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Keep saying that a few more times and maybe it'll become true eventually. Jesus fecking christ!I have been watching the serie A since van Basten was playing for AC Milan. That Milan was the best team I've ever seen. Then I further support my argument based on what I see with stats and of course what experts in the field say
Transfers fail all the time. There's around a 50-60% success rate in football which drops significantly at a club like ours that is poorly run. The reasons are various and include the human element. I canbmake a list of high level flops from veron to bergkamp right to shevchenko
But to blame all our woes to a 23 yr old substitute player who had just joined the club is crazy
Keep saying that a few more times and maybe it'll become true eventually. Jesus fecking christ!
Who cares whether you have been watching Milan since Van Basten. Did you watch Zirkzee? Did you think he was a striker who can come in and score goals? Or forget coming in and scoring goals, will he ever become a striker who will score a lot of goals? Because if you did watch him, like you watched Van Basten, you wouldn't think he was an out and out striker or will ever become one.
Sorry, but if they're great players, truly great, we wouldn't be able to ruin them.I feel bad for Zirkzee and the other signings. All we do is ruin good players. Bruno must have some sort of immunity. He's the only one to come here and not drop off.
Yes he definitely has a touch of Martial, Berbatov etc in regards to work rate and effort. He's been very underwhelming thus far as have most of our previous signings. I couldn't understand his signing at the time as his stats weren't great and even less now that I've seen him myself.I think he may be my least favourite signing in years based on his current showing.
Whatever your profession, if you have anything about you you at least pretend like you're trying in your first couple of months in a new job.
The lad is ambling about like he's been with us for about 4 years and is winding down his contract.
He makes Martial look like a workhorse.
The Antony pass was something was lack of coordination among team mates.. he has just arrived ..We need a compact shape for Zirkzee as we do for Mainoo. These aren't all day runners, they want to pass more. Zirkzee should've had support for that pass to no-one, he probably saw the player outside and expected him to move in that area as did I for a split second yet it didn't happen.
We can blame players but we and and club have to understand the players we have and buy. For our managers plan to work we'd need the most athletic firefighters from the last 10 years to make it all work.
An extreme example of passing and making all work is Pep's city without striker a couple of years ago scoring 100 goals.
Our play and goal scoring is pathetic and getting worse through our manager. Our fans expect Garnacho/Greenwood style individualism to make things happen but even that has its limits.
Honestly his performance annoyed me more than anything. Its not going to give me a definitive, rock solid opinion on the guy but it didn't improve my opinion of him.The comments are wild to me. He looks a really good, technical player.
The problem is people are judging him based on the player they want him to be rather than the player he is.
Zirkzee is not a goalscorer, he likely never will be. The closest player I can compare him to is Firminho, and Firminho was a fantastic player.
I do feel like sometimes him and Bruno take up similar positions, and Rashford looks better when he is on the pitch.
Yeah, we didn't need a different approach, we needed a goal scorer. Different approaches could be approached once your primary approach is working.I think he gives us a different approach to our game similarly to what we had when teddy came in for cole. However for zirkzee to be a success then our wingers need to score goals. For hojlund or even haaland to be a success then they need to produce more assists. The issue lie on our flanks + Bruno. They expect to play like Ronaldo used to do while producing similar goals and assists to a Quinton fortune
How many long term projects have we had in the last decade and how many have turned out to be good?So many fans are back to square one in evaluating each player here and now. Seems like patience is only available from our fanbase when it’s summer and no games are played.
This is a long term project ffs. We can’t buy Mbappe, so we buy players to develop. Patience, competition and regular gametime is what a player like Zirkzee needs to get to next level. It’s not guaranteed that he develops, but it’s very premature to just give him flame and judge him completely right now.
Yeah, we didn't need a different approach, we needed a goal scorer. Different approaches could be approached once your primary approach is working.
This idea that every new player needs 5 better players in different positions before they can be judged is unique to Manchester United. It has been used for countless players before in the last XI years.
How many long term projects have we had in the last decade and how many have turned out to be good?
I'd say the real problem has been listening to people like yourself, who ignore all evidence and just throw out the line "he needs time" at everyone.
Blindly giving more time to rubbish United employees has been our downfall
You have a completely new setup with a new CEO and a new sporting director. Both who have really good merits. They have a shitshow to untangle. The manager has shit tactics, plays a team with no rhythm and on top of that no one is really performing.How many long term projects have we had in the last decade and how many have turned out to be good?
I'd say the real problem has been listening to people like yourself, who ignore all evidence and just throw out the line "he needs time" at everyone.
