea and Man City - two very good teams in their own right. But it would take us a hell of a lot closer. 2nd is our ceiling with this midfield, and we risk going backwards as things stand.

Yes, the midfield is good enough especially when the attack and back 4 are loaded with quality.

Liverpool's title winning midfield wasn't filled with world class players. If we had that midfield now, people would still find something to complain about. No squad is perfect.

Chelsea and Manchester City aren't perfect. City's top goal-scorer last season was Gundogan ffs. Chelsea's first XI isn't as good as ours.

A team that finishes 2nd doesn't add Ronaldo, Varane and Sancho to it to not compete for the title. That's just laughable. We need to compete for the title.

 

[Rozay]

No control balance. Choice to be made between Bruno and Pogba, but I can’t see Ole capable of making it. It has always been the case, from the very day we signed Bruno. Said many times that his signing made no sense if Ole was as resolute on keeping Pogba as he has been.

I’m just super big on balance and having a team that compliments each other where the collective is greater than the individuals. I saw these problems coming from as soon as we signed Bruno, and knew the post-honeymoon period will leave a number of questions.

 

[jackal&hyde]

The 4-2-3-1 Is a good formation which has been used by Ajax and Bayern to good/great success. But the difference in those teams was that the likes of Muller and VdB dropped deep to provide the vertical passing option and thus a midfield two turned into a midfield 3 with real connectivity. Bruno against Wolves didn't provide that at all and I can only assume it was some sort of plan but it ended up isolating the midfielders.

The best teams are those teams who have high functionality from back to front.

I'm not saying we should forget about Wolves, but we also have an example with Leeds, because in that game we had our functioning double pivot. Matic can't do the attacking bit and Pogba can't do the defensive one.

Bruno does not need to do any connecting with our lineup because we don't use traditional wingers, at least until Rashford comes back. Pogba is a mezzala..floating 8 however we want to call him with Shaw providing width and Sancho a playmaker that also like to roam. With James for Sancho this was the Leeds setup and it's rather beautifully balanced and why Bruno was so devastating. In other games, I'm sure Bruno will drop a lot deeper if we play say Rashford and Sancho as wingers. The roles will adjust while on paper it's the same system.

 

[MUFC OK]

You shouldn't need world class players in every position to be successful. That said holding midfield is the one obvious weak area of the team. At this point I'm trusting the recruitment team. The only one that could potentially join today is Neves, my only reservation being that if we go for a 4-3-3, that holding mid has to be very mobile.

Bissouma was completely overrun by Allan and Doucoure at the weekend. Either would improve us but it's not an easy spot to fill.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

No control balance. Choice to be made between Bruno and Pogba, but I can’t see Ole capable of making it. It has always been the case, from the very day we signed Bruno. Said many times that his signing made no sense if Ole was as resolute on keeping Pogba as he has been.

I’m just super big on balance and having a team that compliments each other where the collective is greater than the individuals. I saw these problems coming from as soon as we signed Bruno, and knew the post-honeymoon period will leave a number of questions.

Even if Pogba was preferred over Bruno, I don't think much would change.

I don't think Ole cares too much about recycling the ball and controlling the midfield. It's fairly evident with our set-up and the lack of midfielder brought in too.

I don't even think much would change if we did bring in a holding midfielder.

 

[VinzentFTW]

Our midfield can be good enough if we move the ball fast enough. ATM we move it way to slow with to many touches, and it has to be a coaching issue.

 

[redshaw]

Maximum we could do with a DM plus a ball playing mid like De Jong, Verratti, that would be elite but even just one or two relatively decent passing midfielders would be enough.

Donny can actually do this job, he's not this Lingard/Bruno player, he did a lot of midfield work for De Jong at Ajax. It requires Ole to instruct him a role and the team to play faster, quick touches to beat the press and control games in the centre.

 

[Rozay]

Even if Pogba was preferred over Bruno, I don't think much would change.

I don't think Ole cares too much about recycling the ball and controlling the midfield. It's fairly evident with our set-up and the lack of midfielder brought in too.

I don't even think much would change if we did bring in a holding midfielder.

We haven’t failed to sign a midfielder because we don’t want one I don’t think, we just can’t get the ones we want.

And every manager wants to control a football game.

 

[Litch]

With the fact we have no DM I really think we are going to have to drop Bruno deeper and make it more of a 3 man Midfield.

