Ole is unhappy that we haven't bought a CM

Revan

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Hummels only wanted to go to Bayern. Dias was a punt by City which paid off. Is Hummels actually better than Maguire? Unconvinced. Dias is quality though, agreed.
Hummels went to BVB. And yes, he is better than Maguire (but then, except the second half of last season, I think that Lindelof has been better than Maguire).

I'm pretty sure if I went through your posts i'd find several examples of saying Martial/Lingard aren;t good enough and need selling (which they do). Neither are good enough or consistent enough goal scorers/creative outputs, we're basically left with Rashford/Greenwood and an unorthodox Pogba, who is creative but never scores. Therefore, no not enough. Sancho was 100% required in my opinion. An injury to Rashford/Greenwood and we'd be in serious trouble without Sancho.
Lingard is not, Martial should be good enough but dunno what happened in the last season and this one. Nevertheless, if they were not good enough why Martial got a new contract, and why Ole returned Lingard and offered him a new contract. Why Ole is hoarding players that are not good enough?


So then his recruitment is very good, if in your book there are very few duds, most Managers have a pretty small hit rate when it comes to quality players. Just look at Peps record, he's signed a bucket ton of defensive players at City and the majority have been utter trash.
For the money spent, I think it has been ok. The squad has been improved quite a lot after over 400m spent and two free transfers in expensive wages. I would not sat brilliant though. Brilliant is what Klopp did with Liverpool, when he signed awesome players that did not cost much. And when he spent a lot (like VVD) it was absolute quality, not just an upgrade on what he had.
 

devilish

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Why are either Maguire/AWB considered duds in the first place? AWB's still young and improving with each season, he might not be the most effective going forward for a modern fullback but he does his defensive work on the whole well. I wouldn't consider him a dud at all. Duds are players that are clearly not good enough and get sold after a season or two. Neither Maguire or AWB fit in that bracket. They were overpriced, we all knew that at that time but they're hardly terrible players.

AWB for example has been one of our better players this season. While Maguire was in brilliant form last season (after the initial dodgy opener following his Greece... issues.).

Personally I feel Maguire and Shaw are having post Euro hangovers. As both went into the Euros in excellent form and came back to us deflated and in poor form. I actually think if you look at the England squad as a whole, that fits for the majority of the players that were part of the squad, but thats for a different thread. (feck Southgate).
They are duds for the price we've paid for them. The fact that you're describing a 130m worth of investment as hardly terrible players kind of support what I am saying.
 
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So when our new signings do well then its all thanks to Ole but when they do shit its the committee's fault? Also what does Ole do exactly? Our tactics are crap and our coaching is shit
Again, that's not what I said.

Good or bad, the signings are made the same way.

There's another thread to critique the coaching and tactics.
 

largelyworried

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That's clearly not what I said.

The Manager will have discussions on areas that need strengthening, and ideal targets and then the club go and see who's available and make the deals.

It's well known that this is how modern football works. Liverpool's transfer committee etc. United now have a similar model in place.

The days of a Ferguson running everything is long gone.
He's either involved in purchases, in which case he shares the blame for our midfield, or he isn't, in which case he can't take credit for the good bits of the rebuild. Take your pick.
 

devilish

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Again, that's not what I said.

Good or bad, the signings are made the same way.

There's another thread to critique the coaching and tactics.
Fair enough. However Ole's transfer strategy was considered a feather in his cap by most Ole inners. Take that away from him.....
 

Kurton

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He's either involved in purchases, in which case he shares the blame for our midfield, or he isn't, in which case he can't take credit for the good bits of the rebuild. Take your pick.
That doesn't suit Ole in narrative though does it..
 

Random Task

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So what does OGS actually do? Genuine question. He doesn't coach - because that's someone else's fault, but that was okay because he was overhauling the squad. But now his input in the signings we are making is also minimal?

What are we paying him to do?
Ermmm, pass.
 

