Woke up in the second half and won the game but the performance as a whole still looked disjointed and not in control. Don't think Mount and Bruno can play together. Both far too wasteful with the ball and play too far forward. One has to sit for the other. We need someone alongside Casemiro and not in front of Casemiro. So either we quickly sell Fred and Donny and whoever else and go and get Amrabat or reintroduce Fred if he isn't leaving.
Manchester United vs Lens (Sat 5th August, 12:45 UK time)
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
Came up with means that they put those things as frontrunners in their criticism because the football, that was an issue, was producing a bit of results nonetheless so was often not easy to criticize. And even if I would agree with you that favoritism is the most plausible explanation for things we have seen, it is nothing more than a (still plausible) assumption. So calling it the "main problem" is just wrong in my eyes.
Chicken and egg issue, I guess. But don't think we are far away from each other on that.
Hmm. Well I guess we have to define, what everybody understands by counter attacks. A "high pressing team" creates high turnovers. Wouldn't call that counter attacks. And while our pressing looks certainly more lively this year, I still don't see us engaged in dominating other teams as a high block. We have Bruno and now Mount who "press" in the meaning of charging people all the time. For me, a press is something coordinated and orchestrated by the whole team. This is what we were lacking since 5 years (or longer) and where we went so off the boil having past it and old fashioned managers. It is getting better, not going to deny that, but the 2nd part of 2nd half today we played mostly like Ole would have played. And why wouldn't we - we were 2 goals up. Scored by two counter attacks and a bit of a lucky bounce after a set piece. No need to get defensive here, not meant to be criticism, but I think, the visible result is still pretty close to what we would have seen under Ole. (In pre-season Oles teams played well too by the way. Even playing out from the back).
Before we get further into it: I wouldn't call it Ole ball. It a) isn't a technical term where everybody understands the exact same thing and b) I only noted a certain resemblence of the football we've seen under Ole. It was also focussed on transitions and our goals often looked similar to todays goals.
about 1. - would probably be a bit less absolute but I agree, there is a clear improvement visible. It looks more organized than last season, still a long way to go to call it a strength of the team. But I absolutely can see that this is a personal subjective stand.
about 2. True. Which is great to see. Lets see how this will stand when the league is going but that certainly is the aspect of our game, that ETH focussed on last year, with clear and visible improvements.
about 3. Not sure if I would subscribe to this. Not sure if Ole gave the players any objectives other than "release it quickly". Felt also like he gave his attackers freedom to position themselves where they felt they should be. Which then led to us bunching up in the middle. So all in all, I agree with the team making better use of the space now, but I don't know if this even was a topic under Ole.
I see where you're coming from. But it sounds pretty definitive considering it is based on a few games in pre-season. But I agree, in theory we should be better with that. Lets hope we can bring it into the season. For me, I'd probably try to make us a little more compact. Still feel that defense and offense are a little to far away from each other, but considering new players and especially a completely different kind of keeper will take some time.
see above
Hmm. Not completely convinced of that but lets say it like this - if we can manage to play like we did in the first part of the 2nd half for most games during the season, than I am the first one to praise ETHs changes. But as you said, even the 2nd part of 2nd half looked different already (for good reasons, not meant as a dig) so it is tricky to extrapolate things into the future.
Last edited:
And then let the next back pass trickle through his legs haha.
Yeah I don't want to be that guy who goes in on Mount like the media and some fans are doing
He wanted us to sign Pickford.
He's a good player. But just not enough room for both he and Bruno in our midfield right now but he'll be a great deputy to Bruno at CAM.
Have to say I honestly enjoyed that. For every match you can see the players adapting to each other. Onana is such a vast improvement to our play that it will be a net positive for us. The goal today was mostly down to a Dalot error, but we scored 3 so no reason to complain.
Is Martial fit now then?
Thought that was a good game. I actually like it when the opposition give you a decent match in pre-season, far more useful than if they'd bent over and let us win 5-0 at a canter.
Fixed with some masking tape and bit of pound land glue.
Good to have football back...can't wait for Wolves next weekend.
Note to self and the Cafe...try to enjoy watching United...its not all bad you know.
Note to self and the Cafe...try to enjoy watching United...its not all bad you know.
Enjoyable watch. Lens fans were a great addition too, well up for it.
So what should we do
I meant it more for the highlights but true.
I couldn't watch the game. Did we play with Case as dmc and Mount and Bruno as attacking midfielders or Mount played deeper with Casemiro? As number 8?
Two number 8s.
That team can probably finish mid table in PL if they never have injuries/fatigue. It's actually decent.
Sign a CM/DM and make Mount come off the bench for Bruno.
Really? That is what i was hoping to see this season. Much better than two defensive midfielders.
So it is up to Casemiro to carry the team.
Wise words
Over having the best start to the season possible no. Would you rather we made the first team travel uncessarilly and lose the 1st game of the season, or give them as much rest as possible and boost our chances?
Just noted Lens finished 2nd last season and only 1 point off PSG. So they're not exactly a mid table fodder French side.
Had two miserable pricks behind us. Casemiro was finished, bruno lost a step and we're worse than last season apparently.
Just home from the game, was fun, tough match against good opposition, exactly what was needed.
