[CENTER]DDG
Rafael Smalling Vidic Evra
Carrick Anderson
Rooney
Nani Kagawa
RVP[/CENTER]Me too.@Cina: I would play Rooney a little further back than that map implies, chipping in in midfield to provide a bit of extra steel.
Anderson having an injury season would feel like a hallucination.Anderson having an injury free season would be like a new signing...
It is. Performance level we shouldn't be anywhere near the top, we've probably won around 10 points that we shouldn't have so far this season.Our ability to win a game, no matter how badly we play, is the best in the world.
Indeed, that's clearly not going to happen for him. At best we can hope for him to be ready to play 25-30 games a season in the league. We have to use him when we can though because he has the most potential of all our midfielders. It's a shame that both him and Cleverley can't stay fit because they could be good. Perhaps not world class in the same mould as Barcelona or Bayern midfielders, we don't have anyone who can be that good, but good enough to dominate most teams.Anderson having an injury season would feel like a hallucination.
I wouldn't put any meaning to our European games this season. If anything I think it's been a poor campaign so far. We were in a terrible group, possibly the worst anyone's ever been in, and didn't look impressive in any of the games. I know we're through while Chelsea and City aren't but honestly, looking at groups it feels like we've been in a different competition.Y'know what we're a hell of a lot better than most people on this forum think. That's all there is to it basically.
Comfortably through in Europe. Top of the prem having been to Anfield and Stamford Bridge.
People on this forum all through the summer and start of the season were predicting Chelsea to be better than us this season. We constantly shut these people up week in week out.
CL group qualification is like a comfort blanket for some, amazing that so many use it as an indicator of success. Look at the size and quality of our club/players compared to the ther teams. Not qualifying would be like Klitschko getting knocked out by an amateur.I wouldn't put any meaning to our European games this season. If anything I think it's been a poor campaign so far. We were in a terrible group, possibly the worst anyone's ever been in, and didn't look impressive in any of the games. I know we're through while Chelsea and City aren't but honestly, looking at groups it feels like we've been in a different competition.
As for the league we're gathering points much better than we're looking. We looked terrible at Anfield, absolutely awful, yet won. We played for 30 minutes and it was all Chelsea after that at Stamford, against 9 men it was no contest though. Newcastle was our best performance away from home so far.
Exactly. We were in a group with Galatasaray who haven't been in CL for a while, Braga who are the third best team in Portugal at best and Cluj who have won about 1 CL game until this season. You can look through Europa League groups and you'd find that most are stronger than this.CL group qualification is like a comfort blanket for some, amazing that so many use it as an indicator of success. Look at the size and quality of our club/players compared to the ther teams. Not qualifying would be like Klitschko getting knocked out by an amateur.
It's being realistic, us being through in Europe isn't an indication of success. We were in a poor group and HAD to go through. We've not been tested in Europe yet and looking at our last 15 European games (including horror show against Athletic) I wouldn't be too confident.fecking hell City got knocked out by Ajax. Going through the groups playing shite football and resting key players is what we've done for fecking years. Some of you don't half get negative.
I think getting knocked out last year tricks some into believing qualifying this year is indicator of quality. Truth is we could have qualified from this group if me or you were managing and I'm not joking. In fact, the team wouldn't need a manager at all, just turning up would do the trick.Exactly. We were in a group with Galatasaray who haven't been in CL for a while, Braga who are the third best team in Portugal at best and Cluj who have won about 1 CL game until this season. You can look through Europa League groups and you'd find that most are stronger than this.
I know we were in a crap group last year too and got eliminated but this one is far worse. It'd be like Klitschko getting knocked out by a disabled person.
And they finished below Ajax.It's being realistic, us being through in Europe isn't an indication of success. We were in a poor group and HAD to go through. We've not been tested in Europe yet and looking at our last 15 European games (including horror show against Athletic) I wouldn't be too confident.
Ajax are still much better than anyone we've played in Europe this season. They also happened to have Real Madrid and Dortmund in their group, which you didn't notice.
That does look top class. I hope we see that formation at some point - it's definitely the way to get all our best technical players into the line up.I still think this team:
Has huge potential to fight for every title and play great football against anyone, will we ever see it though? not sure.Code:[CENTER]DDG Rafael Smalling Vidic Evra Carrick Anderson Rooney Nani Kagawa RVP[/CENTER]
Bang on the money.Some great individuals, not a great team. Far from one.
Apart from the inconvenient fact that we've been largely shite.So, we've won 13 out of 16 league games this season, which is clearly mental, and we also won the four CL games we cared about. So that's a record of 17 wins in 20 first team matches this season, 13 of which were away from home.
I'm starting to think we might actually be amazing.
Um, you can't just discount 2 matches in your analysis because you judged us not to care, not really anyway.So, we've won 13 out of 16 league games this season, which is clearly mental, and we also won the four CL games we cared about. So that's a record of 17 wins in 20 first team matches this season, 13 of which were away from home.