An actual MIDFIELD of McT Bruno and Pogba can definitely work as long as Bruno isn't playing second striker.

It will be the best thing for the team I think

You know Bruno gives the ball away an average of 20 times a game don't you?

 

[laughtersassassin]

You know Bruno gives the ball away an average of 20 times a game don't you?

As do players like KDB

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

We haven’t failed to sign a midfielder because we don’t want one I don’t think, we just can’t get the ones we want.

And every manager wants to control a football game.

They do, but Ole doesn't want that by dominating teams via possession and pinning them back(like I would prefer). I've seen nothing to suggest he wants us to play like that.

He wants us to control the game differently by limiting chances/ball progression via the midfield press we do at times and subsequent quick transitions making teams uncomfortable.

 

[CM]

Yes, the midfield is good enough especially when the attack and back 4 are loaded with quality.

Liverpool's title winning midfield wasn't filled with world class players. If we had that midfield now, people would still find something to complain about. No squad is perfect.

Chelsea and Manchester City aren't perfect. City's top goal-scorer last season was Gundogan ffs. Chelsea's first XI isn't as good as ours.

A team that finishes 2nd doesn't add Ronaldo, Varane and Sancho to it to not compete for the title. That's just laughable. We need to compete for the title.

Liverpool's midfield which won the league is significantly better than the midfield we have right now. Fabinho would transform this midfield. Henderson and Wijnaldum are also better players than McTominay and Fred.

We can attempt to compete but we also have to recognise the teams around us have strengthened. Chelsea have far more direction since Tuchel took over, they've won the Champions League and signed Lukaku to address the only real weakness in that side. We may have better depth in attack but their starting team is better than ours. The importance of team balance is obviously being underestimated here - the famous Madrid Galacticos side finished 4th in La Liga when it was first assembled because it was so top heavy.

We might not be a million miles away but anyone seriously expecting us to win the league with McTominay and Fred is in dreamland. You need players who can pass a football, as a bare minimum. Fred's positional sense is even a joke a lot of the time. Those things won't miraculously change.

 

[Litch]

You shouldn't need world class players in every position to be successful. That said holding midfield is the one obvious weak area of the team. At this point I'm trusting the recruitment team. The only one that could potentially join today is Neves, my only reservation being that if we go for a 4-3-3, that holding mid has to be very mobile.

Bissouma was completely overrun by Allan and Doucoure at the weekend. Either would improve us but it's not an easy spot to fill.

Agree cause most top teams generally don't play with a 'true' CDM anymore. They have technically good footballers and are coached really well in moving the ball in transition. Also their 8 offers cover defensively too. The CDM being very mobile, I'd say more like super hero to cover when Pogs and Bruno go forward but not back. It's this reason why Ole plays McFred cause it's a 2 man job if you are not playing a back three.

 

[DickDastardly]

He's going to do a circa Fergie 2012/13; hope we can get away with it by having world class defenders and forwards. Going to be a fun season

Shit that was a great season.

Lost all my hair that season.
Going 0-2 every single fecking game then clawing back can do that to you.

Well, i'm all in - no more hair to lose.

Probably why Cavani is leaving...that hair deserves better.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

Liverpool's midfield which won the league is significantly better than the midfield we have right now. Fabinho would transform this midfield. Henderson and Wijnaldum are also better players than McTominay and Fred.

We can attempt to compete but we also have to recognise the teams around us have strengthened. Chelsea have far more direction since Tuchel took over, they've won the Champions League and signed Lukaku to address the only real weakness in that side. We may have better depth in attack but their starting team is better than ours. The importance of team balance is obviously being underestimated here - the famous Madrid Galacticos side finished 4th in La Liga when it was first assembled because it was so top heavy.

We might not be a million miles away but anyone seriously expecting us to win the league with McTominay and Fred is in dreamland. You need players who can pass a football, as a bare minimum. Fred's positional sense is even a joke a lot of the time. Those things won't miraculously change.

Guarantee you if we had that midfield 3 start a game, people would complain about a lack of creativity from the trio.

All your points about team balance, Fred's positional sense, etc. - That's down to Ole and the coaching staff to offer solutions and extract the most from the team.

