Rather the bleat on about it in the zombie or Cleverley threads, What say you gimps, is this a good thing or a bad thing? Sir Alex thinks it was this that "got us though" against Liverpool, and there's always an argument to be made for experience over youthful energy, as Arsenal have repeatedly refused to find out.
I say it's a bad thing though. We've gone too far the other way, and Fergie's become ridiculously over-reliant on Scholes and Giggs to do jobs their legs no longer allow them to do, and continues to pick them despite having other, better options available to him. It's actually crippling us hugely as a football team.
For me, never mind at Anfield, there is no longer ANY situation where Giggs can start games as one of a midfield two. He doesn't position himself well enough, he can't harry the opposition or move swiftly enough to play through them harrying him, and when we inevitably end up having to sit off, he doesn't track runners from midfield any better than an inexperienced young player would. In short, he just doesn't have the legs, or the discipline to make himself useful there. He's better suited playing in addition to or wide of the midfield, where he can use his guile to affect games while an actual midfield does the midfield work for him...and only in games where his lack of ability to track up and down the pitch every 30 seconds doesn't really matter.
I also don't think, in a vast majority of games, that Scholes is suited to playing in a midfield two anymore. Again, central midfield requires more work rate than any other area of the pitch, and he simply doesn't have the legs. He slows our play down FAR too much and other players default to him as a safe ball too often. There are games where we can get away with starting him there, because unlike Giggs he can dictate play through the middle without having to sprint around everywhere. These games are getting fewer and far between though, and there is no game where starting him in a midfield two makes us better...just games where we can get away with it and not be less likely to win. Basically home games against weak opposition who are going to sit behind the ball all game or not pose an attacking threat.
I find it particularly bizarre since Ferguson reportedly got rid of Berbatov because he wanted to play a "faster, more direct style" which Berbatov wasn't suited to, and now he deliberately picks midfields which force us to play at a much slower, less direct style, and which doesn't suit any of our attacking players at all...apart from Berbatov.
If our manager genuinely thinks that it was experience that won us the game yesterday, then I also find this very worrying. He handed over any chance we had of imposing a gameplan on the opposition by picking Giggs alongside Carrick...and then it was Giggs's lack of discipline/sharpness without the ball that cost us a soft goal.
I say it's a bad thing though. We've gone too far the other way, and Fergie's become ridiculously over-reliant on Scholes and Giggs to do jobs their legs no longer allow them to do, and continues to pick them despite having other, better options available to him. It's actually crippling us hugely as a football team.
For me, never mind at Anfield, there is no longer ANY situation where Giggs can start games as one of a midfield two. He doesn't position himself well enough, he can't harry the opposition or move swiftly enough to play through them harrying him, and when we inevitably end up having to sit off, he doesn't track runners from midfield any better than an inexperienced young player would. In short, he just doesn't have the legs, or the discipline to make himself useful there. He's better suited playing in addition to or wide of the midfield, where he can use his guile to affect games while an actual midfield does the midfield work for him...and only in games where his lack of ability to track up and down the pitch every 30 seconds doesn't really matter.
I also don't think, in a vast majority of games, that Scholes is suited to playing in a midfield two anymore. Again, central midfield requires more work rate than any other area of the pitch, and he simply doesn't have the legs. He slows our play down FAR too much and other players default to him as a safe ball too often. There are games where we can get away with starting him there, because unlike Giggs he can dictate play through the middle without having to sprint around everywhere. These games are getting fewer and far between though, and there is no game where starting him in a midfield two makes us better...just games where we can get away with it and not be less likely to win. Basically home games against weak opposition who are going to sit behind the ball all game or not pose an attacking threat.
I find it particularly bizarre since Ferguson reportedly got rid of Berbatov because he wanted to play a "faster, more direct style" which Berbatov wasn't suited to, and now he deliberately picks midfields which force us to play at a much slower, less direct style, and which doesn't suit any of our attacking players at all...apart from Berbatov.
If our manager genuinely thinks that it was experience that won us the game yesterday, then I also find this very worrying. He handed over any chance we had of imposing a gameplan on the opposition by picking Giggs alongside Carrick...and then it was Giggs's lack of discipline/sharpness without the ball that cost us a soft goal.