Oliver holt : Woodward, Glazers and the crippling Lack of Vision that is hobbling united

[Sterling Archer]

How far are you going back. Only a clown would think Fergie invested properly in the later years. Young prospects in Jones and Smalling are one thing, playing Gibson, Cleverley and Anderson is something else. Buying strikers and neglecting other areas was evident for years, hence the horrific balance of the squad. Feck the Glazers and every dope in here that defends them.

This needs to be said more prominently

FECK THE GLAZERS AND EVERY DOPE IN HERE THAT DEFENDS THEM

It used to be players mistakenly signed for City thinking it was Manchester United. Now they aim to be part of that 'project'. United is the not even the second best option unless youre all nostalgia, which most of these younger talents are in fact not. [/B]

 

[golden_blunder]

The thing is pretty much Mourinho was building the new spine for the team the last 2 season and bad luck(in Zlatan and Rojo) means we can't move on to other area given not being back with bigger budget.

The spine from SAF last years were gutted and was not rebuilt well. And in DDG case, he was minutes from becoming a Madrid player. Let that sink in to see how bad we had been heading in those years

Yeah then just think about what we were discussing - underinvestment and whether it’s relevant to problems today.

DDG nearly went because Lvg didn’t rate him because he wasn’t a sweeper keeper.

Likewise the spine of the team either left because Moyes embarrassed them or Lvg gutted the rest cos he was a ducking idiot

Deck all to do with under investment. Fergie bought and sold the players he wanted

 

[golden_blunder]

This needs to be said more prominently

FECK THE GLAZERS AND EVERY DOPE IN HERE THAT DEFENDS THEM

It used to be players mistakenly signed for City thinking it was Manchester United. Now they aim to be part of that 'project'. United is the not even the second best option unless youre all nostalgia, which most of these younger talents are in fact not. [/B]

What age are you, 12?

 

[golden_blunder]

How far are you going back. Only a clown would think Fergie invested properly in the later years. Young prospects in Jones and Smalling are one thing, playing Gibson, Cleverley and Anderson is something else. Buying strikers and neglecting other areas was evident for years, hence the horrific balance of the squad. Feck the Glazer's and every dope in here that defends them.

In some aspects I do agree but you’re neglecting to factor in the type of man Fergie was. He got more out of developing players than buying the finished article and when he did buy big it didn’t always work (eg veron).
Fergie knew the league inside out and what was required to win it - he felt he had enough to win it.

Secondly he said himself that he wanted to leave a ‘warchest’ for the next manager. His own words.

Thirdly, he left a defense with deGea, Vidic, Ferdinand, Evra in it. Fergie would have got 2-3 more years out of that lot with the addition of a good DM. Every man and his dog saw that and said it. We got Fellaini :sigh:

Fourth, RVP was top scorer and hardly injured that last season. Again SAF would have got more from him

Fifth, Lvg fecked out a load of players who we could have used but they were too attacking for him. Rafa would probably still be our RB now (barring injuries)

What I do blame the club directors for is the very poor planning. I said it at the time, major mistake to let Fergie and gill go at the same time. If they were going to allow that, a DoF should have been brought in prior to keep continuity. We probably wouldn’t be where we are now if it had been planned properly.

But underinvestment? Sorry I don’t see that as the issue,’it’s just people reaching for something to beat the glazers with. Kinda moot when they’ve spent 600 million on transfers in 5 years

 

[BennyBlanco]

Fans of Arsenal, Bayern, Liverpool, Real, Chelsea, etc must be sitting here laughing at the thought of United not investing across the last few years. We've outspent them all bar the 2 oil clubs.

 

[Fully Fledged]

This needs to be said more prominently

FECK THE GLAZERS AND EVERY DOPE IN HERE THAT DEFENDS THEM

It used to be players mistakenly signed for City thinking it was Manchester United. Now they aim to be part of that 'project'. United is the not even the second best option unless youre all nostalgia, which most of these younger talents are in fact not. [/B]

They own the club and that is not going to change anytime soon. If you want to support Man Utd you have to accept that the Glazers are a fundamental part of the makeup of the club until they decide otherwise. It is best to come to terms with their ownership because that is something we can't change.

 

[Fully Fledged]

What age are you, 12?

I think alcohol might be involved. If I say anything stupid for the rest of the evening that is my defence.

 

[Irrational.]

It's funny how every time there is a lull in our performances, it comes back to Woodward and the Glazers.

It's like the go-to excuse once all excuses have failed. The Glazers have been blamed since 2005, despite overseeing one of the most successful periods in the club's history, and Woodward although has had a few slip-ups has delivered on the signings more often than not.

People are looking for a scapegoat every time our performances dip, it's not that complicated. We're in a healthier position now than at any time post Sir Alex.

 

[L1nk]

I think, you can argue all night and day about how much has been invested by the club, but what we can't argue is that Mourinho has been given a substantial sum to spend in the transfer market since he's been here, has it been enough? That's up for debate, but for me it's a simple case of how these resources have been used as opposed to how much of it has been used.

