Combined age of 70 years in our starting lineup up front today (I used quotes around “partnership” as we’re 70 minutes in and I don’t think they’ve completed a pass to each other)
Is this the oldest front two in top flight football ever?
Anyone else run them close?
Bonus points for anyone who can explain why this is anything other than a ludicrous and humiliating record for a club as wealthy as us to break.
Its the stupidity of it I find more humilating than anything else. The wealth side is irrelevant as we had 3 other strikers we could have used.
I get that they're both great players and great professionals but you don't need to be a world class football manager to know that playing them as a strike partnership is a terrible idea. You can't just ignore that intensity and mobility is a vital factor in football. If it wasn't no one would ever retire before about 50.
It reminds me of Ferguson in his last couple of seasons putting Giggs and Scholes in the same midfield and then being seemingly baffled when supposedly inferior opposition would run rings around them....BUT, even then he would facilitate them by having Fletcher or Carrick in the midfield with them. So there was at least some recognition of the need to compensate the lack of mobility with an extra body.
Rangnick instead compounds the matter by having Matic in a two man midfield and then preventing one of his full backs from being able to go forwards and occupy any space. So we have no mobility at all in ANY area of the pitch.
And then its apparently baffling why our players seem to lack any intensity or "motivation"...if you pick a team that quite literally isn't physically capable of being intense or "motivated" then what in the actual feck are you expecting? Cavani and Ronaldo aren't going to magically play like they're 10 years younger. Matic isn't going to magically become fleet footed enough to play in a midfield where he has to be the most mobile player on the pitch for it to work.
Its absolute basic stuff. If you want high intensity football you have to pick your high intensity players. Not just pick your supposed "best" ones and expect them to defy the laws of science.
Its actually really annoying watching our players criticised and ripped apart when there's been this nonsense going on all fecking season. They can't do what physically isn't possible.