I find this extremely strange that we would push deeper our best attacking player (at least in the last few years) because we want to play Mount in #10. Because I have no doubt who is more effective in that attacking role.
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While I agree he has been our best attacking midfielder of recent years as it's not even close, I think the question now needs to be what's the best version of 3 midfielders that is most balanced so if in a 10 Bruno is a 9/10, I think he's an 8/10 in the 8 position whereas Mount goes from a 6/10 in the 8 position to an 8/10 in the 10 position to give an example. I think with Bruno deeper we play better as a team even if his contribution is minimized slightly I do think it's what's best for the team.
Bruno individually is effective higher up but it comes with a risk as we lose a lot of control of the ball as he is a huge risk taker. However when he's deeper he can hurt teams more effectively when he has more space to pick out those important passes, plus he's very combative and presses well. If this is what will get the best out of all three of the midfielders then Bruno has to play deeper.
I feel performance wise, Bruno was better last season than most of his others despite drying up on the goals and assist. The reason you see an elite Rashford is partly down to Bruno and his unselishness.
Basically all three roles in midfield are somewhat flexible. Bruno likes to drop deep to play in our attackers and helps out a lot in defense. Casemiro gets forward quite a bit. Mount presses up high but also helps out in build-up dropping deep.
Mount replaces Fred‘s qualities but is way better on the ball. We played some of our best games last season with Fred in the line-up, with Mount we have a serious upgrade on him.
Bruno is not a better ball carrier than Mount, playing him as an 8 instead of Mount is not an improvement.
I think the requirement for a ball carrier in a transition side is reduced. While I like seeing ball carrying I think he's been brought in for his engine (Like Fred) but as you say he can provide that final pass or touch to create a chance where Fred couldn't.
That‘s true, we actually haven‘t seen much ball carrying dribbling this pre-season.
Anyhoo I don‘t think playing Bruno deeper is needed, he already drops deep a lot.
Where we seriously need to improve is our playing out the back. The goal is to draw the press, then pass through it or bypass it altogether. Didn‘t quite work yet in the games this weekend.
I get the idea but if this is the case, we should've gone for 7/10 midfielder #8. That is the whole point of why people are questioning this transfer. If we play this game and say Fred is 5/10 #8, then did we really improve the team?
But Bruno losing the ball is far more risky in deeper areas then playing as #10. This is Pogba situation all over again. He CAN do a job in deeper midfield but making this his default position is a big mistake IMO. And again I strongly disagree with the idea of moving our best attacker away from the goal. In addition, Bruno in #10 is far more involved that Mount (from what we've seen so far), so it puts even more burden on Casemiro and Bruno.
Fred used to drop deep to hover around Casemiro, Mount does that very rarely and it certainly seems to be by design (he's being pushed to second striker role almost). Agreed about the bolded part.
That's true and he wouldn't have been my choice but I think it's the fact he can play a few positions to a high level which Ten Hag seems fond of
More or less. I'd probably say Fred and especially Eriksen got involved with the first phase of play a bit more, but in terms of positioning off the ball, I'd say that the positioning was very much the same. This can be further highlighted by the heat map of both Eriksen and Mount during pre season.
Man Utd 1:0 Wolves
Upgraded version of Donny/Sabitzer and likely we run into the same issues were in trying to get Bruno into his best position we end up trying Mount in a more orthodox midfield role he has never excelled in.
This guy will offer little other than midfield imbalance and tactical headaches.
I will genuinely eat my hat if a midfield three of Casemiro, Bruno Fernandes, and Mason Mount actually works in the Barclays Premier League
I will genuinely eat my hat if a midfield three of Casemiro, Bruno Fernandes, and Mason Mount actually works in the Barclays Premier League
I don’t get it.
Good player, not what we needed. Square peg in a round hole.
He will probably win the ball back a bit but I feel we wouldn’t need to win it back as much if we had a midfielder that is actually a midfielder. Mount is the English Van de Beek.
Completly shite, but we knew this and still signed him. We'll be overrun in every game if he plays and its bad when Erikson comes on and adds more steel to our midfield.
Was like watching lingard once again, a lot of pointless running around rarely in any position to make much of an impact be it on attack or defense.
We have bought Fred.
Which is not what we needed.
Which is not what we needed.
Fred would have been better to have today
I never really saw what he does that's anything special for England or Chelsea and that was more of the same.
Just garbage and a waste of money.
He didn't have a good game, but everything in this post is wrong and that's quite remarkable given how short the post is.
In 67 minutes he had 30 touches and 17 passes
(Casemiro had 64 touches and 44 passes in 67 minutes)
If Scott McTominay got those numbers he would be accused of "hiding from the ball" and being "scared of the ball".
(Casemiro had 64 touches and 44 passes in 67 minutes)
If Scott McTominay got those numbers he would be accused of "hiding from the ball" and being "scared of the ball".
He is worse than Fred. He is hiding. At least Fred tried. This guy is hiding. How many times did he touch the ball? 12? No shots, no chances created? I mean wtf
He literally had 2 good pieces before HT. people said already MOTM and decent
Other than that, nothing. 55m is daylight robbery and we were stupid to chase him for weeksTo be honest, we’ve simply bought Mason Mount.
That is your imagination because that never happened. Straight after Eriksen came on, Wolves had their best chance and it should have been 1-0. They cut through us multiple times before and after that also.
Not as bad as Bruno but still very bad. It's not a coincidence that we played better when Eriksen came on.
Destined for the bench. Huge waste of money considering all the midfield talent sold this summer.
I said that I would give him time and wouldn't base everything just on one performance. I liked his mobility, so for me it's a case of how we plan to use him. Him AND Bruno both going forward left our midfield (well...Casemiro) exposed for long periods of time. I feel that if we're going to play him, then Bruno needs to be the one forward and Mount hangs back, or they alternate, or somebody drops in. There is a usage for him, but I don't think we saw any of that today.
He is a nothing a player and we have wasted 60m pounds on him. He wasn't the profile of player we needed in midfield and we actually need to think about somebody better than Casemiro.
Everytime we buy a player who Chelsea have little interest in keeping it seems to go pretty poorly.
Midfield seemed just as imbalanced and easy to run through when he went off so I don't think we can blame him for that.
Didn't really get on the ball enough.
Didn't really get on the ball enough.
Either this, or switch the formation. Can do a diamond in midfield. Or Sancho as a false 9, but can't just playe 4-3-3 with only a single holding midfielder
The 10 outfield players were vomit.
Wouldn't like to put the blame on just one player.
Credit Wolves.
Wouldn't like to put the blame on just one player.
Credit Wolves.
Except this didn’t happen, but whatever makes you feel good.
I wouldn't have said that for Kovacic
He was considerably worse than Bruno. At least there’s an upside to Bruno as showed by his pass for the goal.
He is a very good player, who has shown a higher level of performance than any of these United players. He is the only one who has won a major competition, and was a major part of it.
Early days but I really expected him to slot right in
We were actually worse after Mount went off... if you watched the game you could see that
Copy your quote and post it in every players performance thread...it would apply to everyone.
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