Averaging 1.0 points against the bottom 13 teams

[stepic]

Football matches are made up of a series of personal performances in a system, not a system itself. You still need brilliant individualists.

Liverpool's midfield says hi

 

[TwoSheds]

My point is that with the top coaches you see how they plan to address certain question, even if the squad isn't full to their liking yet. Upgrading on Lingaard will probably yield more goals and thus more points, but it probably won't magically give Solskjaer new ideas on how to properly dominate games. Something which I think is the biggest issue, since United's squad may be worse than Liverpool's and City's, but it's not 1ppg bad.

You do? What did Pep do to address his problems with shite full backs in his first year? He played them in weird centre mid sort of positions, scraped top 4 and fecked them off in the summer and got new ones.

I don't think Ole is ever going to be a tactical genius against the little teams but that isn't necessary if you are good at squad building and you can set up a team well against the big boys. Fergie won many times by having the best players with the best attitude rather than having some genius system. He used to say stuff like "Robin, I'm an old man and I'm bored, do something to get me off my seat" and then Van Persie would score a goal. The game can be that simple at times.

 

[Zlatattack]

Thought it deserved a thread. Our record against the top 6 this season is 14 points out of 18 which has been talked about after Spurs and City. Now it’s on to the horrible side of our season 11 games 11 points against the teams 7 or below it really is shocking but not surprising we our the easiest team to play in the league sit deep compact and we will struggle

Great thread, I wish we had sports journalists which would ask the manager difficult questions like this. I'd love to know how he plans to improve this.

 

[Tom Cato]

Liverpool's midfield says hi

Yes, no absolutely amazing individualists in Liverpools midfield

 

[Conor]

For the first goal against a team that has 10 men in the box, you need either a defensive mistake or some individual brilliance most of the time. Big teams aren't scoring that first goal against these types of teams with sumptuous football, it's one of their world class players doing something amazing, or a deflection from a defender etc. from the constant pressure.

Once the first goal goes in, the floodgates open, as the losing team now needs to do something to score(usually). We simply don't have enough of the players that can change a game in that way yet, and our players that can are too inconsistent in their performances, mostly due to their age. Pogba will definitely help, but if we had signed Fernandes, or someone like him, in the summer, I'm fairly confident we would have a lot more points from these games at this stage.

 

[do.ob]

You do? What did Pep do to address his problems with shite full backs in his first year? He played them in weird centre mid sort of positions, scraped top 4 and fecked them off in the summer and got new ones.

I don't think Ole is ever going to be a tactical genius against the little teams but that isn't necessary if you are good at squad building and you can set up a team well against the big boys. Fergie won many times by having the best players with the best attitude rather than having some genius system. He used to say stuff like "Robin, I'm an old man and I'm bored, do something to get me off my seat" and then Van Persie would score a goal. The game can be that simple at times.

I was talking more about tactical questions (how to deal with approach x from opponent). His team was dominant, it played good football, created plenty of chances they had the answers but were visibly being held back by Bravo and some of the defenders.

The impression I get from the current United side is not that they know the formula for success against lesser teams, it's not like the team plays great positional football until Lingaard ruins it.

I mean sure you can keep buying better and better players and at some point just brute force it against most teams, but if you want to keep pace with what Liverpool and City have been doing in recent seasons that probably won't be enough.

 

[Chesterlestreet]

Liverpool's midfield says hi

Yeah. That's a fair-ish point.

But, significantly, their attackers are on a different level to ours. We have good and rapid attackers who are well suited to hitting teams on the counter - but they aren't currently good enough to punish anyone, at any time, regardless of how the match flows. Liverpool's attacking trio have a degree of guile and creativity in them - not just finishing power - which ours are some distance off matching. Which means they can get away with fielding a functional but unspectacular midfield behind them (they don't need a brilliant "unlocking" player as part of the midfield setup).

They also have a pair of fullbacks who contribute significantly in attack. We have a defensively rock solid right back - and options on the left that are either vastly inexperienced, clearly over the hill or just a bit underwhelming all things said and done.

And - obviously - Klopp is first rate. He knows precisely how to get the best out of a midfield that looks pedestrian enough in terms of names. I don't doubt that he would've been able to milk something more out of our current midfield options, because he really excels at that sort of thing - but most managers wouldn't. And - presumably - we aren't debating whether Ole is on Klopp's level as an "enabler" of otherwise fairly ordinary midfielders (through fielding them in a system they're ideally suited for).

 

[TwoSheds]

I was talking more about tactical questions (how to deal with approach x from opponent). His team was dominant, it played good football, created plenty of chances they had the answers but were visibly being held back by Bravo and some of the defenders.

