"In the derby, United played as if they were City's servants.’’ - LVG

[R.N7]

Van Gaal managed Ajax, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and had two spells as Holland coach before succeeding David Moyes at United in 2014.

He lasted two years before being replaced by Jose Mourinho with some United fans dismayed by his methodical style and rigid playing pattern.

Despite that criticism, the experienced Dutchman has laid into Solskjaer's own brand of football – and has slammed the Norwegian's confusing tactical switches.

“The football he brings is of a counter attacking team. He always adapts to his opponents” says Van Gaal.

“And he is playing different systems all the time. Against Southampton it is 4-4-2, in the next match it is 5 defenders, next it is 4-2-3-1.

“You could argue he is using the qualities of his players, but at West Ham United they were outclassed in the first half.

“It was only when Marcus Rashford and Bruno Fernandes came on they made the difference.

“Using different systems is okay but my question would be is he actually properly training the players to use these systems?

“Because it's key that if you switch these different playing systems it must be executed in a good way.

“It depends less on the quality of the players than on the actual practice of a system in training.’’

Van Gaal admits he was disappointed in Solskjaer's guarded approach during the dull 0-0 Manchester derby draw claiming United were City's “servants”.

All Man United did was defend with ten men. Everyone knows my relationship with Pep Guardiola, who is angry with me because I challenged him in my last book.

“But I enjoyed watching City more than United. I have far more sympathy for City than for United.

“Honestly, United were just defending and hoping they can do a quick hit on the counter. Pep’s team don’t have the intention to defend with ten men.’

“United just defend and put a couple of players up front who can run 100 metres in 9 seconds. Is that a world record?

“All I mean to say is that Greenwood, Rashford or Martial are super fast runners who will use the space United’s opponents leave behind their defence when United sit back and defend.

“In the derby, United played as if they were City's servants.’’

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/louis-van-gaal-brands-man-23193381

 

[R.N7]

Sure his football was dull as dishwater but he was the last Manchester United manager to understand that United should be about Sex Dominance and not Sex Masochism. He took the game to United's rivals. Also, the last United manager to actually have a proper system, albeit a shite one.

 

[Kaos]

Sure his football was dull as dishwater but he was the last Manchester United manager to understand that United should be about Sex Dominance and not Sex Masochism. He took the game to United's rivals. Also, the last United manager to actually have a proper system, albeit a shite one.

Did he though? Because it looked like his approach to these games was to bore the opposition into submission by passing it around sideways the whole game, dominating possession and doing a whole lot of nothing with it, hoping the opposition slips up at some point.

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

Perfectly fair comment.

LvG was the last manager we had who truly looked to go out and dominate the big games. Juanfield and the 4-2 City game at OT were sweet memories.

It went to pot in his 2nd season though, 0-3 at Emirates was a low point.

 

[711]

Sure his football was dull as dishwater but he was the last Manchester United manager to understand that United should be about Sex Dominance and not Sex Masochism. He took the game to United's rivals. Also, the last United manager to actually have a proper system, albeit a shite one.

It's an awful phrase but going along with it anyway I would say the complete and total opposite to be true.

 

[EngimaMK]

I can't be bothered to check but I'd wager OGS record against big teams is better than LVG.

 

[big rons sovereign]

Did he though? Because it looked like his approach to these games was to bore the opposition into submission by passing it around sideways the whole game, dominating possession and doing a whole lot of nothing with it, hoping the opposition slips up at some point.

Pretty much what I was thinking.
LVG lost his balls after twattenburg stitched us up at Leicester. It was never the same after that.
Somebody should remind him of the thoroughly forgettable games against city and PSV.
And probably a lot more I've completely forgotten about.

 

[ColvaleGoa]

How about Pep played 2 defensive midfielders to counter United as he was scarred by his last 3 meetings?

Yeah, let's all pile on Ole. LvG's football bored me no ends. I 'd rather have Ole's unpredictable Football than the eyegouging fare served by LvG.

 

[Adisa]

He makes some excellent points, especially about always changing the system.
I said it last week, how can we be consistent when the formation we play and how we play is always changing?

