Because coming third in the league takes season long consistency whereas winning a cup is just going on a run for 6 odd games
Ole Gunnar Solskjær
- Thread starter Samid
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That is on me. I wanted to write winning against Norwich and then losing to semi final (meaning that he had easy fa cup run but still didn't do much) .When did he lose an FA Cup game to Norwich?
How is finishing 2nd after signing a Van De Beek, Cavani on a free and teenage Pellistri and Amad considered lucky?
Alongside making up FA Cup defeats to Norwich, you're also cherry picking Leicester and Lampard's Chelsea as his only competitors whilst ignoring the fact that he finished above Klopp's Liverpool and Mourinho's Spurs.
Regarding the entertaining football: after Fergie retired, we never scored 5 or more goals in a league match up until Ole arrived. Under Ole, we scored 5 or more goals in a single match 10 times.
We finished above Kloop the year we're he had basically no defenders for 6 months? The year they lost 7 something to Villa. The year that we played against them and decided to park the bus.
And since when putting 9 goals to soton or 5 against a random European team is considered something great ? How many times we conceded 4 or 5 or even 6 goals? I mean that is entertaining for the opponent sure. We never dominated teams for a long period. Some good games here and there sure. The same can be said for any other manager (except maybe Amorim). And for example we put 5 over Leipzig, but they still finished above us.
I never said anything about ETH putting things right for us - I said that with him in his 2nd season we started to apply a high press. This is backed by the amount of tackles we made in the final third, a number that started to go up from the seasons before. Except for one the 2019/20 season where we had a rather high value compared to the rest of the league yet significantly less than the teams that were known for a high press back then. And after that season, that number went even down. If I remember correctly, there was also a stat bit around about the high number of high turnovers we had in ETHs 2nd season. A stat that showed that his aggressive style had an effect, we just weren't capable to capitalize on it because we were so poor making use of those turnovers.
If you have a source distance for distance covered, I'll happily take it. Even though the correlation with "a good press" might be thin. Same goes for ppda, can only find the values for the current season on opta.
My source for PPDA is understat. Also you are looking at absolute numbers and not relative to others. The absolute number for tackles in the attacking third has gone up under ETH so has the number of tackles in the defensive third and relative to others we were much poorer than we were under ole. That isn’t indicative of a better press just that we are tackling more and so are others.
Thanks for the info, will have a look at it. edit: Oh nice, wasn't aware that Understat offered so much more behind the settings wheel, seems like an odd decision on their part.
And yes, thats why I was saying that it is an indicator. I don't think you are right though. Even if all the numbers went up, that isn't the sole explanation for it. Just look through the teams that led the tackles in the attacking third and you'll see the names that are associated with such tactics - Pool, City, Bournemouth that one year, Brighton for a while, Leeds, Fulham that one year, Brentford for one year. I didn't say its proof, it is an indicator. And with that, it is just in line with your distance covered and probably ppda as well.
When were fulham, leeds or Bournemouth ever known for high press. Also the overall tackling figures went up for all the teams rather than just ETH and we were much poorer than the other teams.
Regarding the PPDA stat i did a bit of research and found out that it means the number of passes that is allowed in the defensive 3/5ths of the team having possession before an action results in possession change. So it isn’t affected if someone makes a PR press. The action has to result in possession change. So yeah if the stat is accurate then it shows we were a good pressing team under ole. It got worse under ETH and has gotten better under amorim.
Oleball was sensational compared to Amorim's style of play.
Some amazing goals especially if you dont see the result on the top left 
Seems like a long, lost dream to see us attack with as much pace, power and impetus as we did in those highlights.
It wasn’t so great when we were getting trashed by big scorelines and relying on Bruno to dig us out of holes on a weekly basis. It got found out pretty quickly and we looked clueless when it did.
When was this exactly? I don’t remember anything apart from that one game against Liverpool in the last season.
Wow, those goals seem from a different era long forgotten.
Three off the top of my head are obviously the Liverpool thrashing, his final game at Watford, and against Leicester. We were bloody awful and he was out of his depth massively. Something that his prior career and his career since has proven.
Love him as a player but as a coach he didn’t inspire any confidence unfortunately. I think the initial good times were built off simply improving the feeling amongst the players and them then having a bit of freedom on the pitch. We were the beginning of the Moments FC bollocks under him, Bruno dug us out every week and some of us saw the capitulation coming a mile off.