Hammondo

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Midfield is the most important part of any team, so I cannot take a manager seriously who does not start sorting this out first. A manager who looks at this last is worthless.
 

Rhyme Animal

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Nonchalantly scoring the winner...
He's either involved in purchases, in which case he shares the blame for our midfield, or he isn't, in which case he can't take credit for the good bits of the rebuild. Take your pick.
Or… MAYBE he’s only involved in the good transfers / results / performances…

BUT has nothing to do with the crap signings / silly contracts / bad results / awful performances.

Yeah, that makes sense. Let’s believe that:)
 

Rhyme Animal

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Nonchalantly scoring the winner...
So what does OGS actually do? Genuine question. He doesn't coach - because that's someone else's fault, but that was okay because he was overhauling the squad. But now his input in the signings we are making is also minimal?

What are we paying him to do?
He’s apparently paid more than Klopp as well…
 

charlenefan

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I think the Ronaldo signing caused this but then again, the Glazers are crooks.
Nah we were heading to no more signings after Varane, Ronaldo was an unexpected bonus (depending on how you feel)
 

The White Pele

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Ole will ultimately pay with his job for not being ruthless this summer and making a tough decision on VDB and Pogba.

He still hasn’t worked out how to fit Pogba in and he’s in his last year of contract so he probably should have bit the bullet and sold him and replaced him with a more conventional midfielder that would have been a better fit for this team.

The same applies for Donny. If you can’t find a way for him to contribute then take what you can get for him and bring in someone that will.

We have 5 central midfield players and can’t find a pair that work together to give us defensive protection but also to play progressively with the ball. Each one has their deficiencies and doesn’t have a partner that compliments their weaknesses.

We are obsessed with finding a DM that can accommodate Pogba and Bruno in a 3 man midfield. There isn’t one. Not unless we find a cute tactical solution to box teams in and not let them out.

We would have been better off accepting the double pivot and upgrading one or both of our options there.
 

RedSky

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Hummels went to BVB. And yes, he is better than Maguire (but then, except the second half of last season, I think that Lindelof has been better than Maguire).
No fecking way has Lindelof been better than Maguire. No chance.

Lingard is not, Martial should be good enough but dunno what happened in the last season and this one. Nevertheless, if they were not good enough why Martial got a new contract, and why Ole returned Lingard and offered him a new contract. Why Ole is hoarding players that are not good enough?
Is that down to the Manager though? Or is that down to our owners not wanting our players to leave on frees? It's been happening for too long with too many players on a consistent basis for it to be a Manager issue imo. I put it down to another example of the higher ups at the club being utterly stupid fecks.

For the money spent, I think it has been ok. The squad has been improved quite a lot after over 400m spent and two free transfers in expensive wages. I would not sat brilliant though. Brilliant is what Klopp did with Liverpool, when he signed awesome players that did not cost much. And when he spent a lot (like VVD) it was absolute quality, not just an upgrade on what he had.
I'd say if a new Manager does come in with actual coaches who know how to get a team playing football then we'll look back at Oles rebuild and think it was excellent. I'm of the opinion that if something happens on a consistent basis despite Managers being replaced then it boils down to perhaps it's not entirely the fault of the Manager after all. The clubs been run so badly for years and years, despite the PR coming out of the clubs making it sound like we're a world class team. It's just all misdirected rage.

Carrick/McKenna should have been replaced years ago, they're simply not upto the task. We fail on a consistent basis on the very basics of football and this has happened through two different Managers now so clearly its not a Manager issue. That's not to say Jose/Ole were blameless, but it's a complete mystery to me that we've not changed our coaches and instead the PR coming out of United tells us that they're elite coaches. It's utterly baffling and if we force the next Manager to deal with Carrick/McKenna again then nothing will change. This whole "United Way" bullshit is also utterly shite, the very reason why Sir Alex managed to compete on a regular basis wasn't by having himself surrounded by old United players, it was hiring the very best coaches he could find. McClaren, Knox, Queiroz and Smith were not involved at United as players were they?