 

[charlenefan]

Someone remind him of the even worse 0-0 against City under him

He speaks far too much shit for someone who caused the most damage to the team of all the managers post Fergie

 

[harms]

Did he though? Because it looked like his approach to these games was to bore the opposition into submission by passing it around sideways the whole game, dominating possession and doing a whole lot of nothing with it, hoping the opposition slips up at some point.

Against rivals? Van Gaal’s team was usually great in big games, the unimaginable bore came against the minions.

 

[Bwuk]

Someone remind him of the even worse 0-0 against City under him

He speaks far too much shit for someone who caused the most damage to the team of all the managers post Fergie

No he didnt. Moyes took a team who’d walked the league to 7th.

 

[FrankDrebin]

He's never going to say anything remotely positive concerning United.

 

[FrankDrebin]

No he didnt. Moyes took a team who’d walked the league to 7th.

LVG spunked over 200 million + up the wall.

 

[Andycoleno9]

Everything what he said is true. He was the first who said that Ole is defensive manager two years ago. When people still thought that Ole is some kind of attacking manager.

But lets write off all his comments because his football was boring. Logic, eh?

 

[Bwuk]

LVG spunked over 200 million + up the wall.

So has everyone bar Moyes

 

[FrankDrebin]

Sure, we're a counter attacking team but atleast its fecking exciting and we see goals.

 

[Park's Petrified Pooch]

LVG the man I enjoyed, he said the right things and appeared to ‘get’ United as a club. However his football was dire. In the 35 years I’ve supported United, LVG’s tenure was the only time I’ve avoided watching us. His eventual sacking has led to him becoming embittered about the club, and his gargantuan ego and narcissism means he will never be able to be even remotely objective about us. I stopped listening to him the day he exited the building. He’s a retired rent-a-quote for people wanting a negative sound bite on the club at this point.

 

[gormless]

Whilst I don’t think we were going to go right back to the top with LVG, our subsequent managers had totally different styles to him which led to a lot of his very good work being undone

 

[VeevaVee]

I’d rather watch Ole’s football than his, a million times over. He can talk all he wants, and bloody hell does he

 

[Norman Brownbutter]

I can't be bothered to check but I'd wager OGS record against big teams is better than LVG.

If memory serves, he had the same issues Ole does. Good record against the big six, but dropping points at clubs that on paper we should be beating with ease.

this was until around March 2016 I believe and didn’t include wins over arsenal and city. So 35 points over 18 games from the big six.

 

[cyberman]

Seen much of City this year, Louis?

 

[FrankDrebin]

I wouldn't be surprised if LVG genuinely enjoys Arsenal's football under Arteta (at this current moment) because that's not a million miles off with what he was producing for us.

 

[charlenefan]

No he didnt. Moyes took a team who’d walked the league to 7th.

Right and? What damage did that do long term? Look at the shit LVG brought into the club and more importantly look at the players he let go to bring that shit in. He left the squad in a far worse state to the one he found it in. Moyes wasn't in the job long enough to do that kind of damage

 

[Bilbo]

LVG has forgotten more than any of us will ever know about football, so we should always listen to what he has to say, however that doesnt mean that he is always right.

I would say that he more than Jose or Ole failed to implement his vision at United. There was a run of 6 or so games during his spell when United looked very, very good indeed, but that period was an outlier. He could not maintain that level. Using his logic that has to be viewed as a coaching failure.

 

[RedDevilRoshi]

Does the guy not remember how awful his football was to watch?

 

[No Idea For Nickname]

I see old fart is still angry and frustrated, so feels like he has to speak. Why press wants interviews with him? Ah, right, he speaks shite about us, and press loves it, clicks, likes, and gives them something to talk about for weeks. Are we little bit bored mr. Retired, huh? Miss being in spolitghts? Miss putting opo teams and United fans to sleep?
Bore off

 

[FrankDrebin]

"My captain shall always play"

 

[kps88]

LVG placed too much emphasis on the system while Ole is overly dependent on individuals. A mix of the two would be ideal.

 

[Zoo]

Fair enough criticising United here but then he must do the same towards Pep and City. He does the opposite almost which means he lacks credibility.

Sad to see, I know he’s justifiably bitter about certain things from his time at United but he needs to be fair.