Another thing worth pointing out is that the squad we had under Ole was actually very solid, he had some top class players available to him and we squandered that really.
This is another myth that needs to die. We were not moments fc and Bruno was our best player but he did not dig us out every week. We had martial and rashford playing brilliantly and combining well with cavani and greenwood. Bruno was the creative outlet of our team. All in all a great team playing wonderful football.
Saying bruno dug us out of trouble every week is like saying Salah won pool all their trophies. Which is total bollocks.
For someone who played about 6 full games, Donny features heavily
Bruno wasn't even that amazing in 20-21 outside the ridiculous amount of penalties he scored. Definitely not a one man team like he was last season. Maguire and Cavani were as important as him at various parts of the season, and McTominay and Shaw were very good too.
A great team playing wonderful football? Your memory is a lot more positive than mine. If it was that good then there wouldn’t have been so many people questioning Ole for a long time before he got sacked. Arguably if the club didn’t jump the gun, he may have not made it past that first season, as it was awful to watch after around the time he got made permanent.
He certainly had a team of players who we all believed had promise and talent, but it never really went anywhere. He achieved a second and third place finish during the Covid times, with points totals of 66 and 74 - which would typically not have you in those positions. But he was fortunate in that other top clubs were in complete disarray, and we were just the least shit at the time. But many of us saw through all of that and could see how it would end.
The EL final where we mustered up 1 shot on target in 120 minutes was the writing on the wall for me. Especially with the players at his disposal.
From what I recall (I’ve tried to forget about those days) we were floundering during the 19/20 season until we bought Bruno in January. Think he managed to win our player of the season award with only half a season played? Obviously he is and was just a very good player, but he was everything to Ole, a complete tactical crutch. Having him feeding the likes of Rashford papered over many cracks. And later on he has Ronaldo who saved his bacon a good number of times despite he himself taking a lot of flack for being the reason we were poor.
The reason why so many critics were questioning him for so long was hat he defied their expectations by performing so well over a period as they were quick to write him off as a non tactical manager who thrived on vibes. Their expectation was that he will fail soon as the vibes will wear off and the mourinho fanboys and abu’s lapped it up and regurgitated it as gospel truth.
Ronaldo saved his bacon! More like fried it while adding extra fat. The fact is it all went pear shaped when he arrived. Since when is it a bad thing for managers to get their best players playing at their best. I mean do people think a manager is only worth his salt if he gets a creative midfielder to play as a defensive midfielder. Don’t understand this sentiment at all of he was saved by bruno feeding the likes of rashford. Last i checked a creative midfielder needs to provide balls to attackers so that they go and score goals. How is that a bad thing for a managers reputation.
His biggest mistake was signing Ronaldo. It ruined individual growth (must pass to Ronaldo) when we had young talents ready to make that step up. And when the most senior "legend" is acting like a petulant child and basically saying "this club is shite" it affected them in negative way. Cavani was more than enough for that senior striker role. We didn't need the Ronaldo show. I dont think we would have won anything major but at least he wouldnt have gotten the sack. Not only Ronaldo was expensive and broke the wage structure, we were also going backwards with the tactics, only playing to be a feeder to him. At that situation the manager has so much to answer because the team is not winning, getting worse as a whole, and the individual we relied on also got worse over time because hes old. And you cant do shit with Ronaldo in the side, he wants to be prioritized always.
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Also Ronaldo would have signed for city instead.
So what? The clash of egos (Pep vs CR7) could have been quite funny. But Ole was too scared of sentimental criticism that he agreed to sign him.
The point is that would have been interesting to see.
I've said this before but so many fans need to go back and remind themselves of exactly what was going on at the time. You and others have convinced yourselves we were smashing it until Ronaldo came back.
We had an excellent spell under Ole but that's not how it was going the 6 months before Ronaldo arrived.
The season before Ronaldo arrived Martial got 4 league goals. He was then injured for most of 21/22.
Greenwood got 7 league goals the season before Ronaldo came back and then obviously missed most of 21/22.
We weren't some free scoring outfit leading up to his return. Bruno and Rashfords goals also dried up second half of 20/21.
Cavani? Come on. I liked him but injured constantly then went on some kind of strike.
Without Ronaldo's goals that first season back we'd have been in big trouble.
Ole's biggest issues were a declining goalkeeper, Maguire and Lindelof as a CB pairing and McFred as a CM pairing. It's crazy to me he thought that was anywhere near good enough.