 

[Nick7]

Regardless of thoughts about how good our midfield actually is, we're kinda fecked if someone gets injured aren't we? McTominay or Fred out injured for a decent amount of time and we're relying on Matic more than we should.

 

[Litch]

Liverpool's midfield which won the league is significantly better than the midfield we have right now. Fabinho would transform this midfield. Henderson and Wijnaldum are also better players than McTominay and Fred.

We can attempt to compete but we also have to recognise the teams around us have strengthened. Chelsea have far more direction since Tuchel took over, they've won the Champions League and signed Lukaku to address the only real weakness in that side. We may have better depth in attack but their starting team is better than ours. The importance of team balance is obviously being underestimated here - the famous Madrid Galacticos side finished 4th in La Liga when it was first assembled because it was so top heavy.

We might not be a million miles away but anyone seriously expecting us to win the league with McTominay and Fred is in dreamland. You need players who can pass a football, as a bare minimum. Fred's positional sense is even a joke a lot of the time. Those things won't miraculously change.

Not saying it's success and we should be closer to city but how did we get to 3rd, the 2nd, semi's and finals not to mention unbeaten away if Fred and Scott are that poor? How many times last season did Fred or Scott cost us the games? You know there were a number of goals conceded by crosses and the amount of chances that our strikers missed at home. The failures of our home form wasn't down to them either.

 

[Litch]

Guarantee you if we had that midfield 3 start a game, people would complain about a lack of creativity from the trio.

All your points about team balance, Fred's positional sense, etc. - That's down to Ole and the coaching staff to offer solutions and extract the most from the team.

Kind of agree. Chelsea weren't even looking like finishing top four, new tactical aware manager, same players, they beat City to win the CL.

 

[Ash_G]

As I think others have said we can definitely improve CM but should we be able to compete with the options we have?- I think so.

A top manager should be able to get more out of the players than the sum of the parts and personally I don't see how with the right set up we shouldn't be able to compete, certainly for the PL and should be able to make a good go in Europe with the defence and attack we now have.

I think there are wider issues in how we set up than one DM can solve. As others have mentioned I don't think it's not feasible for any one player to cover the space we asked Fred to cover against Wolves (clearly he wasn't good in that game either). With our attackers pushing so high and Pogba playing as he is prone to in the middle we were basically saying we think we can outscore you and whilst that will probably be fair in a number of games I'm not sure it's the best solution for success over the season.

Personally I think if we can get the attack to play a bit deeper, in particular have Bruno drop to be a 3rd attacking midfielder in our build up rather than play so high, and similarly not have the whole attack push right up against the defence when we have the ball deep, then I think in a number of games we can get away with Pogba/Fred in the middle and in some games we'll have to bring in a McT/Matic to keep it more stable but I don't think that is such a problem that it would stop us competing.

 

[VinzentFTW]

Liverpools midfield are very functional regardless who they use. They are instructed to press high and move the ball quickly to the attackers, who then have more room to run into.
United move the ball so fecking slow with their sideways and backward passes, which result in us attack a balanced defense to often.

 

[CM]

Guarantee you if we had that midfield 3 start a game, people would complain about a lack of creativity from the trio.

All your points about team balance, Fred's positional sense, etc. - That's down to Ole and the coaching staff to offer solutions and extract the most from the team.

Well it isn't a like for like because Liverpool's creativity largely comes from their full-backs and their midfielders cover them in return. That wouldn't be possible for us with Wan-Bissaka, so we need the creativity to come from the midfield.

That's fine. The solution will be McTominay and Fred in the majority of games and we'll see similar results to last season.

Not saying it's success and we should be closer to city but how did we get to 3rd, the 2nd, semi's and finals not to mention unbeaten away if Fred and Scott are that poor? How many times last season did Fred or Scott cost us the games? You know there were a number of goals conceded by crosses and the amount of chances that our strikers missed.

McTominay and Fred aren't terrible players, but they aren't going to take us to the next level either. The two of them together perform the role of one midfield player, but still lack the qualities on the ball to carry us to a title. If one of them is out, as we've seen with McTominay for the last two games, that is also a major problem.

We're difficult to beat with the pair of them in the side, but equally how many draws did we have last season? If our ambition is to win the league we won't do it drawing 11 league games.

 

[Lentwood]

Ole will do what him and the SMT have done with every other position we needed to strengthen.

