I had no idea where he was playing or meant to play. But then I had no idea where anybody was playing that second half since it seemed like we had 4 people playing behind a striker, and that included our actual striker which meant we had nobody in the box.
22
Season Average Rating
- Appearances
- 41
- Goals
- 11
- Assists
- 5
- Yellow cards
- 4
-
In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
- Status
This is so relevant. I'm not saying that people should only be able to comment if they've lived overseas, but at the very least people should think about what that means.
I've lived and worked in France and NZ after being born in England, living there for 27 years. Both were tough moves. France was toughest due to the language barrier. But both were entirely different societies, I had no friends, literally zero knowledge of the area that I lived in. I didn't find a 'home' (as opposed to a house) for at least 3-6 months. It was foreign. I was unhappy for weeks at a time, even though I was loving the change of environment, enjoying new things every day.
The guys signing hasn't worked out yet. It could be purely football based reasons, who knows? I don't think paying someone six figures a week is a guarantee that they settle in a new country though.
There's very little point in analysing his time here so far in any great detail. he's played a little. Flashes of good, swathes of average. I'm happy to wait until may do decide if he's had a good season.
Was last season just him being the individual example of " doing a Leicester" ?
Hmmm. Nah I think he has it in him to perform like that consistently but damn does he need the absolute ideal environment for it...
Thought the exact same thing. It really was a shit show tactically
was it after the game comments? He looked active and some decent touches, lost the ball on a few occassions too but he needs to play more than 25 minutes in 15 games
He was playing as our 10. Mata shifted wide right to take Rashford's place. Come on. It was fairly obvious. You could see him telling Mata where to go.
interesting plane journey home when your manager says that about you
Helps when you play for a team that actually plays zippy football.
Sure. However, individually he was playing well, making good passes, moving intelligently knowing that he had good players with him at Dortmund. I hope he'll show the same trust in his new teammates' abilities
Which is great except thats not really what happened is it? I thought that was fairly obvious given the way we played.
That is what happened, though. I mean they don't stand still in their allocated positions but that was clearly the position they played.
What did Mourinho say about him? The tweet won't load.
Mourinho on Mkhitaryan: "He has to do more. It's as simple as that. We have big expectations. We have lots of players for that position."
You guys really don't get it !
Mourinho didn't sign him and doesn't want him.
Your club is a clusterfeck !
The debates on here are hilarious. You have no idea about what is going on at your club
Mourinho didn't sign him and doesn't want him.
Your club is a clusterfeck !
The debates on here are hilarious. You have no idea about what is going on at your club
Glad to see you got your mouth back buddy. I was worried about you and BobbyManc for a while.
And you do?
Oh look it's an ITK, direct links to Jose and bringing the scoops no one else knows of
If Mourinho didn't want him then why would this transfer have been sanctioned? I can't imagine anyone else at the club was insisting we sign him.
Nah mate clearly Raiola not getting paid £25m, getting Pogba a world record deal and Ibrahimovic wasn't enough. He insisted we sign Bebe, sorry I mean Mkhitaryan. Arsenal and a whole host of other clubs were after this Bebe. Jose went to Dortmund games to watch this Bebe.
Obviously @Polite Poster knows everything. Maybe he is Raiola.
Mourinho hinted that he can't rely on Mkhitaryan in big games. Has he realised yet that he can't rely on half the squad for every game? 
Mata was worse. He was non existent. Mkhitaryan gave the ball away a couple of times but still moved us forward. I don't remember Mata doing that once.
But Mata and Mkhitaryan weren't played in their ideal positions.
Mata was plonked in at #8 when he's a #10 and Miki was played at #8 also when's he's a WINGER.
Mata switched to the RW and I honestly forgot his was playing.
I've been saying it time and time again we have the squad just our set up is useless and shit with plAyers out of position.
We played this today:
Zlatan
Martial Rooney Mkhitaryan Mata
Herrera
When we should be playing this:
Zlatan
Martial Mata Mkhitaryan
Herrera Carrick
I honestly think we would be seeing a much more different result if we played the bottom team. Everyone in their right positions and some sort of stability.
This is what makes me worry about Mourinho. Him not getting it right.
But Mata and Mkhitaryan weren't played in their ideal positions.
Mata was plonked in at #8 when he's a #10 and Miki was played at #8 also when's he's a WINGER.
Mata switched to the RW and I honestly forgot his was playing.
I've been saying it time and time again we have the squad just our set up is useless and shit with plAyers out of position.
We played this today:
Zlatan
Martial Rooney Mkhitaryan Mata
Herrera
When we should be playing this:
Zlatan
Martial Mata Mkhitaryan
Herrera Carrick
I honestly think we would be seeing a much more different result if we played the bottom team. Everyone in their right positions and some sort of stability.
This is what makes me worry about Mourinho. Him not getting it right.
You sound hysterical.
He's our most overrated player bar none. The outcry for him is incredible. I still can't believe we opted for him over going for Gundogan.
Are you sure you're a "polite poster"?