Anyway, i'm going wildly offtopic as I haven't had a chance to rant about United yet in the last few days.
 

Blood Mage

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A good manager could put together a functional midfield with what we have. It seems all Ole has left are excuses, he has been backed more than his three predecessors were.
 

Sviken

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The hilarious thing is that we have a perfectly fine midfielder sitting on the bench. Ole also had 3 transfer windows were he could have easily sold the likes of Baily, Lingard, Martial and even Pogba to fund whatever purchase he wants. Hell, sell DVB and you'd get 2 new shiny midfielders, all nice and ready to use. Yet now he believes we need a new midfielder. We can buy a midfield of Zidane, Scholes and Xavi and we'd still be no better than what we are at the end of the day. Our problems rest with Ole and his staff of clowns, not with individual players.
 

Skills

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No fecking way has Lindelof been better than Maguire. No chance.



Is that down to the Manager though? Or is that down to our owners not wanting our players to leave on frees? It's been happening for too long with too many players on a consistent basis for it to be a Manager issue imo. I put it down to another example of the higher ups at the club being utterly stupid fecks.



I'd say if a new Manager does come in with actual coaches who know how to get a team playing football then we'll look back at Oles rebuild and think it was excellent. I'm of the opinion that if something happens on a consistent basis despite Managers being replaced then it boils down to perhaps it's not entirely the fault of the Manager after all. The clubs been run so badly for years and years, despite the PR coming out of the clubs making it sound like we're a world class team. It's just all misdirected rage.

Carrick/McKenna should have been replaced years ago, they're simply not upto the task. We fail on a consistent basis on the very basics of football and this has happened through two different Managers now so clearly its not a Manager issue. That's not to say Jose/Ole were blameless, but it's a complete mystery to me that we've not changed our coaches and instead the PR coming out of United tells us that they're elite coaches. It's utterly baffling and if we force the next Manager to deal with Carrick/McKenna again then nothing will change. This whole "United Way" bullshit is also utterly shite, the very reason why Sir Alex managed to compete on a regular basis wasn't by having himself surrounded by old United players, it was hiring the very best coaches he could find. McClaren, Knox, Queiroz and Smith were not involved at United as players were they?

Anyway, i'm going wildly offtopic as I haven't had a chance to rant about United yet in the last few days.
The problem is that they're doing a job they wouldn't be expected to do at any other club. The managers of others clubs, don't just waive all coaching responsibility onto his staff.

Pep/Klopp have gone through various coaches through their careers - and it doesn't ever matter, because they're the ones who are the brains behind the coaching operation. Oles not interested - and quite frankly is probably nowhere near good enough anyway, in a hands-on coaching role.
 

RedSky

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They are duds for the price we've paid for them. The fact that you're describing a 130m worth of investment as hardly terrible players kind of support what I am saying.
Well, I think they're decent players. They weren't worth 130m, no. I argued at the time that both were overpriced but thats not down to Ole is it? He doesn't negiotate the price does he? AWB for me will be a shrewd purchase long term and will develop into a fine player and Maguire for me (despite his stinker against Leicester) has been a decent upgrade and been on the whole reliable for us. He'll develop a great partnership with Varane long term.

I'm still mystified that we had to pay all of Maguire fee upfront. That really was a totally insane deal that Woodward signed off on, can't wait for that man to feck off, counting down the days!
 

devilish

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No fecking way has Lindelof been better than Maguire. No chance.



Is that down to the Manager though? Or is that down to our owners not wanting our players to leave on frees? It's been happening for too long with too many players on a consistent basis for it to be a Manager issue imo. I put it down to another example of the higher ups at the club being utterly stupid fecks.



I'd say if a new Manager does come in with actual coaches who know how to get a team playing football then we'll look back at Oles rebuild and think it was excellent. I'm of the opinion that if something happens on a consistent basis despite Managers being replaced then it boils down to perhaps it's not entirely the fault of the Manager after all. The clubs been run so badly for years and years, despite the PR coming out of the clubs making it sound like we're a world class team. It's just all misdirected rage.