They will identify the right players and then make a move for them, when we have the funds.

No point in signing players who aren't good enough out of pure desperation. Being "better than Fred" shouldn't be our buying criteria. We need to think longer-term than that.

This, by the way, is what I mean when I say City and all their oil money have a much bigger advantage than just simply comparing who spends what. The WHEN is also very important. We are a business, we have books to manage. That's true regardless of what you think about the Glazers.

City are not a business. The only have to worry about cooking the books enough to not get punished by UEFA. Therefore, they can go and strengthen every position they need at once. We cannot do that.

Basically, be happy with what we have done this year and you will have to patiently accept that we now need to wait until next Summer to bring in a top midfielder

 

[Litch]

Well it isn't a like for like because Liverpool's creativity largely comes from their full-backs and their midfielders cover them in return. That wouldn't be possible for us with Wan-Bissaka, so we need the creativity to come from the midfield.

That's fine. The solution will be McTominay and Fred in the majority of games and we'll see similar results to last season.


McTominay and Fred aren't terrible players, but they aren't going to take us to the next level either. The two of them together perform the role of one midfield player, but still lack the qualities on the ball to carry us to a title. If one of them is out, as we've seen with McTominay for the last two games, that is also a major problem.

We're difficult to beat with the pair of them in the side, but equally how many draws did we have last season? If our ambition is to win the league we won't do it drawing 11 league games.

What's the next level? If it's competing with City, this team pretty much looked like they were gonna win everything until really late in the season. The bar is that high and Scott and Fred replacement singularly does not close that gap. This stems from the top including City having one of the best managers in the last decade, the best owners and two teams that could finish in top 6 places.

It's not Scott or Fred to create chances or score them, it's for them to stop them. Have people got selective memories of the amount of set pieces or crosses we conceded goals from or the missed chances from our forwards in big moments?

 

[Cédric Sophie]

After deadline day we will still be a DM short of an elite side.

 

[MikeUpNorth]

I'm reassuring myself by saying we're waiting patiently for Bellingham.

 

[CM]

What's the next level? If it's competing with City, this team pretty much looked like they were gonna win everything until really late in the season. The bar is that high and Scott and Fred replacement singularly does not close that gap. This stems from the top including City having one of the best managers in the last decade, the best owners and two teams that could finish in top 6 places.

It's not Scott or Fred to create chances or score them, it's for them to stop them. Have people got selective memories of the amount of set pieces or crosses we conceded goals from or the missed chances from our forwards in big moments?

The next level is a team capable of winning the league or Champions League. I actually think we've got a better shot at the latter this season, we've been more of a cup team in the post-Ferguson years. But it'd have to be more in the mould of a shithouse Chelsea team than a dominant side playing good football.

Every team has big moments that don't go their way, that's part of football. If you want to be in the conversation of best team in the league you can't have two midfield players dedicated to stopping the opponents from playing in every game. We've got some great attackers and need to get the ball to them.

Out of interest, did you watch the last two games? We didn't have midfielders of the required quality in those games. Last time out we saw Fernandes and Pogba dropping deep trying to play hollywood balls which were doomed to fail because of the absence of a controlled midfield player. It's a massive problem.

 

[Adnan]

I'm not saying we should forget about Wolves, but we also have an example with Leeds, because in that game we had our functioning double pivot. Matic can't do the attacking bit and Pogba can't do the defensive one.

Bruno does not need to do any connecting with our lineup because we don't use traditional wingers, at least until Rashford comes back. Pogba is a mezzala..floating 8 however we want to call him with Shaw providing width and Sancho a playmaker that also like to roam. With James for Sancho this was the Leeds setup and it's rather beautifully balanced and why Bruno was so devastating. In other games, I'm sure Bruno will drop a lot deeper if we play say Rashford and Sancho as wingers. The roles will adjust while on paper it's the same system.

The Leeds game was different to the Wolves game tactically. Wolves off the ball were far superior to Leeds and would quickly change to a 5-4-1 when defending, with the two wide forwards dropping deeper into midfield to push up on our fullbacks, hence cutting off the passing lanes to them. Their wingbacks (Marcal & Semedo) would drop further to make it a 5 man backline which meant they were easily dealing with our forwards who I believe should've dropped deeper to help with the build up play which didn't really happen. So that isolated our midfielders who had no passing options out wide to our fullbacks or a vertical passing option through the middle, because Bruno for some reason stayed high and didn't drop deep.


