Eight games away from another disastrous season under Ole

Galactic

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Considering he wasn’t supposed to be our permanent manager, and the dreadful end of last season and first half of this season, he is doing pretty well IMO. Deserves more time to prove himself to build a successful team.
 

Red00012

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He’s doing all the right things so far , seems to be clearing the bad eggs and the dross out either be selling or not putting them in match day squads. His signings have been probably a 8/10 to be honest.
 

Web of Bissaka

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You guys really have problems with honest posts that dare say a slight bit of negative about Ole's. Relax~

Maybe the posters are referring to this early season's tactical decision making instead of ability.

I think no doubt Ole has good tactical ability.. tactical knowledge to be exact. He showed that plenty enough ever since he's our caretaker. Overall he's good... and actually surprisingly good. It's just that good. His tactical decision making in this early season though..

But let's not pretend his chosen main tactic/system is good enough early of this season vs majority of the teams. Only against big teams that generously gave us more spaces to exploit we usually do well with normally a change of system to 3CBs system. Even with Pogba, do you seriously confident we will get top 4 in normal seasons? I'm not seeing it with that 4231 #10 system, thankfully a lot of other teams are also undergoing transitions as us so basically they and us are roughly on the same "pace" with up-and-down per teams. I don't agree with his decision making this early season with that system considering players that can make it works are injured + insufficent and it's plain by day it's not working and we're dropping pts.
 

Tarrou

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You guys really have problems with honest posts that dare say a slight bit of negative about Ole's. Relax~

Maybe the posters are referring to this early season's tactical decision making instead of ability.

I think no doubt Ole has good tactical ability.. tactical knowledge to be exact. He showed that plenty enough ever since he's our caretaker. Overall he's good... and actually surprisingly good. It's just that good. His tactical decision making in this early season though..

But let's not pretend his chosen main tactic/system is good enough early of this season vs majority of the teams. Only against big teams that generously gave us more spaces to exploit we usually do well with normally a change of system to 3CBs system. Even with Pogba, do you seriously confident we will get top 4 in normal seasons? I'm not seeing it with that 4231 #10 system, thankfully a lot of other teams are also undergoing transitions as us so basically they and us are roughly on the same "pace" with up-and-down per teams. I don't agree with his decision making this early season with that system considering players that can make it works are injured + insufficent and it's plain by day it's not working and we're dropping pts.
Then they should say it then. It's pointless saying Ole is weak tactically if you add no context to the discussion.
 

EwanI Ted

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You guys really have problems with honest posts that dare say a slight bit of negative about Ole's. Relax~

Maybe the posters are referring to this early season's tactical decision making instead of ability.

I think no doubt Ole has good tactical ability.. tactical knowledge to be exact. He showed that plenty enough ever since he's our caretaker. Overall he's good... and actually surprisingly good. It's just that good. His tactical decision making in this early season though..

But let's not pretend his chosen main tactic/system is good enough early of this season vs majority of the teams. Only against big teams that generously gave us more spaces to exploit we usually do well with normally a change of system to 3CBs system. Even with Pogba, do you seriously confident we will get top 4 in normal seasons? I'm not seeing it with that 4231 #10 system, thankfully a lot of other teams are also undergoing transitions as us so basically they and us are roughly on the same "pace" with up-and-down per teams. I don't agree with his decision making this early season with that system considering players that can make it works are injured + insufficent and it's plain by day it's not working and we're dropping pts.
The players he was forced to use earlier this season makes assessments of Ole's tactical performances back then fairly pointless. For an extended period our first team had an attacking midfield made up from some combination of Mata, Dan James, Pereira and/or Lingard. Those players are so poor that its not certain that any tactical approach could have turned them into a winning unit, and besides, we'll never be relying on those guys again.
 

RedNed77

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I think we can also describe Rashford with that.
Who has similar talent, right temperament and consistency in doing that.

Martial and Pogba for me tend to be more moody but definitelyhave the talent to do that.

While McT and few others are more consistent and has the right temperament, they lack the talent to be honest.
I agree ability wise they are game changers, they’re just not the kind of players to take command and rally those around them, if for example we’re getting dicked like in that Carabao cup game against City, which is the bit I was referring to. We have plenty of players who can change a game with a moment of brilliance, adding sancho will help too, but few who will run and run and marshal the team if heads go down. Bruno did this for sporting so I have no doubt he’ll be the one to fix it when we inevitably hit more difficult times. IMO we need another one of those kind of players.
 

