As I've already said, LVG seized the opportunity to deflect attention away from our dismal performances under him. He knew exactly what he was doing.
Louis Van Gaal - Press Conference vs Burnley - Feb 10th
- Thread starter RedMachine03
- Start date
Yes thats what Big Sam said anyway so as I said...
Benitez won trophies everywhere too if you also conveniently ignore all the times he failed.
Perhaps we should get him in as Van Gaal's assistant so we can go around blindly hailing the pair of them as genuises regardless of what they do?
We'd finally have a bond with the scousers.
No.
Cracking up implies that he reacted like this because the pressure is getting to him.
In reality he reacted like this because he's a pedantic know-it-all.
There's an important difference there.
The fingers point towards his management. He has plenty of class players in his squad to make it better.
Amazed people cant see it.
Dislike him even more now, embarrassing move on his before, made him look desperate trying to prove Big Sam wrong.
Maybe the pressure is getting to him.
He's been talking about other teams playing long balls all season, so he can't get offended by it now. Not to mention the fact that he's clearly not read what Allardyce said and has gone off at the deep end.
Seen a few other journos on twitter criticisng him for not getting enough out of our attacking options.
Not really sure this idea that he's 'deflected attention away from our performances' is a valid one.
Not impressed by this whole scenario. Big Sam hung out the bait and LVG bit hard. Not reason for it. I don't care if he is pedantic know it all or cracking. Either way he let another manager get to him which is not great.
I'd say he's done exactly the opposite.
Yeah, I don't buy that idea either. If anything he's brought more attention to the problems. I think he just likes winning arguments. No more, no less.
He's actually almost smirking as he produces stats. I think he loves that he predicted the question was coming and he loves that he's able to "educate" the journalists as to what's actually going on.
It might be a negative trait in its own right but it's not the same as having a meltdown, which would be way more worrying.
People are happy to criticise him right now though, so.....
Apart from being pathetic and Rafa esque, am I alone in thinking those fachts actually prove Big Sam right more than LVG? Almost a quarter of our passes were long. That's way too many.
Bit stupid comparing stats players got for different teams, in different leagues. Although it is interesting (and worrying) that both of them have had even worse seasons in the recent past.
@Joga Bonito A good metaphor for what he was doing is probably a quote by an ex teammate of Van Gaal that I remember hearing, or reading. They were invited to a gameshow on tv, I imagine it was somewhere in the 80's. Was a simple quiz with rather obvious answers. Yet the teammate didn't score any points on the quiz that night. In his own words, he was 'too busy laughing his ass off about Louis van Gaal's fixation to press the bell and give the easy answers like a mad man, for half an hour straight'.
Like I said, he just has these moods where he's like Dwight from the Office; taking things too literally, nitpicking. It's happened quite often during his career, at all the clubs. Pretty sure he is aware that it also distracts from some other questions/discussions, about the team's perfomance or perhaps the BJ-saga or anything. But that's more an excuse for him to behave like he did, than the real reason behind his behaviour.
He was in a friendly mood today, sometimes he also gets emotional and angry for no reason, he simply isn't always the most balanced person. Like most coaches obviously. But with LvG it's taken some time before he's showing it, his limited vocabulary probably helped keeping his pressers short and shallow. When he gets emotional or angry he looks like a proper nutjob, which amuses me to no end. Media in Holland had a field day last year when he expressed his maniacal desire to see Wesley Sneijder making a tackle, saying he would 'CHEER' if he succeeded:
The look in his eyes at 0:28
Like I said, he just has these moods where he's like Dwight from the Office; taking things too literally, nitpicking. It's happened quite often during his career, at all the clubs. Pretty sure he is aware that it also distracts from some other questions/discussions, about the team's perfomance or perhaps the BJ-saga or anything. But that's more an excuse for him to behave like he did, than the real reason behind his behaviour.
He was in a friendly mood today, sometimes he also gets emotional and angry for no reason, he simply isn't always the most balanced person. Like most coaches obviously. But with LvG it's taken some time before he's showing it, his limited vocabulary probably helped keeping his pressers short and shallow. When he gets emotional or angry he looks like a proper nutjob, which amuses me to no end. Media in Holland had a field day last year when he expressed his maniacal desire to see Wesley Sneijder making a tackle, saying he would 'CHEER' if he succeeded:
The look in his eyes at 0:28
van Gaal should counter ''Long-Ball United'' accusation on the pitch...
Comparing long ball stats with West Ham.
Shame.
Shame.
The knives really do seem to be out for him.
Seing as the thread had grown to 10 pages coming home from work, I thought something important had happened... Like our whole team injuring themselves or some serious issues. People are too precious and had Fergie or Mourinho done something similar they'd be applauded.
LVG's point is that a lot of those long balls were switching the play side to side as opposed to going forward with them.