Carrick/McKenna should have been replaced years ago, they're simply not upto the task. We fail on a consistent basis on the very basics of football and this has happened through two different Managers now so clearly its not a Manager issue. That's not to say Jose/Ole were blameless, but it's a complete mystery to me that we've not changed our coaches and instead the PR coming out of United tells us that they're elite coaches. It's utterly baffling and if we force the next Manager to deal with Carrick/McKenna again then nothing will change. This whole "United Way" bullshit is also utterly shite, the very reason why Sir Alex managed to compete on a regular basis wasn't by having himself surrounded by old United players, it was hiring the very best coaches he could find. McClaren, Knox, Queiroz and Smith were not involved at United as players were they?

Anyway, i'm going wildly offtopic as I haven't had a chance to rant about United yet in the last few days.
Managers would know how much the club is willing to spend per season and has a say on whom we're going to buy or not to buy. In my opinion, Ole genuinely thought that he could get away with this CM. In fact, if transfer rumors are to be believed if we had more money we would have signed Trippier ahead of a CM. That doesn't mean that Ole didn't want a CM. He probably wanted to wait a year so he could spend most on his budget on Rice, something that would have been impossible to do this summer with us signing Varane, Sancho and Ronaldo
 

ivaldo

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Hold on. So we didn't need a midfielder now?
 

devilish

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Well, I think they're decent players. They weren't worth 130m, no. I argued at the time that both were overpriced but thats not down to Ole is it? He doesn't negiotate the price does he? AWB for me will be a shrewd purchase long term and will develop into a fine player and Maguire for me (despite his stinker against Leicester) has been a decent upgrade and been on the whole reliable for us. He'll develop a great partnership with Varane long term.

I'm still mystified that we had to pay all of Maguire fee upfront. That really was a totally insane deal that Woodward signed off on, can't wait for that man to feck off, counting down the days!
Everyone knew that Maguire would cost an arm and a leg and that Leicester would take any buyer to the cleaners. Hence why better run clubs with actual managers switched targets early on. He was simply not worth it.

The impression given by Ole is that he seem to fixate on a player (Maguire, Sancho etc) and would not consider any alternative to him. That makes negotiating very difficult.
 

RedSky

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The problem is that they're doing a job they wouldn't be expected to do at any other club. The managers of others clubs, don't just waive all coaching responsibility onto his staff.

Pep/Klopp have gone through various coaches through their careers - and it doesn't ever matter, because they're the ones who are the brains behind the coaching operation. Oles not interested - and quite frankly is probably nowhere near good enough anyway, in a hands-on coaching role.
Jose trained and coached. As I said, it's been an issue for two Managers now and has been a problem for 6 years. When in those 6 years have we played consistent, decent football over a period of say 2 months? Not the type of performances where we grind out results, I mean the type of performances where it's clear we were on top and dominated from the get go and we deserved to be in the position we were. They've had 6 years to get us to a point where we play properly and we can't even do the basics. They are the problem as much as Ole/Jose/Woodward were/are.

Even if they disagreed with their Managers tactics, they should as coaches be able to get the players doing the very basics of the game right?
 

Enigma_87

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Jose trained and coached. As I said, it's been an issue for two Managers now and has been a problem for 6 years. When in those 6 years have we played consistent, decent football over a period of say 2 months? Not the type of performances where we grind out results, I mean the type of performances where it's clear we were on top and dominated from the get go and we deserved to be in the position we were. They've had 6 years to get us to a point where we play properly and we can't even do the basics. They are the problem as much as Ole/Jose/Woodward were/are.

Even if they disagreed with their Managers tactics, they should as coaches be able to get the players doing the very basics of the game right?
Jose should've been appointed when we appointed Moyes. LvG expiry date was also 5-6 years late. Moyes style is also really outdated, but also not apt for a top club. Ole's style is as of a PE teacher, so no surprises there.

