It is tiring pretending that there is not a right way to 'support' a club - there absolutely is
- Thread starter Wumminator
- Start date
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Nik (@Rood) and Imran (@Annihilate Now!) discuss United's fantastic win away against Athletic Club in the semi-final of the Europa League.
They also pick out the positives of United's 4-3 loss away at Brentford, and Nik reviews a day out at Old Trafford watching Manchester United Women qualify for the Champions League.
It absolutely depends on context. If we’re posting after a ten game winning spree, those points are silly. If we are doing awfully, those points can be justified.
Anyone having a go at a 19 year old for having a poor match is an idiot. Most 19 year olds aren't even near the first-team in the P.L - so he is allowed to have a lot more bad days than seasoned pros
in fairness - we had many disgraceful performances at United, how often did you see Ferguson having a rant like that ?
Yes but what you write here is a perfectly acceptable criticism - I dont agree with it, but it's possible to discuss. But the worst people here would write - Ole is incompetent or he is a fraud. You could argue that he is not good enough to take us to the top, but clearly its impossible to be incompetent and still take a team like ours above City and Liverpool in the table.
How have people been roped in by this 
Kudos @Wumminator you've still got that old wumming spark after all these years. Thank you too, this thread made for some hilarious lunchtime reading. Just the tonic for what's going to be a very busy working week.
Kudos @Wumminator you've still got that old wumming spark after all these years. Thank you too, this thread made for some hilarious lunchtime reading. Just the tonic for what's going to be a very busy working week.
As entertaining as the rant is, he also regretted it almost immediately and apologised to the squad the next day.
People complain about throwing players under the bus. This would be throwing them under the space shuttle crawler vehicle.
Personally, I don't understand the people complaining about the process under Ole.
I came of age during that 2003-2006 run under Fergie, and initially joined this site in 2004 (though I was lurking since 2003). We sold Beckham and Veron and were trying to phase out Keane, Giggs etc with people like Bellion and Djemba-Djemba and thought Tim Howard might be the guy to finally replace Schmeichel. We also got some skinny little runt from Portfugal that summer. It didn't work and first Arsenal and Chelsea just took it to another level which we couldn't at the time reach. But this place was never toxic back then like it is now. We reacted to defeats matter of factly and didn't think the world was ending. We knew as a fanbase that we were building something, and even when it got really bad, like the 2005 CL group KO, or Rob Smyth's shredding his legacy at every turn article, this forum was in the thrall of something akin to a siege mentality. Where has that gone?
The rebuild then was a lot easier than this one now, and after 5 years of aimlessness, we're actually looking at building something that is for the long-term and sustainable, and what's more, it's one of our own who is doing it. That should be the perfect formula for people on this board to give the man his backing at every step, but somehow it isn't and I just don't understand.
He's done it under very difficult circumstances, with a board who have only ever backed him half heartedly despite him reaching every target that they had set him. He's also taken us from 6th, to 3rd and currently on to 2nd. We're closer now to the title (even if we take on board that Liverpool have dropped off their usual levels) than we have ever been before (fun fact; we were closer to the title in terms of points under LvG than we ever were under Jose, seeing how so many of the Ole outers and Jose acolytes like to talk about points totals). He's developed our style of play from the turgid stuff we used to see under Moyes, LvG and Jose. He's also made use of the kids and developed the talent that was already at the club and being wasted, and he's bought well when he's had the need and opportunity to do so.
Seriously, what more do the people who doubt him want? Just give the man in charge the benefit of the doubt and see where it leads, what is the harm in that? If it doesn't work out, then so be it, but if there's one person I am going to be willing to give that extra bit of rope to, it's Ole, and I have no qualms or concerns in doing so, or admitting to that.
I came of age during that 2003-2006 run under Fergie, and initially joined this site in 2004 (though I was lurking since 2003). We sold Beckham and Veron and were trying to phase out Keane, Giggs etc with people like Bellion and Djemba-Djemba and thought Tim Howard might be the guy to finally replace Schmeichel. We also got some skinny little runt from Portfugal that summer. It didn't work and first Arsenal and Chelsea just took it to another level which we couldn't at the time reach. But this place was never toxic back then like it is now. We reacted to defeats matter of factly and didn't think the world was ending. We knew as a fanbase that we were building something, and even when it got really bad, like the 2005 CL group KO, or Rob Smyth's shredding his legacy at every turn article, this forum was in the thrall of something akin to a siege mentality. Where has that gone?