We have the second highest possession rate, second highest pass completion rate and fourth highest number of short passes. Hardly signs of a long ball team.
Would love to see us start Fellaini and Smalling up top tomorrow and literally only hoof it long. Probably score more goals than we have been doing in a convincing 3-0 win and rile everyone up in the process.
Watch us not hit another long ball for the rest of the season now.
Sam's team have traditionally played long ball football. I wonder when some journo will come up with stats comparing United with other teams in the Premiership.
There are several other stats that put the whole thing into context and we did get a goal from the change. Whether we should play like West Ham against West Ham to get something out of the game is a different question and most would probably prefer to play differently, but the reaction is over the top. Upton Park isn't an easy ground to go to this season and take something away from, we should have done better, but we've definitely had equally uninspired performances away from home under Ferguson and got a draw late on.
Ah right, English sense of humour. In that perspective, he should have said : ''“ Big Sam, He looks like a horse in a man costume!” ''
I think that it was around the same time with Moyes, no?
It does seem that there's a certain amount of time before the media start getting into them / managers start doing some irrational shit.
I agree completely. But that's not conceited, obnoxious or pedantic enough.
... coming in the next press conference.
Seriously though, I'd rather he probably didn't do it, but it's still not nearly as bad as Rafa's rant. He's probably trying to be polite with the other managers/journos and we know he's not used to it. Rafa's rant was more of an attack against Fergie than "explaining things".
Either way, I don't really care that much about all that, and as far as I'm concerned it's Big Sam 1-1 LVG. What I care about now is the results of the coming games. The winner of those "mental games" is not the one who is factually more correct or the one who says less embarrassing things, it's the one who wins in the end. Rafa would have been called a winner despite his stupid rant (and so would Keegen) had they won in the end. They lost the "mind games" because they lost on the pitch, not in the press conference rooms. Let's hope LVG emerges a winner out of this.
Long Ball United. LBU. Not bad.
GGLBMU.
GGLBMU.
Football is about the right ball. Short, long, along the ground or in air hardly matters. However, putting our tallest player up front and hoofing the ball as a tactic means his philosophy and team selections are failing.
We could be 6th by the end of play today.
I think the fans had turned around this time last year but if I remember correctly the press was much much later, some didn't turn on him at all.
with his tactical stubbornness and sensitivity/spikyness with the press LVG really reminds me of Benitez
Laugh it off Louis.....
Laugh it off Louis.....
The reaction to the way we played or the reaction to LVG's Rafa rant? As for the latter, United fans who ridiculed Rafa and yet defend LVG are the biggest hypocrites. Then again, football fans always are.
We called Benitez's self-defense pathetic, so in the name of consistency we should call this performance by LVG pathetic. I think the only reason why we see a difference between the two episodes is because it's two different men we're talking about and both react to criticism (perceived and otherwise) in a different way.
If this was somehow LVG's way of being funny, I don't think it worked very well. But I don't think it is, really. I think he's trying to play the mind games that are common amongst PL managers and he doesn't quite grasp how it works. Why a trophy winner with Barcelona and Bayern feels the need to defend himself against a two-bit piker like Allardyce is another thing entirely.
He would've been much better off laughing at it and moving on.
If this was somehow LVG's way of being funny, I don't think it worked very well. But I don't think it is, really. I think he's trying to play the mind games that are common amongst PL managers and he doesn't quite grasp how it works. Why a trophy winner with Barcelona and Bayern feels the need to defend himself against a two-bit piker like Allardyce is another thing entirely.
He would've been much better off laughing at it and moving on.
Sam wasn't the first person to say "Long Ball United" I heard Cambridge fans say the same after their game.
He should of been announced and had the hacks sit up in their chairs....
Then casually sauntered over to the far corner of the room, as far away behind them as possible....
"Why don't you LONG BALL me your questions from over there today"
Then casually sauntered over to the far corner of the room, as far away behind them as possible....
"Why don't you LONG BALL me your questions from over there today"
I doubt he would do that.
LVG likes high possession football. So I doubt he would suddenly switch to long ball football, from the start of a game.
Also, we are at home, so we should be able to score 3 goals, using or "normal" system (whatever that is).
The major problems we have are away. We just can't seem to win away from home.
The clip is not as bad as I thought it would be! Now that I've viewed the clip for myself I think the media coverage and reaction is OTT.
It's easy to make similarities to Rafa but this is just LVG being himself. He does come across as slightly bonkers, but I took it as another example of LVG educating the English.
But it doesn't change my opinion that he should have United playing far more attractive football than he has managed so far.
It's easy to make similarities to Rafa but this is just LVG being himself. He does come across as slightly bonkers, but I took it as another example of LVG educating the English.
But it doesn't change my opinion that he should have United playing far more attractive football than he has managed so far.