Sultan

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It's difficult to get things right all the time. I'm not sure anybody is claiming he's perfect. No doubt he's made mistakes and learning on the job. As others have already pointed out he was working with a limited squad talent-wise and however good a tactician it's sometimes futile. As the old saying goes you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Basically, you can rarely turn something inferior (squad at his disposal earlier in the season) into something attractive and win.
 

CG1010

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The 2 things I judge Ole about are the transfers and the coaching. Get these right and we are moving in the right direction, otherwise not.

His transfer record is perfect at the moment - probably nobody would argue that Maguire, AWB and Bruno have not improved us massively. Plus his outgoing transfers have also proven to be great. At the start of the season the questionable decisions were Lukaku and Sanchez and from where we stand now, those departures have allowed us to develop our own players who will serve us for the next decade or so.

With regards to his coaching, first we saw improvements in fitness levels. The team has come a long way from being gassed out from 65 minutes onwards. Then we could see improvements in individual players over time. Things like headed goal by Rashford, Shaw's positioning, Mctominay's passing and AWB's crossing etc. Not to mention the evolution of the likes of Greenwood and Williams over the season. I would argue that we can see much more cohesiveness in our attacking play with better players - something we didn't have probably for the last 10 years! We are finally getting an identity in our team.

At the moment there is no coach in the world I would replace Ole with. Of course with this foundation, the team has to kick on and if we fail to compete for any major honors in next 2 years then I would look to replace him.
 

glazed

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I would rather have Poch myself but if he gets third or fourth place he deserves to keep his job.
 

RollieOle

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I would rather have Poch myself but if he gets third or fourth place he deserves to keep his job.
Why? If Ole ever leaves us he will have no shortage of job offers now. He has proved himself to be a very good manager.
 

Bobski

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He has positioned Utd excellently, started to get a group of players together who fit playing with each other. This was a major problem post Fergie, we had these mismatched squads with no clear identity or style of play, no vision. Ole has identified what he wants, moved on(still useful in isolation) players such as Smalling and Lukaku) who did not fit his vision and you start to see a more coherent Utd. Still remains to be seen if he is the man to take a squad to success, or if he has the tactical acumen to compete in Europe but this process is what Utd have needed for years instead of the short term steps and quick fix big name solutions.
 

lysglimt

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I hear this often but can't understand why. What's he won that Ole hasn't?
I have given Poch a lot of criticism - but the most pro-Pochettino fans seem to find it really hard to reply to the areas I mention:

a) Signing players in the wrong positions (like not correcting the full-back positions)
b) Signing poor players (basically 4 years of poor recruitment)
c) Allowing Spurs to fall to pieces in the last 12 months of his tenure
d) Leaving Spurs with a completely unbalanced squad where there are extremely few players who have room for development
 

wolvored

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Ole has done an incredible job so far. Let’s look at his tenure.

Joined the club and went on an amazing unbeaten run where we played some good football, culminating in that night in Paris. He asked players who had been playing quite passive football under Jose to start pressing from the front and outrunning opponents. The squad ran out of steam towards a charge for top four and the lack of quality and maturity showed.

During preseason his rebuild could start. Got rid of as many of the players he thought were a negative influence or wanted away as possible, even though he knew it may leave us short. Brought in Maguire, Wan Bissaka, James and from what we can gather, wanted a no.10 as well.
Ole wanted to implement a high press and again set about on improving our fitness as well as the mentality of the club. We had some teething issues and the squad often looked like a group of individuals rather than a team. Pogba got injured early on and remained so.

as the season progressed, players started to improve. Fred and McT gained confidence and looked a good partnership, Maguire became Captain and took a leadership role and Rashford and Martial were having their best seasons in positions that favoured their skills more. Ole showed faith in youth and brought through Mason Greenwood and Brandon Williams gradually.
January arrived and our upturn continued with Matic playing himself in to good form now too, allowing us to have more support for our back four. The real change in this period of course was the arrival of Bruno Fernandes, who seemed like a huge piece of the puzzle and finally we could see how Ole wanted to play. His good work on character building and fitness was paying off and Bruno the catalyst for the attacking play. Greenwood and Martial thrived in front of such a playmaker, yet Rashford gets injured. Odion Ighalo comes in on loan and chips in with some goals from the bench.