I'm starting to think we might actually be amazing.
Shite at looking competent whilst winning football matches. But the fact is we do win them, constantly, regardless of opponent, which is rather the point of football.Apart from the inconvenient fact that we've been largely shite.
This.Apart from the inconvenient fact that we've been largely shite.
Fair enough. When I started the thread I meant 'good' to mean actually playing well. But i suppose you could make an argument that we are good in the sense of successful.Shite at looking competent whilst winning football matches. But the fact is we do win them, constantly, regardless of opponent, which is rather the point of football.
That isn't sustainable though.Shite at looking competent whilst winning football matches. But the fact is we do win them, constantly, regardless of opponent, which is rather the point of football.
Definitely, I mean against Southampton, Reading, Villa and Fulham we got the three points but there was plenty wrong with the performances.Looking purely at results from 17 fixtures is a crap way to ascertain the quality of the side. the sample size is far too small, it doesn't take into account factors like luck and quality of opponent, and most importantly quality and results don't directly correlate. While it's true that the better your side is, the more likely you are to win matches, it doesn't follow that winning a lot of matches must mean your side is brilliant, certainly not over such a short period of time.
Exactly, and against City we could easily have been screwed out of 3 points by the linesman's wrong call on Young's "goal", or if the ball had hit Nasri 1cm differently, results simply aren't that good a barometer of a team's quality, they hinge on such tiny margins at times.Definitely, I mean against Southampton, Reading, Villa and Fulham we got the three points but there was plenty wrong with the performances.
Why not? We were like this in the first half of 1999-2000, at least in terms of the crap defending, and in the second half of that season we just went and started hammering everyone. The goals aren't going to dry up, and if Vidic comes back and restores some order we will be a terrifying prospect.That isn't sustainable though.
Like the grand national innit. I confidently predict this year it will be won by a fairytale winner.There's a tendency in football for people to envisage that everything's part of a plan or narrative, that the best team always wins, people are never really prepared to attribute things to luck. When United score in the last minute it's because of Ferguson's never say die attitude he instils in the players or when a team plays badly and wins, it's always the stuff of Champions/Survivors etc., never just that the goal happened to come in a particular minute or the team got lucky. I suppose it's more interesting for the media to write about but using it to evaluate the quality of a team and treating it as reliable is asinine.
There was a thread on here a while back where some cretin maintained that luck in football didn't exist.Exactly, and against City we could easily have been screwed out of 3 points by the linesman's wrong call on Young's "goal", or if the ball had hit Nasri 1cm differently, results simply aren't that good a barometer of a team's quality, they hinge on such tiny margins at times.
There's a tendency in football for people to envisage that everything's part of a plan or narrative, that the best team always wins, people are never really prepared to attribute things to luck. When United score in the last minute it's because of Ferguson's never say die attitude he instils in the players or when a team plays badly and wins, it's always the stuff of Champions/Survivors etc., never just that the goal happened to come in a particular minute or the team got lucky. I suppose it's more interesting for the media to write about but using it to evaluate the quality of a team and treating it as reliable is asinine.
OK, fine, it's amazing, it's incredible, but you're going to need to come up with a better argument that "Look at our results!" to convince people that that the team will be able to keep it up. There are grounds for optimism, but simply looking at the numbers and assuming they're going to continue isn't really a meaningful point.13 out of 16 isn't just good, you know, it's bloody brilliant. It's over 30 wins a season if we keep it up.
Well you are kind of insinuating there that the bad performances are going to stop, in which case you're changing the discussion.Why not? We were like this in the first half of 1999-2000, at least in terms of the crap defending, and in the second half of that season we just went and started hammering everyone. The goals aren't going to dry up, and if Vidic comes back and restores some order we will be a terrifying prospect.
hope we don't mirror 99/2000. smash teams up and down the country en route to the league and get foolishly picked apart by Madrid in Europe.13 out of 16 isn't just good, you know, it's bloody brilliant. It's over 30 wins a season if we keep it up.
Why not? We were like this in the first half of 1999-2000, at least in terms of the crap defending, and in the second half of that season we just went and started hammering everyone. The goals aren't going to dry up, and if Vidic comes back and restores some order we will be a terrifying prospect.
Maybe alot of people would take that scenario right nowhope we don't mirror 99/2000. smash teams up and down the country en route to the league and get foolishly picked apart by Madrid in Europe.
Sounds about right, but I'd be interested to know the methodology behind that sort of study. One of the annoying things about the "Best team always wins the League" rhetoric is that it's so difficult to disprove, given that there's no better way of fairly evaluating a team's quality.There was a thread on here a while back where some cretin maintained that luck in football didn't exist.
A few years ago someone did a statistical analysis that suggested what seems intuitively obvious, that luck plays a big part in low-scoring games like football. They reckoned the best team wins a league competition about 85% of the time, if I remember right. Cup competitions obviously much less.