The likes of Muller and VdB played a similar role to Bruno for Bayern and Ajax. But the difference was their actions on the pitch had purpose, both on and off the ball. Their positional game was very strong and they dropped deeper when required to provide a extra passing option along with their wide forwards. So when Ajax played Juventus in the UCL, Van De Beek along with the two wide forwards would get involved and help in the build up phase, which really helped both Schone and de Jong. So if we can tweak it a little where someone like Bruno is tasked with occupying spaces for a purpose then that will improve us alot as far as team cohesion goes.

I admit our midfield isn't the anywhere near the best. But we've got to create conditions for them to at least contribute to a satisfactory level.

 

[RedSky]

- Sancho Deal / United have enough cash in reserve, with the €85m Borussia Dortmund are due for Jadon Sancho to be paid in five instalments.
- Ronaldo Deal / Juventus have confirmed the deal is €15m paid in installments over five years
- Varane Deal / Real Madrid confirms the deal is €40m paid over installments (amount unknown)

So although we've agreed deals worth €140m this Summer, our Summer spend is actually lower. Suggests to me that we're actually being fairly tight on money and working with a strict balance. I don't think any of our previous deals have any installments left to be paid either.

 

[jackal&hyde]

The Leeds game was different to the Wolves game tactically. Wolves off the ball were far superior to Leeds and would quickly change to a 5-4-1 when defending, with the two wide forwards dropping deeper into midfield to push up on our fullbacks, hence cutting off the passing lanes to them. Their wingbacks (Marcal & Semedo) would drop further to make it a 5 man backline which meant they were easily dealing with our forwards who I believe should've dropped deeper to help with the build up play which didn't really happen. So that isolated our midfielders who had no passing options out wide to our fullbacks or a vertical passing option through the middle, because Bruno for some reason stayed high and didn't drop deep.


The likes of Muller and VdB played a similar role to Bruno for Bayern and Ajax. But the difference was their actions on the pitch had purpose, both on and off the ball. Their positional game was very strong and they dropped deeper when required to provide a extra passing option along with their wide forwards. So when Ajax played Juventus in the UCL, Van De Beek along with the two wide forwards would get involved and help in the build up phase, which really helped both Schone and de Jong. So if we can tweak it a little where someone like Bruno is tasked with occupying spaces for a purpose then that will improve us alot as far as team cohesion goes.

I admit our midfield isn't the anywhere near the best. But we've got to create conditions for them to at least contribute to a satisfactory level.

We'll agree to disagree because I think you are over focussing on one element of the game to find the problem. The fact of the matter is Fred had an extremely poor game, first half in particular, and Pogba doesn't offer the defensive cover necessary for the double pivot (though he did take control of the game a lot more in the second half as he was more disciplined). Not dropping back to much was a tactical decision because if you do that consistently, you invite the entire opposition on you (something characteristic of the Mourinho era). Wolves were very good, we had big underperformers, it happens. Does not justify a system change let alone gutting the best nr.10/SS in football to a new position.

 

[Schmeichel's Cartwheel]

De Gea
Wan-Bissaka Varane Maguire Shaw
Inshallah
Sancho Bruno Rashford
Ronaldo​

 

[Litch]

The next level is a team capable of winning the league or Champions League. I actually think we've got a better shot at the latter this season, we've been more of a cup team in the post-Ferguson years. But it'd have to be more in the mould of a shithouse Chelsea team than a dominant side playing good football. How many goals does any of these players create or score?

Every team has big moments that don't go their way, that's part of football. If you want to be in the conversation of best team in the league you can't have two midfield players dedicated to stopping the opponents from playing in every game. We've got some great attackers and need to get the ball to them.

Out of interest, did you watch the last two games? We didn't have midfielders of the required quality in those games. Last time out we saw Fernandes and Pogba dropping deep trying to play hollywood balls which were doomed to fail because of the absence of a controlled midfield player. It's a massive problem.

That's def a level but I'd say competing is the next level, for me anyway. I don't think Scott and Fred do that every game? I think Scott scored 7 goals last season, and that's probably more than most in his position. Some of these so called better CMs play in systems that play a 5 and still play with 2. Chelsea do and so did Wolves yesterday. Not many play with a 4 and have a CDM in front. Fab and Henderson are more defensively minded for Liverpool.