The rebuild then was a lot easier than this one now, and after 5 years of aimlessness, we're actually looking at building something that is for the long-term and sustainable, and what's more, it's one of our own who is doing it. That should be the perfect formula for people on this board to give the man his backing at every step, but somehow it isn't and I just don't understand.
He's done it under very difficult circumstances, with a board who have only ever backed him half heartedly despite him reaching every target that they had set him. He's also taken us from 6th, to 3rd and currently on to 2nd. We're closer now to the title (even if we take on board that Liverpool have dropped off their usual levels) than we have ever been before (fun fact; we were closer to the title in terms of points under LvG than we ever were under Jose, seeing how so many of the Ole outers and Jose acolytes like to talk about points totals). He's developed our style of play from the turgid stuff we used to see under Moyes, LvG and Jose. He's also made use of the kids and developed the talent that was already at the club and being wasted, and he's bought well when he's had the need and opportunity to do so.
Seriously, what more do the people who doubt him want? Just give the man in charge the benefit of the doubt and see where it leads, what is the harm in that? If it doesn't work out, then so be it, but if there's one person I am going to be willing to give that extra bit of rope to, it's Ole, and I have no qualms or concerns in doing so, or admitting to that.
That is easy. You are a true fan, if you criticize/mock the same players/manager that I do. If you start criticizing players that I have my bias for, then you are just a moaning, agenda poster who does not know how to truly support the team.
But when people don't share the same faith as you, and that's all this is, faith, you are have previously tried (like OP) to silence those people.
It's just another form of top-reddiness that is paraded as fact, when in reality its just your biased opinion. You constantly absolve the manager by blaming the board for his shortcomings. Is that level of criticism allowed? Because despite how you, WUMs or sammsky try and spin it, they are still the club so by your definition deserve your unwavering support.
While no one condones the name calling, those posters are in the absolute minority yet anyone who has doubts over Ole are immediately pigeon holed as knee-jerk reactionary millennials.
OP has a sensitive point in extreme cases, but I wouldn't require from this place to become oasis of happiness and kumbaya after Pool winning the league. It simply won't work that way.
Things like mood and confidence in the team or the whole club for that matter will eventually get better with football progress... if not, then mods will start banning scousers, again. It's the best solution possible.
On a serious note Wumminator was right about Mourinho in the end. Surely not the right man to work with Woodward and board on transfer strategies in a long shot. I can only hope Ole will last longer, or the managers after him.
Things like mood and confidence in the team or the whole club for that matter will eventually get better with football progress... if not, then mods will start banning scousers, again. It's the best solution possible.
On a serious note Wumminator was right about Mourinho in the end. Surely not the right man to work with Woodward and board on transfer strategies in a long shot. I can only hope Ole will last longer, or the managers after him.
Ahhhhh, so basically Wumminator between June 2016 - May 2018.
You lost your username, because you were a negative feck remember? Or has that slipped your mind Twigginator?
What now?
He means that on RAWK moderators harshly clamp down on any sort of dissent from the official line. He wants the same system here, with him in charge of defining the aforementioned official line.
A lot of people are very much attracted to authoritarianism outside of politics, too.
I don't necessarily agree with those opinions either, although they are justifiable to a degree - or at least they were a month into the season when the situation was concerning. Like Wum says above, context is everything.
I don't believe there is a right or wrong way to express your support for the club. So long as your opinions are sincere and with the interests of the club firmly at heart, you are supporting the club in the right way. Whether those opinions are negative or positive does not come into it.
What's the point of being a football fan if you can't tell your manager to feck off?
As far as I can tell, "fan" is not short for "reasonably, measuredly supportive".