Lockdown starts and ends and our players come back looking like the only team that bothered to get on the bike or treadmill during the downtime. Pogba and Rashford return and the impact of having both Bruno and Pogba in the same team, a now settled (and good!) defence, an exciting front three coupled with the Matic or old and real options from the bench causes us to continue our unbeaten run to 17 games, steamrolling over teams and becoming the first team in Premier League history to win four games in a row by three goals or more. Our rival fans start to call Bruno “Penandes” after he wins Player of the month, third place in in our hands, a cup semi with Chelsea beckons and we get a favourable draw in the Europa league knock outs.

How can anyone look at that and not respect the man for the job he has done, regardless of what the immediate next chapter brings. I am happy to have him as our manager and look forward to his continued rebuild next season.
I agree with a lot of that. Our bench showed against Norwich that it is still weak and needs strengthening. You rightly say the rebuild is showing great improvement and with 2 - 3 really good signings in a months time, along with promotion of our better youth players, and moveout of the dross, we can kick on. Its a pleasure to watch Utd now, compared to the gash that has been served up previously.
 

CG1010

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I would rather have Poch myself but if he gets third or fourth place he deserves to keep his job.
I find it incredible to be honest.. let's say Poch is a better manager but he will start again with an unfinished job again.. why not let Ole finish building his team and then see whether he is good enough? Plus as some have said above, Ole is far more likely to have a winners mentality than Poch
 

ReddevilTinu

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The 2 things I judge Ole about are the transfers and the coaching. Get these right and we are moving in the right direction, otherwise not.

His transfer record is perfect at the moment - probably nobody would argue that Maguire, AWB and Bruno have not improved us massively. Plus his outgoing transfers have also proven to be great. At the start of the season the questionable decisions were Lukaku and Sanchez and from where we stand now, those departures have allowed us to develop our own players who will serve us for the next decade or so.

With regards to his coaching, first we saw improvements in fitness levels. The team has come a long way from being gassed out from 65 minutes onwards. Then we could see improvements in individual players over time. Things like headed goal by Rashford, Shaw's positioning, Mctominay's passing and AWB's crossing etc. Not to mention the evolution of the likes of Greenwood and Williams over the season. I would argue that we can see much more cohesiveness in our attacking play with better players - something we didn't have probably for the last 10 years! We are finally getting an identity in our team.

At the moment there is no coach in the world I would replace Ole with. Of course with this foundation, the team has to kick on and if we fail to compete for any major honors in next 2 years then I would look to replace him.
I concur.
 

RedSky

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I have given Poch a lot of criticism - but the most pro-Pochettino fans seem to find it really hard to reply to the areas I mention:

a) Signing players in the wrong positions (like not correcting the full-back positions)
b) Signing poor players (basically 4 years of poor recruitment)
c) Allowing Spurs to fall to pieces in the last 12 months of his tenure
d) Leaving Spurs with a completely unbalanced squad where there are extremely few players who have room for development
e) Not winning anything despite having one of the best first 11's for 2/3 years.
f) Having a poor start at Tottenham.

Ole has just equaled Pochs best unbeaten run too. If you look back at his tenure you have big questions about his ability to push a team to the final level. If we wanted Poch, we should have given him the job of rebuilding the team, but Ole's doing that right now and so far, brilliantly. He'd be ideal at Chelsea imo.
 

tenpoless

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What's wrong with his tactics?
Go on, explain how his tactical ability is far from ideal.

Surely his record against the top 6; against the likes of Pep, Klopp, Mourinho and Poch is evidence enough that he's tactically estute.

