December Fixtures

[Todd]

The fixtures list for December is looking pretty brutal:

Newcastle (A)
Chelsea (H)
Bournemouth (H)
Bayern (H)
Liverpool (A)
West Ham (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Nottingham Forest (A)

How do you think we'll fare next month? Back into the top 4 after a great run, or looking at replacing ETH and panic buying in January after we lose half of these?

 

[VP89]

The fixtures list for December is looking pretty brutal:

Newcastle (A)
Chelsea (H)
Bournemouth (H)
Bayern (H)
Liverpool (A)
West Ham (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Nottingham Forest (A)

How do you think we'll fare next month? Back into the top 4 after a great run, or looking at replacing ETH and panic buying in January after we lose half of these?

Think we'll do alright, obviously we'll buckle in some but so will the teams around us.

 

[BootsyCollins]

The first three PL matches are really important.
Possible to get nine points from those and then we can build from there.

 

[bond19821982]

Will win the home games. Will lose all away except Forest

 

[VP89]

Will win the home games. Will lose all away except Forest

Forrest were unbeaten at home up until yesterday I think, and even then they were very unfortunate.

 

[MileStolar]

The first three PL matches are really important.
Possible to get nine points from those and then we can build from there.

I don't want to sound pessimistic but what part of "3 points away to Newcastle" sound possible to you?

 

[Ayoba]

Newcastle (A) - L
Chelsea (H) - W
Bournemouth (H) - W
Bayern (H) - L
Liverpool (A) - Heavy L
West Ham (A) - D
Aston Villa (H) - L
Nottingham Forest (A) - W

 

[VP89]

Newcastle (A) - L
Chelsea (H) - W
Bournemouth (H) - W
Bayern (H) - L
Liverpool (A) - Heavy L
West Ham (A) - D
Aston Villa (H) - L
Nottingham Forest (A) - W

I reckon Forrest is going to be harder than Villa.

Villa are really good, but that high line looked suicidal. If they do that at OT vs Garnacho/Hojlund/Rashford youd imagine there would be a huge amount of chances for us.

 

[CallyRed]

Christmas ruined.

 

[bosskeano]

Newcastle have a CL game midweek like we do and they are dealing with a huge amount of injuries at the moment...good time to play but shame it's away after having to make the long trek to Turkey while they are home for both matches

 

[BootsyCollins]

I don't want to sound pessimistic but what part of "3 points away to Newcastle" sound possible to you?

They have a lot of injuries to and sometimes (like most of our wins this year) a team gets lucky?

 

[CallyRed]

Last time we played Newcastle they had an even weaker team, and still beat us

 

[Samid]

Reminds me of that one Green Bay song, wake me up when December ends.

 

[cyberman]

Last time we played Newcastle they had an even weaker team, and still beat us

We made 8 changes to the starting 11 from an already depleted first team

 

[Todd]

I don't think we're getting anything at Newcastle, sadly. They're capable of scoring in bunches and I think they can be counted on to get goals when needed more than we can.

Chelsea and Bournemouth are both very winnable matches, although you never know which Chelsea you're gonna get. I still like our chances at home against them.

As for Bayern...if by some miracle we win in Turkey, we'll be well up for Bayern and considering that they'll have nothing to play for in that match, they might hopefully rest some players.

We're not getting anything at Anfield unless they do themselves in somehow.

West Ham and Villa will be tough, and I can't see us taking all 6 points.

Forrest we should be able to beat.

I think 12-13 points from the available 21 as far as the league matches go would be pretty decent.

 

[Lash]

I reckon Forrest is going to be harder than Villa.

Villa are really good, but that high line looked suicidal. If they do that at OT vs Garnacho/Hojlund/Rashford youd imagine there would be a huge amount of chances for us.

Agreed, Villa's away form is crap and were it not for some rubbish finishing, they would have easily lost the Spurs game.

I think we'll do OK - if we get a good result against Galatasaray on Wednesday, we go into that fixture list in great form. Newcastle also have a huge midweek game an injury list longer than your arm, I think we'll surprise people. The Liverpool fixture is the real worry for me.

 

[nmm85]

Agreed, Villa's away form is crap and were it not for some rubbish finishing, they would have easily lost the Spurs game.

I think we'll do OK - if we get a good result against Galatasaray on Wednesday, we go into that fixture list in great form. Newcastle also have a huge midweek game an injury list longer than your arm, I think we'll surprise people. The Liverpool fixture is the real worry for me.

I think they're only missing a couple of players from their best XI (Tonali and Botman).

 

[soapythecat]

Tough fixtures for sure. Martinez could be back for a few of them hopefully. He will make a difference if he’s properly fit this time. However, if we concede possession like we did in the first half yesterday to most, if not all, of these teams then we will get humped. We need to play much, much better if we are to pick up a decent set of points from these fixtures. Everton were so poor with their finishing yesterday - could have scored 5/6

 

[stu_1992]

Very tough run coming up. I'm going to try to stay positive and hope our players can rise to the challenge. I don't expect we'll play amazing football but I don't think we're capable of grinding out results there. A key thing is some of the teams around us are also playing each and so will drop points too.

 

[RaddyRed]

Heavy defeats away at Newcastle and Liverpool are pretty much guaranteed but fancy us to fo well in the other games, including beating Bayern to finish 2nd in the group.

 

[Lash]

I think they're only missing a couple of players from their best XI (Tonali and Botman).

But their squad is paper thin at the moment, so a massive midweek game can have a big effect on that XI.