Recently a guy on Twitter posed the question on if you could spend around £300 million better than Mourinho has spent his since he's joined, the only catch was that you had to name exactly 10 players, silly? Maybe, but bear with me a moment. Now whether it be Mourinho, Woodward or the boards fault on how it was squandered, fact is it is a substantial sum of money for anyone, and we've laid it down on very few players, leaving gaps in the squad (RW, 10, LB, RB, CM) and not replacing sub standard players with great ones.

Now here is a list of players i proposed that switched clubs either in 2016 or 2017 since Mourinho took over, meaning they were entirely gettable and we can see the transfer fees they went for.

Timo Werner - £9mill to Leipzig, would go for substantially more now.
Julian Draxler - went for £35mill to PSG, always had quality, now coveted at a higher price
James Rodriguez - £50/60mill loan with option to buy for Bayern, would of been a brilliant #10
Ruben Neves - £16mill to Wolves, a shock transfer because he's higher quality than this, and is smashing it there now.
Eric Bailly - £30mill, kept him because he's great
Paul Pogba - £89mill, high price yes but worth it if he flourises
[Irrelevant point] - £20mill to Chelsea, now considered one of the best LB's in the world
Davinson Sanchez - To Ajax for £4mill, then to Spurs in 2017 for a much higher price
Thomas Meunier - £5mill to PSG, and now we are linked with him at a higher price.
Leon Goretzka - Maybe Schalke could of been tempted with £20mill due to contract.

Now that's £288mill there spread over the 2016 and 2017 transfer windows and covers substantial gaps in our squad with quality, you can't tell me virtually all of them now wouldn't replace the deadwood in the squad with quality. You have LB, RB, 2 DC, 3 CM, 2 Winger/AM's, 1 ST.

Im not saying all of them were gettable, or that we didnt even try but looking at our scattershot approach, where we seemingly weren't allowed alternatives to players like Perisic you'd have to guess not.

So why is this, do we lack the scouts? The conviction? Is it Woodward? or Mourinho's lack of wiggle room. I just cant see what our approach is other than I think its wrong, obviously people will say well i dont know better than the manager or the club but surely everything i've listed above is just common sense. Worrying signs all around really behind the scenes.

 

[antohan]

Jose left them in a mess and Conte turned it round in no time.

He won the league and Conte won it again with pretty much the same team. What happened in between is as much on Mourinho as on the players. Personally, I'm not a fan of wholly blaming managers for players acting unprofessionally and downing tools.

I think Liverpool are aiming a bit higher than the league cup or Europa.

They've been aiming high every year for almost three decades now.

 

[Footyislife]

I think it's naive to think that our board doesn't care about titles & trophies. Trophies brings success, relevance, and fan base growth which is all tied to a growing brand value. Our board definitely wants that, but isn't desperate to win right now. They feel confident in the brand value and financial health and don't feel justified in making a risky investment. Why risk jeopardizing the long term stability of the club, when financially we don't need to? Mourinho is an unproven product. If he were delivering progress in terms of results, evolution of playing style, and development of players, it would be appropriate at that moment to go "all in". However, Mourinho hasn't shown that. He got into the CL the riskiest way possible winning a consolation level European cup nobody cares about, won a second tier domestic cup, and a curtain raiser friendly & half the fans by in Jose's idiotic remarks that he has delivered success with 3 trophies? He's barely delivered the bare minimum to progress, most our players seem stagnant or regressing, and over a 1.5 yrs. hasn't shown an aptitude for competing & delivering success in the domestic league.

Football is a business first, just because we forget it as fans (consumer) doesn't mean the club owners (manufacturers) have to. I think people hate that concept, but fail to realize the consequences of not treating the club as a business. Our business excellence is what keeps us relevant and gives us the power to remain a top club in Europe. We aren't a club dominating football in our country & across Europe like the likes of Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern, or Juventus. Without the best manager of all time (which don't grow on trees) I doubt the nature of our league & our competition will ever allow us to be on that level again. Nor are we a club funded by a sugar daddy or a oligarchy the likes of PSG, Chelsea, & City. It is a testament to the power of our brand & our commercial operations that we've retained status in the top echelon of football as commercial giants and have not phased to the second tier with the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, AC Milan, Inter etc.