This is before we had all our best players fit, using the likes of Lingard and Pereira to beat some of the managers in the world. Are you just plucking this 'tactical ability' out of your arse because that's exactly how it reads so I'd be interested in a full explanation of your position.
Keep in mind when I said not ideal, I used managers in the calibre of Sir Alex or Pep as the definition of ideal - most suitable, perfect but not likely to become a reality. That's why I stated I didn't expect him to be the new Sir Alex, I didn't say if he was worse or better than Jose, for example. I should have stated it in my post. Because why should I use Jose, Van Gaal and Moyes as standards of what is ideal when they have clearly failed? so the term not ideal in my post, doesn't necessarily mean Ole is a bad manager.

About the tactics part, one thing that I often saw on match day threads was that people were complaining about the subs he made; I was one of them - I have to dig through my old posts to find when and who exactly he put for concrete examples. Also we were too reliant on counter attack to score goals and struggled against packed defences.

For several months now, the team has been able to turn things around and play more attackingly and be less reliant on counter attack, but in my mind we'll have to wait and see, would be interesting what he'd do with new signings and if the team would revert to struggling against smaller teams again. Don't get me wrong, the recent performances is of course credit to him because you can't just play 11 players and expect them to do what they want and score ala Jose. Jose had good coaching staffs but because he's a stubborn manager, the team bad performances were down to him. The fact that we parked the bus most of the time was also down to him. Because that's what a manager do, he had the final say.

All I suggested was that, if Ole needs a coaching staff that could help improve the tactical aspect of the team, should he think that it is currently not enough, it's okay to hire a specialist for that, or replace some of the current ones.

For now, I still see Ole as the first time when he got the job. Okay manager but not exceptional. Not filled with lots of brilliance like Pep Guardiola. That doesn't mean he can't achieve things with his team though. I'd gladly be proven wrong. Maybe Ole is a brilliant manager after all. Do not take my words as a something that I insist must be correct. I simply stated what's my view, as a nobody on a football forum.
I'm not sure, Ole, much like Sir Alex, Arsene Wenger, Harry Redknapp and these old school managers do much coaching. Blaming Ole for lack of coaching ideas is not understanding his role. All aspects of day to day running of the football side from coaching, fitness, science, buying and selling players is usually a joint decision with specialists employed for these specific roles and his trust of these people to do right. Training, coaching and selection for specific games are discussed around a table on a daily basis. Ole's task is to knit all the above together and make sure it works well.

The club has a busload of specialists for specific roles and it's ultimately Ole's responsibility to hire these specialists. Yes, you can blame Ole if he chooses the wrong personnel for these tasks. However, to blame Ole for lack of coaching or not having the tactical ability is something of a guess without knowing what goes on within the inner circle of the club's footballing structure.
I have read about Sir Alex dividing responsibilities to the 'specialists'. Sure, lack of coaching might be down to the coaching staffs and that means not only the manager. My english isn't great so maybe I worded it wrong. What I meant by tactical ability is the ability to analyze a game and making changes during a game, live, including players and formation when things are against you. Surely, for this one, ultimately, what's being put on the pitch is down to the manager right? and surely he has a lot of input and say in this aspect. That's why even with Carrick and McKenna around, Jose still parked the bus against Crystal Palace.

Edit: Web of Bissaka said tactical decision is the more proper word, instead of tactical ability. I think he's right. I didn't mean Ole is a bad manager who doesn't know about what is a 4-4-2 and when to play 4-4-2. Guess I was just putting the wrong word, sorry :D
 
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POF

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You guys really have problems with honest posts that dare say a slight bit of negative about Ole's. Relax~

Maybe the posters are referring to this early season's tactical decision making instead of ability.

I think no doubt Ole has good tactical ability.. tactical knowledge to be exact. He showed that plenty enough ever since he's our caretaker. Overall he's good... and actually surprisingly good. It's just that good. His tactical decision making in this early season though..

But let's not pretend his chosen main tactic/system is good enough early of this season vs majority of the teams. Only against big teams that generously gave us more spaces to exploit we usually do well with normally a change of system to 3CBs system. Even with Pogba, do you seriously confident we will get top 4 in normal seasons? I'm not seeing it with that 4231 #10 system, thankfully a lot of other teams are also undergoing transitions as us so basically they and us are roughly on the same "pace" with up-and-down per teams. I don't agree with his decision making this early season with that system considering players that can make it works are injured + insufficent and it's plain by day it's not working and we're dropping pts.
Are you seriously saying that the 4-2-3-1 system isn't good enough to get top 4 in a "normal season"? It's likely to get 3rd this season despite not having a fit for purpose squad for half the season!