So it seems to me that the expectation you have for the kind of utterances and behaviour that would be on display on an online forum of football fans is completely off, if you have a problem with them being over the top, petulant, moaning, and constantly expressing wrong, exaggerated, hysterical, unreasonable, wildly inconsistent and blatantly contradictory stuff. That's what this is about, isn't it? We're supposed to keep it together in real life, not here. We need to cut everyone some slack, really.
As far as I can tell, "fan" is not short for "reasonably, measuredly supportive".
So it seems to me that the expectation you have for the kind of utterances and behaviour that would be on display on an online forum of football fans is completely off, if you have a problem with them being over the top, petulant, moaning, and constantly expressing wrong, exaggerated, hysterical, unreasonable, wildly inconsistent and blatantly contradictory stuff. That's what this is about, isn't it? We're supposed to keep it together in real life, not here. We need to cut everyone some slack, really.
The forum deteriorated because right from the start with Ole, people were prepared to stick by him however much of a shit show he put on because it was Ole. It almost become an obsession with some. People definitely wouldn't of been as charitable towards the manager if it was someone else.
Now things seem to be on the up (relatively speaking) it's as if people who supported Ole from the get go want to rub peoples noses in it and say they were right all along as these types of threads prove which is also a reason the forum is deteriorating. Maybe deteriorating is too strong a word but it certainly does bring conflict because BOTH sets of groups are as bad as each other.
Yes. You are right. Clearly the forum deteriorated because of too much positivity. That clearly drove people away.
I'm still waiting for someone to explain to me exactly what being a true fan consists of.
That's what this discussion was originally about, no?
That's what this discussion was originally about, no?
RAWK proxy banned me years ago because my views on Liverpool as a club did not align with their own. I was displeased to say the least.
I thought they were a shitty club so why can't I say so?
Meh.
Supporting the club however you find fit.
The problem becomes when some fans think they are more of a fan because they don't agree with your opinion.
Silencing people? Get over yourself
it's an internet fans forum ffs, not downtown Baghdad under Saddam! If you're getting pulled up on the inconsistencies of your arguments, it's not because we think you're saying a potentially dangerous point to our argument, it's because the arguments you are making aren't very good and can be dismantled, which is exactly what I'm doing and will continue to do in the future. If you don't like it and want to have an echo chamber, please feel free to block the offending posts and posters and you can continue to live in hope that the manager of the club you claim to 'support' fails. Not sure how that entails support, but you do you hun.Again with the strawmans - I've given Ole criticism when it's due. Multiple times in fact (most recently after the CL exit), but unlike people who want Ole gone, I don't extrapolate one bad performance, or one bad result in to a cardinal sin and want him gone off the back of it. A serious question here, is your standard that we never lose or draw a game? Do you expect us to be perfect in every game? Because in this season of all seasons, that isn't going to to happen, and it never happens in any season. We've accrued the third most points in the period since Ole first took over a team that was floundering and in 6th place. Arteta and Lampard haven't gotten close to getting to that level of consistency in their comparative periods and neither has Rodgers who took over at a similar time at Leicester. Moreover, the progress has accelerated, rather than decelerated in the last year with our PPG being close to title contending (and that too, with a squad that is nowhere near fully formed). If you stand back and consider the season as a whole, rather than 3 or so games, or even just the last game, you can see the progress in black and white. So please tell me where you have the doubts beyond the surface level, asinine arguments of "patterns of play" etc, because honestly speaking, we were similarly focused on individual players and moments of magic towards the end under Fergie, but I never saw that tear the caf in half like this issue has done under Ole.
The other issue is the inconsistency of the arguments being made. It's gone from performances being decent but results being shit, to results being decent and performances being poor. Ole is literally the only manager I've seen where having a good big game record was a stick to beat him with, with people saying that "anyone would be able to do it with the players he has", if that was the case, why couldn't Jose and to a lesser extent LvG get close to him with predominantly the same set of players?
Also, another serious question and please answer truthfully, were you even lurking on here in that 2003-2006 period to say that what I saw was "just my opinion and not a fact" or are you again, just talking out of your arse? I make no bones about giving Ole extra credit but if I'm honest, he hasn't needed to dip into that credit line as yet because he's more than done his job well in the circumstances. Jose had a meltdown when he had the same window in 2019, for instance.
