Jesus. Players being considered old at 27 is metal
Salah is only just now dropping off this season
He was 32 last year
Mbuemo and Cunha have a long way to go yet before falling away
Jason Wilcox - Director of Football
- Thread starter reddevilchennai
- Start date
Salah is only just now dropping off this season
He was 32 last year
Mbuemo and Cunha have a long way to go yet before falling away
Yes and clearly the club were targeting them for their experience and 'point to prove' background.
Cunha having been at Atletico and RB Leipzig and just done ok, but determined to show he belongs as an elite player
Mbuemo having worked his way to an opportunity at a bigger club
Neither are on their way down, and both have a tonne of experience to help carry a side where needed.
Keep in mind the club finished 15th and the market would be difficult for players willing to build with the club who are capable of impacting now, we did really well.
Lets keep doing it then
What does this mean?
Our finances are gonna look a lot better soon
With UCL miney
And saving guaranteed 28M a season with Casemiro and Sancho departures
Additional potential saving with Rashford, Onana, Hojlund, Zirkzee and Ugarte out the door - 36M
With UCL miney
And saving guaranteed 28M a season with Casemiro and Sancho departures
Additional potential saving with Rashford, Onana, Hojlund, Zirkzee and Ugarte out the door - 36M
I was gonna say that some folks are very quick to write off new signings. These lads aren’t even through a full season yet (and Mbeumo had his disrupted). My only gripe is that we don’t have a winger who is comfortable going on the outside and flinging a few crosses into our basketball CF. But that can be rectified with an addition to the squad.
Dorgu, maybe?
Perhaps. We will have to see how he comes back from injury. He was a bit inconsistent with his crosses prior to that. But yeah, perhaps.
Look at those crosses that potter was doing against United. Only Bruno can cross like that at United that I’ve seen
That's because our squad building was so godawful in the past, as opposed to any failing of Wilcox. In the 5 seasons before he arrived, we spent about £800M in transfer fees, and the only players still in and around our first team are Casemiro, Martinez, Maguire and Bruno. Maybe Mount. Imagine we'd managed 2 to 3 quality players for each of those 5 seasons, now how would the squad look?
I agree. Would also help with a left fullback who can cross (David Raum!). I also think that a central midfielder who can cross well from the half space (particulary the right if we bring in a left winger) area would be nice. Bruno do this today, but it would be nice to see him attacking the box when someone makes that cross.
But that's the past and you will never have an 100% hit rate with transfers. I'd say we did this summer in terms of players, but I think our squad still has gaps and more gaps are coming with the likes of Casemiro leaving and we want to replace the likes of Ugarte and Zirkzee - whilst also adding depth. Is adding 2-3 players going to cut it when we're going to be playing way more than 40 games next season? I'm not so sure.
Agreed. We do not target players with the technical level that was on display last night, yet somehow pay higher fees for them. Even though they are at ages where they are unlikely to improve.
What is the point of getting back into the CL if we don't appreciate the qualities that are needed to win the competition?
Its not the past, its the present. Those decisions defined our current squad, just as our current decisions will define our squad over the next 2 to 5 years. There is simply no way to assemble a 15 to 20 man squad capable of challenging for the PL and CL in 2 to 3 years. That's the fantasy we chased for a decade. So, yes, returning to the CL will be a challenge, both in quality and depth, but that's the price we pay for repeatedly splurging instead of building.
1) its easier to sign better players from a position of strength
2) Premier League tax, even more for Man Utd since we have little leverage
3) we targetted experienced players because the target was to go from 15th to top 6
4) Bayern and PSG don't play Premier League, they don't have to compete within their leagues for the best talents willing to live in their countries and don't have the challenge of 15 other clubs being a threat week in week out, if not on a technical level, then athletically resulting in high intensity and transition football and set pieces you have to prepare for in your squad construction
Then surely the smart strategy is to look beyond the PL, especially if your budget is limited and the players you are signing for exorbitant amounts are not world beaters, are not moving you beyond a team that primarily thrives in transition and are at an age where their skillset will not improve.
Yeah, but what I'm saying is so do the decisions we're making in the present. If we can't make a PL and CL challenging squad in 2-3 years, then we should pivot away from Cunha and Mbuemo for 65/70m type signings this summer or at least should really only be one we spend big on. We know Bruno will need replacing in that time, we have to rebuild a midfield, CBs and FBs. There's a lot to lay the ground for, instead of being slowly additive.
Not if your goal is to get immediate success in the Premier League. I.e. going from 15th, to say, 3rd.
Shorter settling time, more likely to succeed.. etc etc.
Champions League now means more revenue, hopefully more commercial activity and more options for signings. That means more leverage in terms of walking away and outside of midfield where experience is essential, we can look at younger profiles for other recruitment priorities.