As for the other points bolded above, he absolutely stuck with the 4-2-3-1 system through the season when other systems may have yielded better results in one off games. But, bedding that system in during the first half of the season is a huge part of how quickly it clicked once Bruno was added as the creative heartbeat.
 

The United

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Keep in mind when I said not ideal, I used managers in the calibre of Sir Alex or Pep as the definition of ideal - most suitable, perfect but not likely to become a reality. That's why I stated I didn't expect him to be the new Sir Alex, I didn't say if he was worse or better than Jose, for example. I should have stated it in my post. Because why should I use Jose, Van Gaal and Moyes as standards of what is ideal when they have clearly failed? so the term not ideal in my post, doesn't necessarily mean Ole is a bad manager.

About the tactics part, one thing that I often saw on match day threads was that people were complaining about the subs he made; I was one of them - I have to dig through my old posts to find when and who exactly he put for concrete examples. Also we were too reliant on counter attack to score goals and struggled against packed defences.

For several months now, the team has been able to turn things around and play more attackingly and be less reliant on counter attack, but in my mind we'll have to wait and see, would be interesting what he'd do with new signings and if the team would revert to struggling against smaller teams again. Don't get me wrong, the recent performances is of course credit to him because you can't just play 11 players and expect them to do what they want and score ala Jose. Jose had good coaching staffs but because he's a stubborn manager, the team bad performances were down to him. The fact that we parked the bus most of the time was also down to him. Because that's what a manager do, he had the final say.

All I suggested was that, if Ole needs a coaching staff that could help improve the tactical aspect of the team, should he think that it is currently not enough, it's okay to hire a specialist for that, or replace some of the current ones.

For now, I still see Ole as the first time when he got the job. Okay manager but not exceptional. Not filled with lots of brilliance like Pep Guardiola. That doesn't mean he can't achieve things with his team though. I'd gladly be proven wrong. Maybe Ole is a brilliant manager after all. Do not take my words as a something that I insist must be correct. I simply stated what's my view, as a nobody on a football forum.
I have read about Sir Alex dividing responsibilities to the 'specialists'. Sure, lack of coaching might be down to the coaching staffs and that means not only the manager. My english isn't great so maybe I worded it wrong. What I meant by tactical ability is the ability to analyze a game and making changes during a game, live, including players and formation when things are against you. Surely, for this one, ultimately, what's being put on the pitch is down to the manager right? and surely he has a lot of input and say in this aspect. That's why even with Carrick and McKenna around, Jose still parked the bus against Crystal Palace.

Edit: Web of Bissaka said tactical decision is the more proper word, instead of tactical ability. I think he's right. I didn't mean Ole is a bad manager who doesn't know about what is a 4-4-2 and when to play 4-4-2. Guess I was just putting the wrong word, sorry :D
Btw, people used to get frustrated with the timing of SAF subs all the time.

Ole shows so far that he is ready to learn and not too stubborn when he makes costy mistakes.
 

ColvaleGoa

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We desperately need to win some silverware. Our form suggest we should be in contention for both the trophies. Neither is going to be easy but we really need to get out hands on one of them. This will get Ole some more time and make people look and take notice. It will also be not counted as new manager bounce as we have had some horrendous times with Ole .

The team we have at the moment I hope gets some luck on our quest for Silverware as ability wise they are right there. Ole has done a great job, just win a trophy and shut all the haters up. The time is now.
 

SteveW

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I'd wager he has. Beat the following teams with Molde: Sevilla, Celtic (twice), Stuttgart (twice), Herenveen (twice), Zenit St. Petersburg. Drew Ajax and Basel. All these teams are supposedly better than Molde.

https://www.transfermarkt.com/ole-g...ein_id=687&liga=&wettbewerb_id=EL&trainer_id=
Exactly. It's just a vague little criticism they can throw out and not back up. Nobody ever gives any specifics to why his tactics are supposedly so bad. His results against big teams have always been good.
 

glazed

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I hear this often but can't understand why. What's he won that Ole hasn't?
He achieved a lot at Spurs than we did with fewer resources. He is far more tactically sophisticated than Ole, which allows him to get more out of less good players.
 

