Last season stats - areas to improve - worst in the league for set pieces and points away to top 9

IrishRedDevil

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Worst in the league for set piece goals and away points versus the top 9.

1 point away to top 9 was a 2-2 draw with Spurs.

Hard to believe we managed 3rd.

 
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Witchking

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Away points has to improve. But at this point, it is a mentality thing with the players. Anfield, Emirates & City away are foregone conclusions. 0 points expected which is the usual. We had strong characters last season and still got whopped 7-0, 6-3 at Liverpool and City. Taking in the 5-0, 4-0 from Liverpool in the previous seasons, i do not see any improvements coming through. They just have our number.

Other teams like Brighton have figured us out and play better football. Not too confident of any thing improving with regards to the away form. This is only due to the mentality of the players and not the manager. We have a fantastic manager.
 

maximus419

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Witchking said:
Away points has to improve. But at this point, it is a mentality thing with the players. Anfield, Emirates & City away are foregone conclusions. 0 points expected which is the usual. We had strong characters last season and still got whopped 7-0, 6-3 at Liverpool and City. Taking in the 5-0, 4-0 from Liverpool in the previous seasons, i do not see any improvements coming through. They just have our number.

Other teams like Brighton have figured us out and play better football. Not too confident of any thing improving with regards to the away form. This is only due to the mentality of the players and not the manager. We have a fantastic manager.
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Is it not the job of the manager to get the mentality right though? I mean coaching and managing the players is about the whole thing, what they do on the pitch, driving them to be more resilient, building stronger character and belief.

Even in business when managing a group of people, you can do team building days, organising groups and having someone with leadership in each group to improve the overall mentality.
 

Witchking

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maximus419 said:
Is it not the job of the manager to get the mentality right though? I mean coaching and managing the players is about the whole thing, what they do on the pitch, driving them to be more resilient, building stronger character and belief.

Even in business when managing a group of people, you can do team building days, organising groups and having someone with leadership in each group to improve the overall mentality.
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True, and the manager is doing that.Players like De Gea, Maguire, Fred, Mctominay are being slowly pushed out but Shaw, Rashford,Dalot, Awb are the remaining players Eth needs to really work on. They go in to a shell in these games instead of standing up. Players like Antony, Bruno will at least give it their all. I am quietly confident that Onana has the exact United mentality we need. With Martinez, Onana, Bruno, Antony and now Hojund, we can hope for a better outcome, but till i see it on the pitch in those away games, i am not going to get carried away, the 7-0 really showed how fragile we are when we are up against it.
 

redshaw

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Hopefully Mount and Hojlund can help. Mount can produce fantastic delivery from freekicks.
 

Leftback99

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We have Casemiro as a threat on set pieces, maybe Varane and that's it. The rest of the team is weak in the air.
 

sullydnl

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And below is where the teams in that same order ranked for set-piece goals:

2nd
11th
17th
9th
14th
8th
10th
15th
13th
20th
5th
1st
6th
3rd
12th
4th
18th
7th
16th
19th

Point being, if it's a height issue then it's one many smaller teams have avoided and many bigger teams have also walked right into. So not a height issue.
 

IrishRedDevil

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sullydnl said:


And below is where the teams in that same order ranked for set-piece goals:

2nd
11th
17th
9th
14th
8th
10th
15th
13th
20th
5th
1st
6th
3rd
12th
4th
18th
7th
16th
19th

Point being, if it's a height issue then it's one many smaller teams have avoided and many bigger teams have also walked right into. So not a height issue.
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Good research.

City and Liverpool same average height as us and they got 5th and 1st.
 

RedStarUnited

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It would be nice to see a consistent taker. Our corners feel like a toss up between the players nearest to the ball.
 

Lentwood

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sullydnl said:


And below is where the teams in that same order ranked for set-piece goals:

2nd
11th
17th
9th
14th
8th
10th
15th
13th
20th
5th
1st
6th
3rd
12th
4th
18th
7th
16th
19th

Point being, if it's a height issue then it's one many smaller teams have avoided and many bigger teams have also walked right into. So not a height issue.
Click to expand...
Those are averages though, and you're talking about a difference of a cm or two. Reality is, you only need two or three big players, or players who are good in the air, to be a threat at set pieces. You can have 5/6 players who are tiny if 2/3 are beasts in the air.

I'd say the only players we have who are good at attacking set-pieces are Casemiro (who isn't even that tall) and Maguire, who never plays and is likely to be sold.

Don't know if you ever played football manager but there was a line in there about certain players that said something like "lacks the mentality to ever be a serious threat in the air". I'd say we have 5 or 6 players who could be good in the air, based on size/leap etc...but aren't because they're not brave/aggressive enough...Rashford being a prime example.
 

RyRy11

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Almost scuppered us again. Im wondering what has to be done for us the move on from Eric Ramsay as he seemingly has very limited impact in improving our defensive set pieces.
 
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