We are a young team who is still growing with 3, arguably 4, large gaping holes in the first XI - that's almost half the team right there. In what world are you expecting us to be where we currently are? I've always said it, and nothing I've seen has changed my mind - give Ole what he wants and needs to complete the squad and see where he ends up. In the interim period before he completes the squad, he needs to attain Top 4 every season, and as long as he does that, his job should be assured. If, at the end of that squad building process, he wins the title, great. Keep him on and continue to back him. If he doesn't then we can let him go and wish him all the best. Is any of that, in any way unreasonable to you and your sensibilities?
Busby lived at a time when the options of bringing players from outside the club were virtually non existent. Clubs weren't as rich, the FA wasn't very keen on foreign players taking British jobs and the EPL didn't pay enough for many players to bother leaving their country for it. Busby in himself was a revolutionist. He was a former City player who was managing United, who went on challenging the FA so that United could play in the European cup and had given the thumbs up of us signing Di Stefano. Ah and I almost forgot. He personally supported a group of cash strapped 'Johnny Foreigners' to set up the first Manchester United supporters club outside the UK. I am member of such supporters club.
You ever been to OT @Wumminator ? Since you exemplify how it is to support the club would I be a real fan to suggest that we fix the roof? Or maybe find a way to install a screen & take the stadium into the 21st century? Or would it that take away from the sentiment & romance of the club?
You don’t support a club for its stadium ffs.
But if I were Ed I would only take surveyor information on the project from a top red tbh.
That's just nonsense, most of the Ole in posts on this forum are logical. I have said since he came in that he isn't being judged as a legend, he's being judged as a Man Utd manager and amongst reasonable fans, he's done a brilliant job so far. You seem to be ignoring the absolutely awful team and atmosphere Ole inherited from the toxic one.
Basically in a nutshell it’s about supporting your club through thick and thin.
Not being a weak b*tch and moaning all day every day on a forum because we aren’t winning the league in total ignorance of the fact we dropped in quality MASSIVELY since SAF left and that it will take time to get back there, in the most competitive league in the world with the two best managers in the world directly above us.
It’s not about ignoring CLEAR signs of progress under Ole through pure snobbish mentality, because your mate in the pub winds you up calling him useless and out of his depth.
It’s about having a bit of a backbone, like our away fans who sing not only when we are winning.
I genuinely couldn’t give a shit about a large screen tv at Old Trafford.
Yeah I think this has been made clear numerous times in the thread.
Great post and that about summarises most of the feelings amongst the reasonable fans on this forum. Unfortunately, this sort of sensible rationale is drowned out all too frequently on these boards by miserable, moaning 'fans'.Silencing people? Get over yourself
Again with the strawmans - I've given Ole criticism when it's due. Multiple times in fact (most recently after the CL exit), but unlike people who want Ole gone, I don't extrapolate one bad performance, or one bad result in to a cardinal sin and want him gone off the back of it. A serious question here, is your standard that we never lose or draw a game? Do you expect us to be perfect in every game? Because in this season of all seasons, that isn't going to to happen, and it never happens in any season. We've accrued the third most points in the period since Ole first took over a team that was floundering and in 6th place. Arteta and Lampard haven't gotten close to getting to that level of consistency in their comparative periods and neither has Rodgers who took over at a similar time at Leicester. Moreover, the progress has accelerated, rather than decelerated in the last year with our PPG being close to title contending (and that too, with a squad that is nowhere near fully formed). If you stand back and consider the season as a whole, rather than 3 or so games, or even just the last game, you can see the progress in black and white. So please tell me where you have the doubts beyond the surface level, asinine arguments of "patterns of play" etc, because honestly speaking, we were similarly focused on individual players and moments of magic towards the end under Fergie, but I never saw that tear the caf in half like this issue has done under Ole.
The other issue is the inconsistency of the arguments being made. It's gone from performances being decent but results being shit, to results being decent and performances being poor. Ole is literally the only manager I've seen where having a good big game record was a stick to beat him with, with people saying that "anyone would be able to do it with the players he has", if that was the case, why couldn't Jose and to a lesser extent LvG get close to him with predominantly the same set of players?