Fred and Scott don't pick themselves or play how they think is best, this comes from the manager and coaches. If Ole wanted to change how we play and thought that Scott and Fred couldn't do it plus, this was as pivotal to us competing, why has he not done anything about it? All the links to CDMs are from fan channels and the media.

Yep watched both games and was at OT for the first one. It's 3 games in, Fred was awful especially in both first halves but he wasn't alone. The games weren't all about him but clearly he's the scapegoat. I seen poor build up play, no patterns of play and little to no movement up front. Seen the ball being misplaced by all the players and technically we looked really poor. Shaw was poor, AWB goal line stop covered up a poor game with nothing going forward. Dan James was poor so was Bruno. Varane had a steady start but if Lindelof had been beaten to that header, the vultures would be circling. Martial was none existent.....how does a CDM change all of that?

 

[Sparky Rhiwabon]

Feels so greedy wanting one more but it would really be the icing on the cake.

It’s not the icing, it’s a key ingredient of the cake itself. Ronaldo is maybe the icing.

 

[MasterCode]

Ole will do what him and the SMT have done with every other position we needed to strengthen.

They will identify the right players and then make a move for them, when we have the funds.

No point in signing players who aren't good enough out of pure desperation. Being "better than Fred" shouldn't be our buying criteria. We need to think longer-term than that.

This, by the way, is what I mean when I say City and all their oil money have a much bigger advantage than just simply comparing who spends what. The WHEN is also very important. We are a business, we have books to manage. That's true regardless of what you think about the Glazers.

City are not a business. The only have to worry about cooking the books enough to not get punished by UEFA. Therefore, they can go and strengthen every position they need at once. We cannot do that.

Basically, be happy with what we have done this year and you will have to patiently accept that we now need to wait until next Summer to bring in a top midfielder

I actually agree with this wholeheartedly, make the best with what we have.

Our nailed on midfield of Pogba and Bruno combined with our current squad midfielders Scott DVB Matic etc, with even some of our current CBs (if we wanted to experiment). We should be able to get something pretty impressive than most other midfielders in the league.

I think the only midfielder who I've seen very comfortable when pressed is Donny Van De Beek, but putting him in a double pivot with Pogba would be an experiment, you have to run for a few games unfortunately our fanbase allow stupid pundits to pressure our manager when he tries things.

Everyone would disagree with me here, before Varane the only other CB I watched get pressed and deal with it is Bailly. Now admittedly he gives me a heart attack doing so, with the chest controls, stepovers, and ball rolls. But he does deal with the press okay albeit it's high risk (Ndombele for Spurs is one of the most press resistant players I've seen live and I see similarities with how he and Bailly deal with the press). Defensively Bailly is tenacious enough but the issue would be can he learn the discipline in that role. He would be a water carrier at best, and really be only there to recover and distribute (5 - 10 yards). Not saying it would work but we have a squad to experiment. Does our fanbase have the patience to allow experimentation, does our manager have the courage (I'm fiercely Ole in btw always have been).

• There are on-the-ball arguments for Lindeloff in midfield, however, he makes me nervous when he's pressured physically.
• I've seen Pep play Ferbandinho CB and Gundogan false nine.
• Klopp has played Milner full-back and midfield
• I'm still not entirely sure what role Chilwell was doing in that Madrid second leg last season but it was genius by Tuchel.
• I've seen Oshea and the Da Silva twins in our midfield back in the day.
• https://ibb.co/b71nNTf

No squad is ever perfect, but our squad is pretty close to it (especially with Ronaldo). This season is where I hope Ole proves me right, that he is the man for the job.

 

[hellhunter]

Jones played a couple of matches as DM, just saying...

 

[devilish]

I agree with you on all points, only I'm not sure how easy/difficult it is to sell players. If we don't move any of Lingard, Martial, Jones this window then it's bizarre. Surely we must consider an option they don't want to move?

Jones is nearly impossible. Whoever gave him that long contract should be fired. I don't think that Martial was ever on sale. However Jesse was wanted by West Ham. We could also not signed Heaton and/or allowed Mata and Grant to walk on free. Add to James fee and we would have had enough money to buy a new CM. Ah I almost forgot. Last year we gave a new contract to Matic as well