The impression I get from the current United side is not that they know the formula for success against lesser teams, it's not like the team plays great positional football until Lingaard ruins it.

I mean sure you can keep buying better and better players and at some point just brute force it against most teams, but if you want to keep pace with what Liverpool and City have been doing in recent seasons that probably won't be enough.

I'm not so sure. Madrid's 3 in a row CL team did it by being awesome in big games and good enough against the rest. Much as Fergie was awesome domestically he really didn't win enough in Europe - I'd take a big game manager at this point as long as we can improve significantly against the parked bus.

I also think Ole does seem to be learning and adapting a bit as he goes along which is good. There were a few games at the end of last year and the beginning of this where he just looked a bit lost and his subs were late and poor. His subs seem to be getting better the more he learns about his squad and there haven't been many really abject performances lately, even when we've struggled to create enough clear chances.

 

[Crustanoid]

@Crustanoid - We only played 2 clubs who were sat in the top 10 on the day of each match,

Opponent	Opp Pos in Table When Played	Result
Cardiff	16th	5-1 Win
Huddersfield	19th	3-1 Win
Bournemouth	12th	4-1 Win
Newcastle	15th	2-0 Win
Tottenham	3rd	1-0 Win
Brighton	13th	2-1 Win
Burnley	16th	2-2 Draw
Leicester	11th	1-0 Win
Fulham	19th	3-0 Win
Liverpool	1st	0-0 Draw
Palace	13th	3-1 Win
Southampton	17th	3-2 Win

Yep my point was, we were able to break down and sometimes thrash lesser teams then, so what changed?

 

[Crustanoid]

You're remembering incorrectly.

Are we talking about the same thing? In the case of SAF, in his first few seasons it took him an age to rebuild and we often lost to dross

 

[Crustanoid]

This is untrue. Under Fergie we bullied, battered, outclassed and dominated everyone outside top 4 (there was no top 6 as Spurs and City were our whipping boys). Our M.O against terrible teams wasn't terrible performances, we played entire halves in their box as the United fear factor was real

Not in 1986-90 as I remember? We were really bad a lot of the time

 

[RedSky]

Yep my point was, we were able to break down and sometimes thrash lesser teams then, so what changed?

Pogba, Martial and Rashford on the pitch and in form. We're being carried somewhat by Rashford and he's fairly inconsistent himself.

 

[::sonny::]

It’s all clear, this team can score only in counter attack

 

[Crustanoid]

Pogba, Martial and Rashford on the pitch and in form. We're being carried somewhat by Rashford and he's fairly inconsistent himself.

Hmm, those other two do seem more ‘psychologically’ motivated in their peaks and troughs. Maybe it was getting rid of José, then it ‘wore off’ quickly

 

[sunama]

As we saw against Colchester, it could be an idea when playing lesser opposition, to simply give them the ball and allow them to attack us, then hit them on the counter.
Teams used to do this to us, when LVG was our manager.

The key for us to get these smaller teams, to come out of their shell and attack us, so they leave space in their defence for Rashford to take advantage of.
When a team is resolute in keeping 8 men in their own half, it gives us no space and we struggle.

It's not ideal, but if we can beat every team by hitting on the counter, I'd be quite happy.
I actually love counter attacking football. It really sucker punches our opponent and leaves them deflated. They know they are better than us, but they are losing. Once their morale is broken, the game is over.

 

[Chesterlestreet]

It's not ideal, but if we can beat every team by hitting on the counter, I'd be quite happy.

Thing is that if you rely on counters (as your go-to approach), you need considerable individual quality in order to force some kind of imbalance you can capitalize on in scenarios where the opponent simply won't accommodate you. And you will find yourself in that scenario from time to time. If you don't have that quality, you end up being pretty useless against anyone who isn't up for a dance.

Under Fergie (yeah, yeah - I know) we were never an according-to-Hoyle counter attacking team, but we did rely to a considerable extent on making the most of transitions (they lose the ball, we quickly launch an attack to capitalize on the imbalance). But - and that was always crucial - we also had players capable of transcending a numerical advantage (the old parked bus). The latter takes something special, though. It takes a world beater (or two), pretty much, if you want to win something big.

That "special" player can be a midfielder with extreme passing qualities, a wide attacker with extreme man-to-man qualities, a striker with extreme qualities (movement, finishing from difficult angles) - anything, really. But the key term is "extreme". Or - yeah - "world beater".

 

[432JuanMata]

Down to 0.9 point per game 12 games 11 point funny and sad at the same time