 

[BluesJr]

I want an Anfield win so, so badly. Last year needs to be avenged.

 

[Utd heap]

Always tempted to look at the fixtures ahead but in reality this will all be on confidence and injuries - two wins this week and a few more players back and we could smash this.

Two losses and it could be a car crash.

 

[Sunny Jim]

The fixtures list for December is looking pretty brutal:

Newcastle (A)
Chelsea (H)
Bournemouth (H)
Bayern (H)
Liverpool (A)
West Ham (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Nottingham Forest (A)

How do you think we'll fare next month? Back into the top 4 after a great run, or looking at replacing ETH and panic buying in January after we lose half of these?

8 wins
No doubt about that

 

[Ahmer Baig]

Will win all of them.

 

[PSV]

Newcastle (A) - lose
Chelsea (H) - lose
Bournemouth (H) - win
Bayern (H) - lose
Liverpool (A) - lose
West Ham (A) - lose
Aston Villa (H) - lose
Nottingham Forest (A) - win

Following our trend so far of looking out of place versus the top teams and (more often than not) shithousing our way to a win against the bottom half.

 

[RedorDead21]

Win against Newcastle we’ll get top 4 for me. Don’t and we won’t. That’s the importance of that game for what is a defining period whilst we limp along until players return. Teams are starting to falter like spurs and Chelsea after positive looking spells in which all the plaudits were said. Would be a massive shot in the arm for us in an away game against one of our big rivals for it.

 

[Cheimoon]

Think we'll do alright, obviously we'll buckle in some but so will the teams around us.

The interesting thing this season is that 'tough fixtures' now includes the entire top 10 - and below that, you can't call Brentford, Wolves, Palace Fulham, and Everton pushovers either. That's not just for United, but every team - which is why everybody's dropping points and there are four teams within two points from each other, and no big gaps until Chelsea (4 points from West Ham).

So yeah, while United have quite a few matches against top 10 sides coming up, and will most likely drop a good few points along the way, that would be no reason for hysterics, cause so will everybody else. It's more a matter of not dropping too many points and ensuring an upward trajectory in terms of performances. If that's achieved, then the new year could look pretty bright for United.

 

[ti vu]

Newcastle have a CL game midweek like we do and they are dealing with a huge amount of injuries at the moment...good time to play but shame it's away after having to make the long trek to Turkey while they are home for both matches

They didn't need a strong team to beat us not long ago. They're getting some key players back, so their injury list is not as bad as their last game before the international break. They're pretty similar in strength currently in comparison to when they beat Arsenal.

IMO can't say it's a good time to play them other that using deceptive PL only form. Because the "honest" form with honest context of last 10 games or 5 games including League Cup and CL, saw us with 4 or 2 defeats. We don't seem to have easy games even when we had comfortable scoreline like against Everton. That's the worry right here.

 

[chocolate cloud]

We'll win them all

 

[groovyalbert]

Fully expect the annual hiding at Anfield to continue

 

[VP89]

The interesting thing this season is that 'tough fixtures' now includes the entire top 10 - and below that, you can't call Brentford, Wolves, Palace Fulham, and Everton pushovers either. That's not just for United, but every team - which is why everybody's dropping points and there are four teams within two points from each other, and no big gaps until Chelsea (4 points from West Ham).

So yeah, while United have quite a few matches against top 10 sides coming up, and will most likely drop a good few points along the way, that would be no reason for hysterics, cause so will everybody else. It's more a matter of not dropping too many points and ensuring an upward trajectory in terms of performances. If that's achieved, then the new year could look pretty bright for United.

Yeah, relative form will be the one to monitor rather than our own absolute results.

 

[USREDEVIL]

Brutal? Doesn't look that bad. We'll lose some sure but we can handle many of those ties.

 

[tomaldinho1]

I don't want to sound pessimistic but what part of "3 points away to Newcastle" sound possible to you?

They really aren't that amazing, they pack the middle like there's no tomorrow and use Trippier well. They also now have a lot of injuries. We have just been so hit and miss we've started to fear everyone.

 

[tomaldinho1]

Newcastle (A) - win
Chelsea (H) - lose
Bournemouth (H) - win
Bayern (H) - win
Liverpool (A) - draw
West Ham (A) - lose
Aston Villa (H) - win
Nottingham Forest (A) - win

 

[Utd heap]

Newcastle (A) - win
Chelsea (H) - lose
Bournemouth (H) - win
Bayern (H) - win
Liverpool (A) - draw
West Ham (A) - lose
Aston Villa (H) - win
Nottingham Forest (A) - win

That would be a hard to compute months worth of results

 

[PoTMS]

Newcastle (A) - L
Chelsea (H) - W
Bournemouth (H) - W
Bayern (H) - W
Liverpool (A) - L
West Ham (A) - L
Aston Villa (H) - W
Nottingham Forest (A) - W

We don't do draws so it's either glory or bust. 5 wins and 3 defeats. We're 100% not getting points away to Newcastle and Liverpool and the game against West Ham is going to be difficult - I can't see us going there and getting all 3 points on current form. However, I'm hoping we can get important home wins against Chelsea, Bayern and Villa.

 

[tomaldinho1]

That would be a hard to compute months worth of results

Actually we never draw so I will change that one to a loss at Anfield, otherwise put your acca on and sit back

 

[Rory 7]

Its kind of incredible that we have gotten to December without drawing a game in PL. I think we will draw a fair few games.

 

[Pexbo]

Difficult to see us dropping points if Kobbie Mainoo stays fit.