 

[charlenefan]

Even to this day I still don't know why we hired him, if it were off the back of a good WC (or was it the Euro's?) then I could understand the shortermism of it but we were in negotiations before that tournament even began

 

[T00lsh3d]

Sure his football was dull as dishwater but he was the last Manchester United manager to understand that United should be about Sex Dominance and not Sex Masochism. He took the game to United's rivals. Also, the last United manager to actually have a proper system, albeit a shite one.

It's an awful phrase but going along with it anyway I would say the complete and total opposite to be true.

His teams were more like rohypnol. Inducing a state of stupor before slyly buggering them

 

[Offside]

Better than playing like West Ham or Southampton’s servants.

 

[Jim Beam]

Some fair comments about changing the system which I somewhat agree.

However, Ole's team is playing better style of football then his and if you look only at Van Gaal 2nd season when we really should have improved it is million miles better.
Also, City was so shit in the derby first half that they looked like they were managed by him. No wonder he liked it more.

 

[Ayush_reddevil]

Going beyond the derby comments I do agree with his comments about the formations. I don't see anything wrong with playing different formations but we don't seem to be well drilled in those & just seem disjointed a lot of times

 

[MU655]

I can't be bothered to check but I'd wager OGS record against big teams is better than LVG.

It's not better. Van Gaal had 18/30 points in his first season, and 18/30 in his second season. So, 36/60 points. There was no doubt that Van Gaal knew how to take points from the big teams.

Solskjaer had 18/30 last season and only 2/12 this season. Need to get 16 out of the last 18 to match Van Gaal.

For me, he has a point out about being very negative against the big teams. Last season, the big teams were affording us space in behind and we took advantage of that. This season, they are not allowing that and it has culminated into some very poor results thus far. They seem to be able to quite easily stop us from having much impact on the game. We have been nullified and need to find our way around it.

Just for reference, Mourinho had 10/30 in his first season but has the highest individual season of 19/30 in the next.

 

[big_jeffstar]

Out of all the managers post Fergie, I think he had the biggest task, he had to evolve the team, get them playing as a unit again, get their confidence back and try to get them up to speed with modern football, at the time the game had just passed us by, I’d even go as far as to say for the last couple of years under Fergie we were relying more and more on individuals..
That being said, his insistence on following the “system” to the letter ultimately caused his downfall, I do have sympathy for him though.. he was promised targets that we coundn’t sign, and sacked via the media after he’d just won a trophy.. it was the first time I remember questioning what was actually happening to the club, I always thought we had more class than that.. and clearly so did LVG.
If we’d have actually handled his sacking with a bit more respect, I don’t think he’d be quite as bitter as he seems to be these days

 

[hungrywing]

One of the things he's questioning is whether the formation changes are truly calculated on a top-level or they're akin to the noodlings of a dilettante.

Almost the entirety of it is him alluding to what a large amount of caftards are having reservations about: that we're winning due to having 'better players'.

And this is from someone who clawed their eyeballs out during his tenure.

 

[RORY65]

Overall he has a point, it is a shame that for the most part since Ferguson left our approach to bigger games has generally been to play like underdogs and try to be a threat on the counter rather than being good enough to impose ourselves on others but the City game feels like an odd one to choose given it was a lot of more even in terms of possession and intent than some of the previous derbies and you could argue that City were the ones who changed their game more for us than we did for them this time.

The chopping and changing of systems is a fair argument, especially this year when there's so little time to work on the training ground, but at the same time the nature of the season has meant that players are not all at 100% all of the time and therefore Ole is to some extent trying to work around that plus the fact we haven't played particularly well for a whole game yet (we've had bursts of 15/20 minutes in games) and so understandably he's trying different things to find something that works.

I don't know if this has always been LVG's way to talk so much and always negatively about a former club but I can understand if it's somewhat conditioned by the way his departure was handled, it was really shitty that after months of negativity and criticism that he won the FA Cup and the news leaked about Mourinho as he was celebrating the win and he couldn't at least have had his day.

 

[Lentwood]

I liked Van Gaal, I thought he was building something and was unfortunate to be sacked. However, he needs to stop sniping at the club because it’s coming across as bitterness.