Roario

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Klopp and Pep are not good tacticians. They are good team builders.
Just look at what happens if either of them is losing at half time.
Do they change formation? Playstyle? No.
How long did it take Pep to not go gung ho at Anfield? 3 seasons? Now that's shocking.

How many finals have Klopp won in his career? 1?

Poch is not even worth a mention. He always had to change his approach at half-time against us.
That screams "tactically challenged" to me.

People on here overrate what can be done during a game.
Tactics are done before the game starts. The rest is tweaks and substitutions.

Ole and his team have done better than I expected tactically.
They get the tactics spot on versus the big teams more often than not.

Versus low blocks, I argue there are little to no tactics involved.
Quality matters more than tactics in these situations.
 
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Decomposing In Paris

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He achieved a lot at Spurs than we did with fewer resources. He is far more tactically sophisticated than Ole, which allows him to get more out of less good players.
I don’t think I’ve ever watched a team he managed and though “Wow, the game plan is special”... I’ve seen Park nullify Pirlo & Herrera Hazard... I’ve seen sweepers, false-9’s, inverted fullbacks, & overlapping CB’s... there have been many standout ideas as to how to get a group of players to win a football match. I have no doubt that Poch is an excellent manager, but I also feel that he is perhaps a little conventional (or perhaps even just not brave enough) to be talked about as some sort of tactical genius.
 

Tel074

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People with zero coaching experience will post on the Caf about how Ole’s tactically not good enough. Despite how well we actually play or any clear evidence to the contrary. He’ll always be a glorified PE teacher to them... if we win trophies, they will be won despite having Ole, never because of him.

Couldn't agree more . The Muppetry on here is mind blowing at times . Ole learnt at United from the best he still has him around now and I'm sure he talks to him alot . People on here would have us believe Ole was snatched from a pub and chucked into managing United .
The job he is doing is unbelievable. To get rid of the players we all wanted rid of and it looks like Jones, Lingard, Sanchez will all move on this summer as well is brilliant by him .
He has got Shaw , Martial , Rashford ,Pogba all playing very well when other managers couldn't .

Will we win a title ? Who knows but one thing I do know is whoever gets the job after Ole will have one hell of a easier Job than the job he inherited.
 

RedSky

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He achieved a lot at Spurs than we did with fewer resources. He is far more tactically sophisticated than Ole, which allows him to get more out of less good players.
You overrate him. Sorry, but putting it bluntly, he won nothing. Nothing. Zero, zilch. Very good team builder, i'll give him that. But so far he's failed to accomplish anything meaningful.
 

Green_Red

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Over the last 10 games or so, including obviously a few before the break, I've felt like I've finally been watching Man Utd again.

I know that sounds daft but over the last few years its felt like we've been having an identity crisis.

We had Moyes who couldn't live up to the hype and brought in Fellaini to a title winning side and sacked all the staff.

We then had "pass you to sleep with no end result" Louis van dangalled which was some weird attempt to bring the continental style to Old Trafford with aged German midfielders and Mike Smalling.

Then we hired a manager that had a Chelsea team, that would win the premier league the following year, looking like they be relegated if he wasn't sacked, which he was (for the third time in his career mind), and was then hired as Man Utd manager, and was later sacked for utter tripe football and having everyone in the squad and stands turn against him.

Now we have a club hero managing us, playing with fervour, making Fergi-esque signings, looking like we are a team going in the right direction, and people want to critique his CV? feck me we have a fair share of clown supporters don't we!
 

Amarsdd

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He achieved a lot at Spurs than we did with fewer resources. He is far more tactically sophisticated than Ole, which allows him to get more out of less good players.
Another of those phrases used in football that sounds intelligent but means absolutely nothing.
 
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MikeKing

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Some people have involuntary imposter syndrome in relation to Ole as manager because he came from the club. Like it's too good to be true, and I concede he has a couple of weird years in his managerial history, but a lot of top managers have weird histories like Mourinho, but the least unlikely thing is for great managers to have played at a top club at some point in time. Ole studied SAF, took his badges early during his injuries and even mentioned it in his last game at Old Trafford. I remember watching that and hearing him say "If I haven't learned from him, I can't do coaching" and from that point on I believed he would be our manager. He was on the up, but the dream died for me when he didn't bounce back after the Cardiff stint, but I'm not surprised he knows what he is doing now that he is back.
 