Also, another serious question and please answer truthfully, were you even lurking on here in that 2003-2006 period to say that what I saw was "just my opinion and not a fact" or are you again, just talking out of your arse? I make no bones about giving Ole extra credit but if I'm honest, he hasn't needed to dip into that credit line as yet because he's more than done his job well in the circumstances. Jose had a meltdown when he had the same window in 2019, for instance.
We are a young team who is still growing with 3, arguably 4, large gaping holes in the first XI - that's almost half the team right there. In what world are you expecting us to be where we currently are? I've always said it, and nothing I've seen has changed my mind - give Ole what he wants and needs to complete the squad and see where he ends up. In the interim period before he completes the squad, he needs to attain Top 4 every season, and as long as he does that, his job should be assured. If, at the end of that squad building process, he wins the title, great. Keep him on and continue to back him. If he doesn't then we can let him go and wish him all the best. Is any of that, in any way unreasonable to you and your sensibilities?
Another good post, agreed.
Back when I was old enough to understand what supporting a club means, the Serie A was the richest league by far. AC Milan had the best squad at the time and in my opinion the best squad ever assembled. They had the likes of Baresi and Maldini at the back while we had Brucey and Pally. The difference in terms of quality was quite striking. Not only that, I used to spend summers shitting in my pants at the prospect of Italian clubs coming knocking at our door to poach our players. United might be the big spenders now but back in the day we couldn't even afford matching Batistuta's salary at Fiorentina. So if success was everything then I would have supported them. Take Juventus as an example. They had been dominating football for frigging 6 consecutive decades by now. You can bet your house that those bastards will be dominating their league for the next 6 decades.
So no, success is not everything. A dip in form can and will happen. However that doesn't mean allowing people to take United on a massive ride. United is a giant, we've got the fans, we've got the money and we've got a great academy. We shouldn't be anywhere near to were we are now. Bad decisions are taken on a yearly basis and money get thrown to the bin. That pisses me off big time for two reasons. First of all because if Sir Alex was allowed to tap on that wealth then we would have won double the CLs we won. Secondly because I hate people taking my club for a ride and the very people I love ie the fans. However there's a thing that pisses me off more then that and these are the fans who agree with all that. I can't stand people who excuse the club's cock ups at every opportunity or feel sorry for poor JLingz whose been stealing a living at this club. That irks me big time.
Regarding why I support United, well, the reality is that its directly linked to the very thing that pisses me off. We've got a great club with great people around and great fans. I was lucky to meet many United players all of which were so down to earth that you think that there your mates. Fans are pretty much the same. I assure you its not like that at other clubs. Juventus for example are an A Class arsehole club from top to bottom. Its feckin full Corpo Cyberpunk there. So I absolutely hate people taking the mick out of these genuine people who worry that the player who had been taking them for a ride for 5 years might have issues or the player who will soon be entitled to a testimonial game after a career of doing feck all might end up without a job if we ever show our back to him. They don't deserve that.
Oh well, rant over
Some genuinely great posts on this page of this thread. Thank you guys, it genuinely makes me feel a lot better.
Edit - @devilish not you.
Edit - @devilish not you.
Some genuinely great posts on this page of this thread. Thank you guys, it genuinely makes me feel a lot better.
Edit - @devilish not you.
good. We look forward for your next copy and paste thread in 3 months time.
I find it funny when I hear fans talk about how toxic it is on here. In real life, I have conversations with Manutd fans and some of them are even more negative than posters on here. The match day thread can be toxic but you're not meant to take that too serious, imagine 70,000 fans in OT typing their live reaction during the game at the same time, that's all that is.
Twitter is the place that has the worst 'fans', the Instagram meme pages aren't much better but the sort of unfiltered carnage seen there isn't even remotely replicated here.
Posters here have strong opinions on both sides of the fence and with a manager like Ole that fluctuates from brilliant to woeful fairly often, its natural that there is such a divide on the caf right now.
Twitter is the place that has the worst 'fans', the Instagram meme pages aren't much better but the sort of unfiltered carnage seen there isn't even remotely replicated here.