They are good IF you have one top class winger who has over 20 G/A. Player (like Bruno) who delivers week after week. BBC, Tevez/Rooney/Ronaldo, Salah/Mane/Firmino or MSN type of trios are generational thing and i don't expect that we have that but one winger must be a game changer if you want to win trophies.
We don't have that. We have 3 wingers who are good players and i am glad that we have them but they are tier bellow highest class of players. Amad lacks final product, Mbeumo is patchy player and Cunha is not even a winger.
It means just what it says. For £130m you’d expect more. But they were both bought off the back of seasons they were never replicating so it was all a bit predictable really.
Still surprised we have not gired a proven, world class DoF yet
I don’t think they exists. It’s just a bunch of guys good at their job. It’s not like they rotated between the top clubs like managers.
Who’s the Pep Guardiola of DoF?
I don’t think they exists. It’s just a bunch of guys good at their job. It’s not like they rotated between the top clubs like managers.
Who’s the Pep Guardiola of DoF?
Luis Campos is one of the highest rated ones. And believe it or not, he was desperate to come to us a few years ago, prior to going to PSG. In typical United fashion, we decided we had other ideas though, and he has since rebuilt PSG into possibly the best team around.
Think we have to give them another season to fully judge.
They've come into a team that finished 15th the year before, certainly Mbeumo not playing his actual position, their manager then gets sacked. That's on top of it being their first season at a massive club.
They've still done ok/pretty good.
I wouldn't be surprised, assuming we get the CM signings right, if their stats improve next year.
A DoF like anyone, needs some time. You can't judge their signings too quickly. Unless maybe they're objectively a clear disaster e.g Fellaini being the sole summer signing.
But that's not the case with Wilcox.
Yeah maybe. But I think some fans need a reality check when it comes to their own knowledge of who is or isn't a good DoF. We haven't really got a clue.
Haven’t we seen enough evidence by now with cases like Dan Ashworth that the best option for something is not always the best option for a given club? Alonso was the best managerial candidate around and yet he didn’t last a season at Madrid. Fit and the ability to gain but in from people above and below him is a much bigger factor than ability in a vacuum for a lot of these executive level jobs.
I’ve explained quite often that Campos was on the brink of getting sacked before the PSG vs City game of last season and that he was responsible for a lot of deadwood at PSG too.
A good DoF is the same as a good coach: being at the right place at the right time with the right team.
And there’s already been endless debates about most DOFs inability to replicate success they had at a club to another club
Agree. A lot of it is situational.
I also think, at the big clubs, it's not that hard to make a team competitive for the big trophies.
The DoF doesn't need to be a genius. He just needs to be sensible.
We know this because every year it's pretty much the same handful of teams winning everything. It's relatively straightforward for them.
The problem is we've made such a mess of it that it's created the impression it's incredibly difficult to be there or thereabouts.
At a big club, with everything in your favour, just don't be absolutely terrible at your job and the club will be ok.
Agree
Dan Ashworth was a big picture strategy guy who worked through other people.
Given input from Berrada, and other senior Ineos people on football side, and committee members on Stadium side he didn't have as good a fit once he came through the door. The club decided more technical management was needed and hired experts in football, recruitment, medical, scouting and academy reporting into other technical guys, rather than the 'planner'
He was right about Amorim in the end though
We've also scored 3rd most goals in the league, it's a low scoring league right now
There are still bottlenecks in this team. Quite a few, actually. So potentially ending the season in 3rd place is pretty impressive.
The fact is, last summer was the best transfer window we've had in 20 years. All the signings have proved to be valuable members of the first team.
Hopefully, Mr. Wilcox can follow that up with some more quality signings this summer.
The fact is, last summer was the best transfer window we've had in 20 years. All the signings have proved to be valuable members of the first team.
Hopefully, Mr. Wilcox can follow that up with some more quality signings this summer.
We have. I don't think that says too much because as you say it's a low scoring league and Casmerio somewhat randomly becoming a goalscoring midfielder has helped with that.
But there's no doubt the summer forward signings have been a huge improvement on what we had before.
And I think they'll get better.
Even Zirkzee. It hasn't worked but I can at least see why we signed him. That's important to me. Not every signing will work but you have to be able to see some reasoning behind it. There should be visible reasoning if the DoF and his team are working properly.
Yeah pick another one. Everyone knows Luis Campos and I’m pretty sure his first appoint was the pick the manager he worked with at Lille which was a major failure.
So why is he so great if he can’t even get is first managerial appointments right? I’m being facetious, but give the DoF time. It’s not the same role as being a manager and quite frankly the majority of us don’t have a clue what a good DoF looks like.
You couldn’t even name one that hasn’t been publised to you.