SinNombre

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I feel a lot of United fans do not even understand what made Fergie great in the later part of his managerial career.

It wasn't this undefined "tactical acumen".

There are 3 things which he was good at
1. Motivating players, and being ruthless with throwing out deadwood or the ones who weren't bought in the vision
2. Transfer market (Fergie wasn't the best but he was well above average)
3. Coaching staff (Fergie always had a good eye on hiring coaching staff who were on top of tactical innovations).

Ole has shown that he is at least above average on 1 and 2. McKenna and Carrick appear like a good coaching duo to me even if they are not as hyped as Rene or Quieroz were.

What has Ole not shown? How well he and his team respond once we hit a bad patch (and I'm not going to count the one earlier this season as one since that was still in the middle of the rebuild).

What has his coaching staff not shown? How well can they counter Barca when we next face them in a CL quarters or semis?

That said, if we finish 3rd and win one of Europa or FA cup, this season will already be better than any season we have had since Fergie retired (better than Mourinho's cup double or 81 point season which were dour and had very little future upside).
 
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Mindhunter

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It's difficult to get things right all the time. I'm not sure anybody is claiming he's perfect. No doubt he's made mistakes and learning on the job. As others have already pointed out he was working with a limited squad talent-wise and however good a tactician it's sometimes futile. As the old saying goes you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Basically, you can rarely turn something inferior (squad at his disposal earlier in the season) into something attractive and win.
The modern saying is "putting lipstick on a pig".
 

Strelok

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Klopp and Pep are not good tacticians. They are good team builders.
Just look at what happens if either of them is losing at half time.
Do they change formation? Playstyle? No.
How long did it take Pep to not go gung ho at Anfield? 3 seasons? Now that's shocking.

How many finals have Klopp won in his career? 1?

Poch is not even worth a mention. He always had to change his approach at half-time against us.
That screams "tactically challenged" to me.

People on here overrate what can be done during a game.
Tactics are done before the game starts. The rest is tweaks and substitutions.

Ole and his team have done better than I expected tactically.
They get the tactics spot on versus the big teams more often than not.

Versus low blocks, I argue there are little to no tactics involved.
Quality matters more than tactics in these situations.
Spot on.

I still can't fecking understand why people here generally consider Klopp, Pep or Poch surely a better tactician than Ole. While he won or at least drew against all those with far inferior squads. Look, he beat those with Lingard, and basically only lost or drew when Pereira played. That speaks volumes doesn't it ?
 

Lj82

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Another of those phrases used in football that sounds intelligent but means absolutely nothing.
Also ignored is the fact that Ole outwitted him when we played them soon after Ole was appointed and exploited the space left by their fullbacks to devastating effect.
 
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RiqCantona

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Over the last 10 games or so, including obviously a few before the break, I've felt like I've finally been watching Man Utd again.

I know that sounds daft but over the last few years its felt like we've been having an identity crisis.

We had Moyes who couldn't live up to the hype and brought in Fellaini to a title winning side and sacked all the staff.

We then had "pass you to sleep with no end result" Louis van dangalled which was some weird attempt to bring the continental style to Old Trafford with aged German midfielders and Mike Smalling.

Then we hired a manager that had a Chelsea team, that would win the premier league the following year, looking like they be relegated if he wasn't sacked, which he was (for the third time in his career mind), and was then hired as Man Utd manager, and was later sacked for utter tripe football and having everyone in the squad and stands turn against him.

Now we have a club hero managing us, playing with fervour, making Fergi-esque signings, looking like we are a team going in the right direction, and people want to critique his CV? feck me we have a fair share of clown supporters don't we!
You had me rolling at Mike Smalling :lol:
 

jackal&hyde

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He achieved a lot at Spurs than we did with fewer resources. He is far more tactically sophisticated than Ole, which allows him to get more out of less good players.
Clearly not though. Knew one way of playing and that was it. Ole has showed a lot more tactical flexibility and comes on top most other managers most of the time. Now that we have creative players we break down deep defences too.