Because many of those players were already winners including European Champions and CL winners
It makes me sick
Now do the squads. Pretty sure, Johnson, Phil Neville, Blomqvist, Henning Berg, Wes Brown, May, Curtis, Jordi Cruyff, Greening, Teddy, may not get much play in the current era
And my point on why they have such a bench is that players largely perform. It’s very easy to use hindsight to rate players. Van de Beek wasn’t bought with the intention of him not functioning for us. In fact he came off a semi final showing that he and his Ajax lads were able to achieve the year that Liverpool won the UCL and that was after a freak 96th minute goal that Lucas Muora made happen perhaps his best performance till date.
I'm not sure why a United fan would want to talk down your own treble squad. Of the United players not in that combined XI, I would gladly have regens of Johnsen, Neville, Brown, Solskjear, Sheringham, Yorke and Cole in a squad today. Why are we trying to pretend the 99 squad wasn't extremely talented? It had the best collection of CFs I've ever seen.
It’s apparently odd for United fans to point out City’s coach is brilliant but completely okay for other United fans to claim their players are the greatest thing since sliced bread at the expense of ours. The mental gymnastics people apply because they get fed up with a “narrative”
Yep, I now understand your point more clearly and fully agree.
And I forgot Nicky Butt. Quality player.
As I pointed out before, the 2006 CL was not won by the players who won in Pep's era. Puyol and Valdés were starters that season, Iniesta was the 12th most used player, Xavi and Messi missed a lot to injury and were 16th and 17th most used. Then in the 2008 European championship, it was Xavi, Iniesta, and Puyol. No other Barcelona player was called up.
This is where the distinction between good players and system players is relevant. Akanji, Ake and Stones play competent limited roles within a well refined system. Take them out and put them in another team and they're average players still.
I thought Yorke and Cole were a given so no need to mention them. In combinng the teams Solskjaer probably would not make it nor Sheringham. Who would Neville, Brown and Johnson kick out of the squad assuming we are playing the modern possession based system with 1 forward? Nobody plays 4-4-2 anymore.
I appreciate your honesty
Xavi would have played a lot if not for his cruciate as he was an important cog. Xavi made 20 apps in 2006 despite getting injured a lot, having made over 40 apps from 2003-05, each season and even won Spanish player of the year in 2005. Iniesta made 48 apps in 2006, including a full 90 mins in the CL quarters and Semi's then 45 in the final, but apparently he did not contribute
. He then played close to 50 apps every other year before Pep, he was seen as their rising star with Messi. By 2008 (pre Pep) Messi was ranked 3rd best player in the world, but I guess Pep inherited bunch of nobodies who had zero experience of success on the big stage....he made those boys, Messi includedBut he didn't.
This is the (bad) rhetorical trick a few are trying to do here.
Ranieri already did that, Do you have him as your greatest coach ever?
Yeah he should go on and manage Leeds United and win the Premier League with them so that armchair managers on internet forums recognize him as one of the best ever.
I wonder how many of those who make such statements have Ranieri as their best coach of all time given he took Leicester to the trophy
So….I was kind of referring to what SAF did with an average side in 2013. I’m not sure Pep could do that, based on the established sides he’s managed, and no doubt he has improved them. I guess we’ll never know as it’s very unlikely City will turn into the united team a decade ago.
What a stupid thing to say
Pep is way past this point of his career now, so what's the point ?
Going off the thread title, we’re talking about Pep being the greatest manger of all time. In Peps time as a manager he has inherited quality teams, and made them better. He is brilliant at applying his tactics with quality players but from memory he has never had to build a team from scratch with a tight budget. SAF on the other hand has built, pretty much from scratch, two world class teams (1999,2008) and even won the premiership with a very average team. He’s done this with limited funds compared with the riches Pep as had.
Exactly. Even Chelsea never had this level of doping back then. There's almost no risk of getting it wrong.
Are you kidding? That would have been the easiest of the 3
Why could Tata Martino not win a single trophy with a front 6 of Busquets, Xavi, Fabregas, Iniesta, Messi and Neymar if it's so easy?
None of the footballers would pay any attention to you.
I think there are ways of praising Alex Ferguson's abilities in management without trying to paint this picture where he's looking for coins under the couch and busking on the weekends to try and buy a footballer. He was managing Manchester United for feck's sake.
Definitely but he never spent silly. I think the perception of penny pinching Fergie was post Ronaldo and Tevez where we were fecking around with Michael Owen, Valencia, Obertan and Bebe. Oh and fecking Tom Cleverly in midfield. Also the way Fergie seemed affected by flops like Veron was very different in comparison to Chelsea and City at the time. Or Real Madrid for that matter.
Sorry I meant a tight budget compared to peps.
Good point. Nobody is saying Messi needs to go and prove he can do it at Dortmund before he is considered the GOAT, because he would be daft to move there.
This is the point I have been making. The best players play for the biggest clubs but managers have a different criteria apparently according to the Caf. Even Pep’s work at Barca is being questioned so much so that it looks like an agenda against the man. I understand the tribal nature of football though.
Exactly. A player can be called a GOAT playing good to a single team or two he is literally born in to - yet a great manager has to go around the world and manage a club that is poor and is looking to improve.
No but Pep left Barcelona, his true home, with their greatest ever squad(with Peak Messi) the moment Mourinho pipped him to the title and looked like they were getting even. Its the opposite of Fergie who saw off the one challenge after another.
This is not really true. You are just judging Spanish football by UK standards. Guardiola is one of their longest-serving managers.
What´s the difference? Fergie is anamoly yeah but other UK managers dont get that long. But Pep chose to leave. He wasnt forced out.