Also signed a whole heap of dross for PSG too which is fine if your budget doesn't have limits
He'd have been lynched by fans on here for failing to win the CL for however long. He'd get a season or twos grace and then the knives would be out. We've made mistakes but we are far quicker in fixing them. We are trying to be a lot more sensible. I like it. Pick up the best players in your league that you can afford and take punts on talent from abroad. Replace underperforming players before their value completely tanks. Don't hand out terrible contracts. It's not rocket science. Without toxiitcy and absentee owners our budget, scope and setup managed sensibly and consistently makes us a CL club every season barring a total disaster.
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Agreed, fans and media hype up DOFs based on a team's success and transfers but then their stock can drop dramatically. Ultimately, I think we do not know enough of what they do to make informed decisions. They do not simply sit around all day dreaming of transfers like many fans feel they do. I remember when Ashworth was interviewed on TV it felt as though he was being asked about his job as a transfer guru and he seemed a bit awkward in his responses because that isn't really what his job is but had to just try and answer.
Monchi was the hot super DOF a while ago and then he ended up bouncing around clubs because he wasn't deemed as good as thought. We hired Ashworth because everyone hyped him up to the heavens only for Ratcliffe to say he wasn't quite as advertised basically. Campos had PSG fans wanting him gone due to signings.
Most DOFs that are considered good are not some special humans that graduated from the DOF school with top marks, most top clubs hire ex-players and they grow and learn in the role bringing consistency to club strategy.
I don’t really have an axe to grind with Wilcox aside from Ugarte. My real problem is with Berrada who seems to be appointing his buddies so he can effectively call the shots. And he’s been a disaster, let’s be honest. Carrick has absolutely saved his bacon this season. And the league being so shite of course. If we’d sacked Amorim in the summer as any sane board would’ve we could’ve and probably should’ve been in a title race this season.
Maybe I missed part of this conversation pal but I was answering your question. I’m not sure what you’re on about to be honest but he’s considered one of the best, along with the guys that have been involved with Barca, such as Begiristain. Then there’s loads more who have been successful. If you think every DoF has 100% hit rate then you’re a fool.
Absolute bollocks. Nobody is expecting us to win the CL any time soon. Do you think he’s a failure because he couldn’t help the likes of Lille win the CL? He helped both them and Monaco win the league titles. And he went to PSG and played a part in them winning their first CL.
You haven’t missed nothing mate. I’m just making the point football fans know frig all what a successful DoF looks like unless the football team is winning the league or a major European trophy.
You just kind of fell inline with that.
DoF’s don’t have a 100 perfect hit rate which is why those thinking Wilcox is useless at his job are fools.
If somebody builds a good team, or has a smaller club punching above their weight by buying cheap gems, who then get picked up by top cubs for huge money, then it’s pretty easy to say who has done a good job. Do you disagree with that? Is not just on field success but also the business aspect in which they have an impact.
I wasn’t aware of the previous discussion about Wilcox, I just saw you ask a question about who is considered the Pep of DoFs and I gave an answer. Although maybe he’s more a Fergie of DoFs as he took smaller clubs and pushed aside the big boys in the league, before then cementing a top club at the pinnacle of football for their first ever time.
You said I couldn’t name another DoF unless I’ve been told by the media. I could name others, but then you will just say I’ve googled them anyway. But it’s a moot point, because these days, if a DoF does a good job then the media and fans are all well aware of it.
To add to the Wilcox conversation though, my argument to you would be that he’s never worked in that role at the highest level, apart from a brief stint at Southampton. And I may be wrong but I think they got relegated whilst he was there? But obviously, how much of that is down to him is probably very little. But did he find any good players for them? I don’t know the answer, but I do know that Southampton used to have really good youth recruitment and I’ve not seen them produce much in recent years. Obviously he could turn out great, but there’s a load of red flags already. He advised on the ETH situation and got that drastically wrong. He signed Ugarte when even I could point out every flaw in his game at the time, along with many other posters who weren’t in full on muppet mode. All of those concerns were proven correct, but he missed it. Other than that he’s not really pulled out any signing that is deemed a really good find so far, bar maybe Lammens. It’s been a short tenure, so the jury is still out on all signings bar Ugarte.
And the biggest issue was him apparently meddling in Amorims tactics. He knew what Amorim was when he hired him, and he tried to get involved and change what he is as a coach. I don’t think that is a good look, and if the Carrick interim didn’t work out then Wilcox would have been hounded out of OT by now. Fans were turning on him until he hired an ex player to take the heat off. He also tried to get involved in the tactical setup of ETH too.
And whether you believe the word of some ex players who has shared a room with him, he was going around telling people how he is basically the manager of United and how he can’t help but get involved in the managers role. Personally I think he’s a clown, but we might just have deep enough pockets to mask his decisions.
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