Massive shout out to all the Lens fans that were there, they had an absolute blast all game, brilliant support from them, two thumbs up.
Massive shout out to all the Lens fans that were there, they had an absolute blast all game, brilliant support from them, two thumbs up.
christ
Ffs
Wait, am I not doing it right? I thought doom and gloom was the whole point of pre season on the caf?
There is 8 days from tomorrow until 1st league match.
When this Dublin match was sold it was the last fixed preseason game with the expectation that we'd get what was on show today. Dublin is 30mins flight and Aviva is 20mins from Airport.
Rest has nothing to do with it. 8 days is plenty.
We've been scammed by the PLC by fixing Lens for today weeks after Dublin was advertised as the Red Devils coming to town.
fecking gouged
That feeling when I watch UTD is priceless. I hate summer break, most difficult time in the year!
Still need to see will Mount play everytime alongside Bruno, how Hojlund will play, will we have Amrabat alongside Casemiro, i am sure ETH will set up the best team in order to be the force in transition game particulary. My favorite on watch player is Garnacho, i really want him to be a regular starter, really like his skils...
Onana is great goalkeeper who is involved in the game and this goal today will not change my opinion, he was where he should be, not his fault.
Can't wait for the next weekend. Simply can't wait for the match...GGMU
Still need to see will Mount play everytime alongside Bruno, how Hojlund will play, will we have Amrabat alongside Casemiro, i am sure ETH will set up the best team in order to be the force in transition game particulary. My favorite on watch player is Garnacho, i really want him to be a regular starter, really like his skils...
Onana is great goalkeeper who is involved in the game and this goal today will not change my opinion, he was where he should be, not his fault.
Can't wait for the next weekend. Simply can't wait for the match...GGMU
Any word of the full make up of the travelling squad apart from today's subs obviously. Might have fecking known I'd end up seeing Maguire rather than the likes of Cas, Bruno, Martinenz.. 
Many of the posters here just love it when things don't go well so they can start braying for the manager's head. They liked the old manager better or voted to hire someone else in a poll after the last manager was sacked and they want to be vindicated.
We look absolutely wide open.
I can not believe so fast the minds of fans can change. Until his injury Eriksen was seen as one of our most important players last season. Now he "can't run" and other silly comments like that.
Club:
Eriksen: 582 games 112 goals = 5,19 goals each season.
Mount: 281 games 58 goals = 4,84 goals each season.
Give it a chance because you’re going to see those two guys together. Forever.
Eriksen was often covering more ground than anyone in the team. He’s an extremely good player. He changed the way the whole team played, very much for the better.
However, don’t tell me you haven’t noticed how badly he tired in the second half of matches. This was happening before his injury. At that point nobody was saying he can’t run but we were saying he can’t play 90 minutes.
He is that good that I, among others, was saying we needed a plan to get 60 good minutes out of him and not expect more - have a game plan which includes replacing Eriksen early in the second half. Most of us didn’t say bench him or bin him. After his injury he was mostly off the pace from the first minute, couldn’t seem to get on the ball, couldn’t get himself in position to receive it. We can still hope that a good rest and a good preseason will have fixed him but the chances have to be against him.
I don’t think he is. I think Pellistri starts tomorrow - and most players who start tomorrow are going to be on the subs bench against Wolves.
Tomorrow it could be Hoijland, Pellistri and Sancho/ Forsun who start up front.
The balance in midfield is wrong. This experiment of playing two no.10s in front of a lone 6 is never going to take off.
Last edited:
I don’t get the comparisons with Ole. It was very different to watch today. Ole’s teams were reactive, sat in a low / mid block and then attacked on the transition. The expectation was to win the ball back in our own final third, and we would seldom press in the opponent third.
This team (with Rashford and Bruno) being the 2 best players, and now Garnacho playing well, is built for fast transitions and our players can eat up space while dribbling. It’s only logical to set up a team in a way that maximises their abilities.
Under Ten Hag, we are now a proactive team - and we seek to win the ball back as soon as we lose it. I love how we finally seem to have 2-3 players swarm around the ball immediately.
Also our transitions are being created by inviting the opponent high press. Even when we have the ball, we are playing at the back to allow the other team to push up. So when we break through- we have space in the opponent half. This is a manufactured transition, and works very well for us.
I like how our attack and defensive tactics are now lining up, and I think ETH was right about the history of United being similar to this. Shows he is willing to adapt his possession based style (Ajax) to what suits the United fan base and our players.
Last edited:
Nah it will be seen as a failed experiment after a couple of games and then Amrabat will come in for Mount.
I think we have to give it a few matches to bed in properly. I’m pretty sure EtH isn’t going to abandon it based on a couple of friendlies.
Decent performance. Rashford Anthony and Garnacho looked good. I hardly noticed Mount.onana has brought a whole new dynamic to playing out from the back, we suddenly look confident in that area.
Mount has been bought to press high up the pitch. Amrabat won’t do that.
I’m not saying it won’t fail but I think EtH is pretty wedded to the idea of Mount and Bruno ahead of a lone 6. Not sure if they are doing what he is asking them to do but it is a slightly different plan than last season and I assume everyone is supposed to be doing something slightly different. He won’t be expecting it to click immediately, we shouldn’t either.