Posters here have strong opinions on both sides of the fence and with a manager like Ole that fluctuates from brilliant to woeful fairly often, its natural that there is such a divide on the caf right now.
It’s clearly a WUM and a LOT have been sucked in.
The OP actively started threads and contributed to the negativity surrounding the last manager. It doesn’t really matter what your perceived reasoning was.
It can only be a WUM with that in mind. I don’t think it’s worth the 9 page argument.
The OP actively started threads and contributed to the negativity surrounding the last manager. It doesn’t really matter what your perceived reasoning was.
It can only be a WUM with that in mind. I don’t think it’s worth the 9 page argument.
That's a strawman. We are, and indeed have been for seven years, very far from being perfect in every game. No one expects that yet people keep getting challenged with this ridiculous line even while we only ever fight for top 4 year after year. And regarding your Fergie question: remember the static, slow motion zombie passing thread? People did question the quality of performances in the latter years of Fergie reign, and I think rightly so: the decline started there, we simply didn't do enough, weren't proactive enough in preserving our status as one of the best teams in the world, for whatever reason.
Nobody wants Arteta or Lampard to take over United so that's sort of a moot point. Lampard isn't rated by... anyone, really, at least on the Caf. Arteta has his backers, oddly enough, but not a lot of them. Rodgers doesn't really belong in this conversation as he manages a club with the fraction of the resources available to the manager of Chelsea or Manchester United. And no one really wants him either, though that's because of the Liverpool connection rather than anything else. Well, and maybe because of him being a right tosser with the envelope nonsense and whatnot.
I'm not even sure what you mean here. Van Gaal had a points-per-game record of 1.81, Mourinho's was 1.97. Solskjaer's right now is 1.9. He's right in the middle between the two. Or do you mean their big game records? Because Van Gaal's wasn't bad and Ole's certainly, ahem, regressed to the mean this season.
And I always felt it was slightly disingenuous to say that Ole had inherited a crumbling team that languished in 6th. It was a team that had finished second just six months before he took over, with 81 points. And after over €300m spent, after losing only one key player of that 2017/18 team (Lukaku), we still look unlikely to match that 81 point season. We're on course for 78 as of now - and that's still decent and I'd be happy enough with it come the end of the season. But let's not pretend it's somehow baffling and outlandish to have little faith in Solskjaer's ability to take this team to the next level. He's done an OK job so far, stabilised the club after the toxicity of Mourinho, and made one inspired signing in Bruno Fernandes. Our performances are still a bit rubbish more often than not, and almost invariably awful if Bruno isn't on the pitch.
So yeah, being critical and unsure about Ole doesn't, as you suggest, stem from extrapolating one bad result. Quite the opposite: it's the refusal to extrapolate from decent runs of results because we've seen quite a few false dawns before, from Juanfield through Mourinho's big unbeaten run and 4-0s in 2017 all the way to Solskjaer's almost perfect record as a caretaker. All through these false dawns we almost always looked like a disjointed side and eventually the results regressed to the performances, as the pessimists always fear. The optimists believe that it will all click, if only we sign a couple more good players. And I really hope they're right, I just can't really believe it. But I don't think, contrary to what this thread suggests, that somehow makes me a worse supporter.
Not picking on you, but many posters think of their viewpoints as "CLEAR" proof or something or other. In their minds, they are very much correct and the proof is right there for everyone to see.
Like many Ole outers are very clear in their minds that Ole does not have the capabilities to take this team forward. The team blows hot and cold and loses some easy games. Though I view it as a signs of a team which is work in progress, I can perfectly understand that someone else is just getting more convinced that Ole is not the right man to continue.
Same about individual players. Many people are absolutely convinced about the likes of Maguire, Shaw, Martial, VdB etc. Not everyone would share their clarity.
@Wumminator moaned about Jose for ages. In his mind, he has given Jose enough time. But it was incessant moaning by definition.
Majority of the posters were utterly convinced that only Jose was at fault and that he was absolutely wrong about Pogba/Martial. After couple of years, the number of people so convinced about Pogba/Martial dwindled.
And yet you remain as precocious as ever.