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What's actually frustrating is when we signed Ronaldo, we were probably the second best team in the league to City. If City had signed him, they could have become a bit of a circus and we could have challenged. All ifs and buts who knows? I do think we played great football just before he signed.
I remember at the time Ronaldo was still considered world class. We weren't signing the player he ended up becoming. When we got him instead of city there was massive positivity at the club that we could now go all the way, and City fans were absolutely gutted. I don't think you could find many fans who didn't want the transfer.
Agree. If only Ole starts now. With footballing people around him I think he would do much better. He had mistakes and relying on sentimentality was one of them. Hes someone who needs owner like Jimmy and ceo like Berrada
Explain how we would have challenged for the title 21/22.
Martial missed most of it with injury. He only scored 4 league goals the season before. Five years on he's barely scored since.
Greenwood missed most of 21/22 obviously. He only scored 7 league goals the season before. In fact the season before Ronaldo came back Greenwood only scored 1 in the first 28 league games.
Cavani injured plenty. Rashford was there 21/22, think he got 4 league goals.
How is that a set of forwards and circumstances that could lead to a title charge. No chance.
The season before Ronaldo came we finished 2nd. City were first. You're arguing that the following season was a disaster, we all know it was. Just thinking if Ronaldo and Sancho for that matter weren't signed, we made one or two smarter signings, things could have gone different.
It's not insane to think a team that finished 2nd could challenge the following year.
Well hang on, you said if we hadn't signed Ronaldo and City did, we could have challenged 21/22.
That is insane when you now have hindsight, saw how the season went, who was unavailable, all the other huge problems.
The season before we only got 74 points and a +29 goal difference. 12 points off City. We were nowhere near really.
Then 21/22 Martial, Greenwood, Pogba and Shaw all missed huge chunks of games for different reasons.
Remember we signed Ronaldo on deadline day didn't we? It's not like he stopped another player coming in. It was him or nothing at that point.
Lots of people, I think including yourself have got the 19/20 season in your heads and then Ronaldo's return. The 20/21 season has been deleted. The writing was on the wall of what was to come. We were struggling culminating in that awful Europa League final game.
Once again i am not talking only about his last few months here. I am talking about the whole of his reign. Martial and rashford and cavani and greenwood all performed well at different points and also at the same time. I can’t be bothered to go and check their individual records for different periods. If you want to then you are welcome to. Ronaldo’s goals came at the expense of team performances and the metrics show that.
Where are you getting your goals drying up stat from as the stats show that up till 31/12/2020 we scored 34 goals and from 01/01/2021 till the end of the season we scored 40 goals. So there doesn’t seem to be any drop in scoring.
Go for the West Ham job. would like to see him in the prem again.
You said the forwards were playing brilliantly before Ronaldo arrived.
I've pointed out Martial scored 4 league goals the season before he returned. Greenwood 7. Greenwood only scored 1 in the opening 28 league games.
Would you describe that as brilliant?
In terms of goals drying up I said Rashford and Bruno's league goals did the second half 20/21. Rashford only got 4 league goals January on. Bruno similar. 4 league goals from open play(got 5 pens as well).
Then you saw how that season ended with the Europa Final. Rashford especially was awful but it wasn't out of the blue. Him and the team were trudging at that point.
You can't describe any of the above as brilliant and suggest Ronaldo put a stop to it.
I'm not Ronaldo's biggest fan after the way he left but what you're saying is just factually incorrect.
Nuno is getting that job
I said the forwards were playing brilliantly not a single forward. Rashford scored 4 goals but bruno scored 8 and assisted 10. Bruno scored 10 in the first half of the season for reference. So if you call that a drop off then I don’t agree. Also cavani and greenwood stepped up scoring 7 and 6 goals post January. If someone stopped scoring someone else picked up the slack. So yeah Ronaldo came in and made it the Ronaldo show and screwed up the whole team dynamics.
In hindsight, Ole looked like a tactical genius compared to Amorim.
Brilliant compared to today's standards.
Prior to Ronaldo mucking up the system, his team played the most entertaining football post SAF
Their football is actually strikingly similar: Play direct past the midfield and hope for a bit of luck or that one of your wingers can do something magic.
Difference is, Ole knew that playing 3 CBs doesn't help when that's your build up.
Ole was able to make substitutes, switch the formation, and adapt his approach based on the opposition. As I write this out, I guess what I’m referring to is just completing the basic tasks of a coach on a match day.