Out of all appointments we didn't try to get a young and progressive coach - something all of our rivals did.
 

Skills

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Jose trained and coached. As I said, it's been an issue for two Managers now and has been a problem for 6 years. When in those 6 years have we played consistent, decent football over a period of say 2 months? Not the type of performances where we grind out results, I mean the type of performances where it's clear we were on top and dominated from the get go and we deserved to be in the position we were. They've had 6 years to get us to a point where we play properly and we can't even do the basics. They are the problem as much as Ole/Jose/Woodward were/are.

Even if they disagreed with their Managers tactics, they should as coaches be able to get the players doing the very basics of the game right?
Carrick and McKenna only joined the first team coaching staff in Summer 2018 though?

And they were an addition to the entourage that Mourinho bought. Van Gaal and Moyes also bought their own coaches.
 

Van Piorsing

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Timing of this news is perfect for some PR moves in face of grim situation.

Random prediction: Once we'll patch midfield next summer, another leak will occur on this unbalanced ship and people in charge will do the same thing again.

Not finding solutions within the existing squad or academy is another aspect to think about.
 

elmo

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I think the Ronaldo signing caused this but then again, the Glazers are crooks.
Ronaldo was signed in the last few days of the transfer window, it's getting ridiculous that people are using his transfer as a reason for us not signing a CM when we literally wasted the entire summer not doing our business early as usual.
 

Jackal981

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It seems that Varane, Sancho, Ronaldo and Heaton weren't enough for him and he needed to get more players in. We're really setting the guy to fail.
Signing a CM does not magically make Ole become a better manager or enable him to implement whatever philosophy or tactics he is trying too. Do any of you here think a single player last game would make any difference ? Give him prime Xavi and Iniesta and we will still struggle to hold the ball and press because of his shit tactics.Ole and his reasons. This is gonna get ugly soon if we lost the next game
 

Hugh Jass

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Is Ole in charge of who comes and who goes? Doesnt seem like it. I recall a poster saying that if it were Ferguson or Pep, the second Pogba said he wanted out, they would have got rid of him quickly and cheap too. Seems like the board is in charge of who comes and goes.
 

RedSky

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Carrick and McKenna only joined the first team coaching staff in Summer 2018 though?

And they were an addition to the entourage that Mourinho bought. Van Gaal and Moyes also bought their own coaches.
My mistake, it's been three years then, 6 months under Jose and the rest under Ole. All of which has been a coaching disaster, so point still stands. In fact, the drop off from when they joined and Faria leaving with Jose self imploding actually strengths my point. They're at fault and should be replaced. Simple as.
 

devilish

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Signing a CM does not magically make Ole become a better manager or enable him to implement whatever philosophy or tactics he is trying too. Do you think a single player last game would make any difference ? Ole and his reasons. This is gonna get ugly soon if we lost the next game
TBF a top DM could have helped him. The problem is what Ole is expecting out of a CM. He said and I quote

“We want central midfielders who can play. Today’s football is about he’s a good 6, 8, 10, back in the day you had proper midfielders, Roy Keane, Paul Scholes, Bryan Robson.

“You see players out there who can attack and defend and that’s what we look for, midfielders who are complete and we try to develop that in our midfield.”

So good luck for him finding a new Roy Keane, a new Paul Scholes and a new Bryan Robson.
 

Skills

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My mistake, it's been three years then, 6 months under Jose and the rest under Ole. All of which has been a coaching disaster, so point still stands. In fact, the drop off from when they joined and Faria leaving with Jose self imploding actually strengths my point. They're at fault and should be replaced. Simple as.
And replaced them with who? Buy Cities coaches, and just tell them - "Lads just do what you were doing at City" ?

I think you're massively missing the point of what their job should be. At any other club, the head coach (i.e. Guardiola) is the one who's coaching the players his vision. The other coaches (like Arteta was under Pep) are just some of the tools he uses to teach the players his vision. The coaches are just an extension of the head coach. We just don't have a head coach, because our managers not interested or good enough to do that role.