I watched him quite a bit for Dortmund and I don't think he's anything special at all. I wasn't a fan of signing him and I don't blame José for leaving him out this long, though, considering we supposedly have a good scouting network, it's worrying that we spent so much on him and have treated him like this regardless. Tuchel's system gets the best out of his attackers more so than the individuals being amazing.
Can we wait a few games before we write him off?
Oh i think we should put a little blame on Mourinho for spending £30m on a player and then barely give him a game.
He is a quality player. I agree that Dortmund have a much better platform for attackers to flourish, that doesn't mean Mkhitaryan can't perform for us. I have seen him tear teams apart for Shakthar and the Armenian national team several times.
He was already a very good player before even joining dortmund. Dortmund have possibly the best scouts in the world and there's a reason they paid a club record fee to get him, he ended up producing the goods for them. It's up to the manager to get the best out of him, playing him 20 mins in 2 months is hardly the way to do it.
As the poster above me mentioned, you should watch some of his Shakhtar and Armenia highlights, they are often far more impressive than the dortmund ones.
I hope he comes good but I just don't think he's that good. I'm not basing my opinion on him as a player purely by his time here as, like I said, I wasn't a fan of his watching him at Dortmund either.
I completely agree that José has gone about this situation in a, quite frankly, silly way. Even though I don't rate Mkhi that high, for us to spend so much on him and to use him like we have, is very odd to say the least.
Regarding Dormunds players - I agree it's not just Mkhi who benefit from their style of play. A lot of fan favourite players they have just aren't my cup of tea either. There's only 2 players in recent years I would have liked us to buy from them and that's Gundogan and Sokratis. Weigl, from the little I've seen, looks good, too.
I'll take your word for it considering I only ever saw Mkhi once during his spell at Shakhtar in their game against Arsenal at the Emirates.
Certainly not.
He's risen to the top of every league he's played in.
2012 Ukrainian PL Player of the year. (25 goals in the season. Still a record)
2015 Bundesliga Players' Player of the Season
Theres also nothing wrong with his brain, heart or balls.
He needs to play alongside the right players. Jose should be building his team around Mkhi instead of Pogba.
Mourinho's major weakness has always been a lack of patience. It's what stops him from being regarded as the very best alongside names such as Fergie/Guardiola/Klopp. His teatment of Mkhitaryan is worrying. Outrageous sales of Lukaku/De Bruyne/Robben/Matic etc have not done too many favours for Mourinhos reputation but on the flip side of that you can argue that Jose is good at getting rid of deadwood quickly such as Salah/Cuadrado/Ramires etc as opposed to letting them stagnate on the bench for a long time instead of a quick sale as Fergie sometimes did with the likes of Nani/Anderson/Berbatov/Tevez/Kagawa etc
You can't mention him in the same breath with the other two
Last edited:
Woah it's like we're playing spot the odd one out.
Obviously, you think you do know. Care to enlight us what is actually going on at United - you know, hard facts, not gossip or guessing - or is your post just a very poor trolling attempt?
How did my Armenian prince play?
Mourinho is harsh on this guy. The entire team played like shit and he somehow singled him out for not doing more after coming on when 2-0 down. First game in a while too. I feel for him
An elite manager is one who has proven they can take a bunch of serial underachievers to the next level while also developing youth at the same time. Mourinho is a serial winner but has never shown he can develop youth. Klopp has already worked miracles with the likes of Milner/Lallana/Firminho and Pochettino is working similar miracles with the likes of Dier/Alli/Kane. When Guardiola arrived at Barca he booted out many of the stars such as Deco/Ronaldinho/Eto'o and replaced them with Messi/David Villa/Pedro/Pique etc and won everything you can win. Mourinho's record with the likes of De Bruyne/Lukaku/Matic/Wright-Phillips/Joe Cole would suggest that he still has it all to prove in terms of developing youth before he can be considered an elite manager
Bullocks mate. Youth development is nice and all but its not the be all and end all. Winning trophies and building successful teams consistently (no matter what average squad age) trumps everything else when it comes to the makings of an elite manager. Why haven't you mentioned Wenger? He's achieved more in the game than Klopp and he's great at youth development, wouldn't that make him an 'elite' manager in your eyes then? What has Klopp done in comparison? Hasn't even won a CL (Wenger hasn't either of course).
Also, those Liverpool players you mentioned are far from underachievers. Lallana looked better at Southampton than he has most of his time at Liverpool so far but things are on the up for him this season. Milner has always been a dependable workhouse wherever he's played and Firmino was doing well in the Bundesliga before his move. You make it seem like Klopp is a magician who totally transformed them and thats far from the truth. Dier/Alli/Kane are perfect examples of good handling of youth talent, i'll give you that when it comes to Pochettino.
Klopp hasn't done/won anything at Liverpool yet. Rodgers had a superb season before his final one there and he was doing the same thing with young players
Last edited:
True. I'm a big fan of Jose. I am delighted we have him here. He seems to have a flaw with youth development though but maybe he can develop one or two kids here. Fosu Mensah and Tuanzebe might not get much of a look in when he signs a couple more defenders that he plans to buy. He's an amazing manager though. Next season I've no doubt he will make all the critics eat their words again.
- Status