Blindly giving more time to rubbish United employees has been our downfall
"Goal conversion rate better than Haaland" doesn't mean anything when it was amply clear that he doesn't have the touch or the hold-up play to lead the line for a top club. He is still young player and needs time to develop instead of being given the responsibility to lead the line at such a young age. The solution should have been to get a more experienced striker (goal scorer) and let Hojlund develop in the background. Instead, we got a non-striker as a starter/back-up for him and have struggled.That player was Hojlund. Last season he had a goal conversion rate which was better to Haaland's. The criticism surrounding Hojlund was that he was a goal scorer ie he loved to stay in the danger zone. Therefore whenever United struggled he ended up isolated upfront. Hence why we bought Zirkzee.
United's issue lie not on striker but on the forward line. Honestly I've never seen a forward line that is as selfish as ours. They barely ever drop deep to help out, they don't create enough and they constantly try to cut inside and score. Its ok to have 1 of those if he happened to be WC. SAF accommodated Ronaldo by surrounding him with runners (Tevez, Rooney and Park). But we don't have that. In terms of the EPL, Rashford (0), Mount (0), Eriksen (0) Garnacho (1), Bruno (1) and Amad (1) had less assists then Ndidi (4) alone. That's par to what Jadon Sancho, Nicolas Jackson and Bernardo Silva created on their own and 1 less assist to what Wolves LB Ait-Nouri created. Our captain Bruno and the new Messi Garnacho had created as many assists as our full backs and 1 less then Ait-Nouri, Digne and Rico Lewis. England's Darling Rashford had done worse than that. But hey let's blame the 23 year old squad player we just signed from Bologna whose yet to settle down instead.
"Goal conversion rate better than Haaland" doesn't mean anything when it was amply clear that he doesn't have the touch or the hold-up play to lead the line for a top club. He is still young player and needs time to develop instead of being given the responsibility to lead the line at such a young age. The solution should have been to get a more experienced striker (goal scorer) and let Hojlund develop in the background. Instead, we got a non-striker as a starter/back-up for him and have struggled.
The things you mention in your second para are a system problem more than the personnel problem. There is no way the attackers/wide-players are refusing to drop deep.
Adding the "new Bergkamp" to the mix surely wasn't the answer to our woes either.In terms of assists we've been in decline for many years. We went from 51 in 20-21 to 46 in 21-22 to 42 in 22-23 to 36 in 23-24. That's ridiculous stats compared to Liverpool (43, 71, 58, 60), City (55, 63, 69, 69) and even Spurs (50, 50, 46, 58). And that's not an anomaly. We've been struggling on that prior 20-21 as well18-19 (40) and 19-20 (43).
I agree that tactics needs to change but maybe its time to admit that the new Messi, the Rashy and the Portuguese Maradona are nowhere near as good as we portray them to be. Salary wise they're great and football wise they might have been great in the past (or in Garnacho's case in the future) but that's not good enough.
Adding the "new Bergkamp" to the mix surely wasn't the answer to our woes either.
I don't even think that Zirkzee is a bad player, its just that this was another unnecessary signing when we need a better profile striker in the team.
Perhaps the players are simply not good enough. The pressure of Manchester United can either elevate you or drown you. Most of the players who join United are given ample opportunity, given huge salaries and pampered with excuses. No other reputable big club does this - if Zhirkzee was at Real Madrid, he would be binned off for not stacking up. Manchester United, however, keeps rewarding failure and I am not sure why. Ten hag, Rashford, Sancho, Maguire etc all still rolling up at the club when they should be ruthlessly binned.Never seemed good enough and a badly planned transfer. Doesn't fit the team at all. I don't remember anyone else being in for him either. But this club is a graveyard for talent, where careers go to die, so it's difficult to say which it is. I want to see how he does under a proper coach. But for now - not good.
You think Maguire’s been pampered? This is one of those widespread superficial takes. Binning players wouldn’t solve anything here, it’s a structural problemPerhaps the players are simply not good enough. The pressure of Manchester United can either elevate you or drown you. Most of the players who join United are given ample opportunity, given huge salaries and pampered with excuses. No other reputable big club does this - if Zhirkzee was at Real Madrid, he would be binned off for not stacking up. Manchester United, however, keeps rewarding failure and I am not sure why. Ten hag, Rashford, Sancho, Maguire etc all still rolling up at the club when they should be ruthlessly binned.
The fact is, some players and managers can't cut it under the lights of Old Trafford. Excuses won't change that.
He was almost an AC Milan player.Never seemed good enough and a badly planned transfer. Doesn't fit the team at all. I don't remember anyone else being in for him either. But this club is a graveyard for talent, where careers go to die, so it's difficult to say which it is. I want to see how he does under a proper coach. But for now - not good.