Don't get me wrong, i still think we are run by the biggest idiots out there despite their financial acumen. There is a horrible lack of basic football knowledge which hurts our long term future & brand value. The worst part is there has been no activity to change that by implementing a DOF. We don't need to win now, but we should be using this period to rebuild our squad, developing our next generation of stars, and maintaining relevance through top 4, CL progression, & cup trophies. As far as managers go, the root of our success has been playing with imagination, passion, & bravery to deliver attacking football that our opponents fear, while creating a system balanced in delivering results and developing youth. Instead of getting someone who can deliver on those philosophies we proceed to make the three worst and most comical hires ever:

• David Moyes - Has shown an eye for developing youth, but has never managed at the top level of any league and has no clue how to deliver attacking football. Should work out right? I mean how hard can it be to figure out how to manage at a top club...
• LVG - Probably the best pick so far in terms of ability to deliver a successful brand of football which revolves around the development of youth. Still a risky decision as LVG isn't known for playing attacking football. Unfortunately for us, he couldn't strike a balance between delivering success & developing youth. His stubborn passion for his philosophy, refusal to adapt, & aversion of risk resulted in the majestic creation of the most boring style of football to ever.
• Jose Mourinho - Okay if it doesn't work the first two times, third times the charm right? Let's finally hire someone who can play attacking football and develop youth to get our rebuilding back on track. But wait, how about if we try this new crazy thing and hire someone who doesn't check any of our boxes, but was only successful about 10 years ago when he wasn't backed by money and a very talented squad. Also this guy probably will implode after 2 yrs, but this should all work out right?

To sum it up we are run by excellent financial minds who have made so of the worst decisions in regards to football operations. How about hiring a DOF that can bridge the two schools of thought and create an end product that wins trophies every year & maintains fiscal responsibility.

 

[JustFootballFan]

Neville agrees with Mourinho backers and People who say transfer policy is shit, he clearly cant name players or say Ed has done a bad job, but this is most he can say without burning ties with the club and he has said it.

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Mourinho bought seven players for over €350M. I think even Neville would agree that DDG has Mourinho´s approval as a goalkeeper. So that means 8 of 11 United starters hand-picked by Mourinho. That´s 73% of the starting 11 and 33% of the squad, not 5%. That´s if you accept the idea that players like Herrera, Rashford, Martial, Mata and so on are all complete rubbish. No wonder United are so rich, when they negotiated contracts with guys that have Neville´s math skills.

 

[Ban]

• Jose Mourinho - Okay if it doesn't work the first two times, third times the charm right? Let's finally hire someone who can play attacking football and develop youth to get our rebuilding back on track. But wait, how about if we try this new crazy thing and hire someone who doesn't check any of our boxes, but was only successful about 10 years ago when he wasn't backed by money and a very talented squad. Also this guy probably will implode after 2 yrs, but this should all work out right?

To sum it up we are run by excellent financial minds who have made so of the worst decisions in regards to football operations. How about hiring a DOF that can bridge the two schools of thought and create an end product that wins trophies every year & maintains fiscal responsibility.

Mourinho was successful 10 years ago? Nothing happened since then?


On the other hand he did indeed get the money and players he wanted, he himself said he wanted 4 players last summer but he got 3. Its not all about the money, this team is good enough to be better on the pitch. Maybe it's just a glitch but I don't see us being back in some sort of form soon.
United have spent a lot in recent years. Question is could that money be better spent?
Some of it surely.

I dont blame the board for not spending but I blame them for the lack of any future, long term planning. Saying all that it's not hard to believe they're content with top 4 and money coming in. That attitude will hurt us really badly in the future.

 

[DoubleRevv]

Lack of investment doesn't explain the shite being played on the pitch

If I'm not mistaken, Mourinho has gotten somewhere around 90 percent of the players he has wanted, what else should Woodward and the Glazers do?

If Jose is not happy with the financial backing he is receiving he knows well where the door is. Throwing money at it or throwing tantrums because results at the moment wouldn't help us long term.

Regarding the article, What makes anyone think we are crippled. Admittedly, we aren't where would like to be but we are making improvements. On paper we are good enough to challenge for the league but something is still lacking in the mentality and style of this team. Fingers crossed, Mourninho addresses these.

 

[Fully Fledged]

It's funny how every time there is a lull in our performances, it comes back to Woodward and the Glazers.

It's like the go-to excuse once all excuses have failed. The Glazers have been blamed since 2005, despite overseeing one of the most successful periods in the club's history, and Woodward although has had a few slip-ups has delivered on the signings more often than not.

People are looking for a Space Goat every time our performances dip, it's not that complicated. We're in a healthier position now than at any time post Sir Alex.

Fixed it for you.

 

[Footyislife]

Mourinho was successful 10 years ago? Nothing happened since then?


On the other hand he did indeed get the money and players he wanted, he himself said he wanted 4 players last summer but he got 3. Its not all about the money, this team is good enough to be better on the pitch. Maybe it's just a glitch but I don't see us being back in some sort of form soon.
United have spent a lot in recent years. Question is could that money be better spent?
Some of it surely.

I dont blame the board for not spending but I blame them for the lack of any future, long term planning. Saying all that it's not hard to believe they're content with top 4 and money coming in. That attitude will hurt us really badly in the future.

If you bothered to read all the words in my setence you would have seen the clause stating that he has only been sporadically successful in the last decade by having a perfect team available to him. Obviously that is not happening anytime soon at United, so my point stands why hire him knowing that...

 

[Ban]

If you bothered to read all the words in my setence you would have seen the clause stating that he has only been sporadically successful in the last decade by having a perfect team available to him. Obviously that is not happening anytime soon at United, so my point stands why hire him knowing that...

No need to get all defensive. Actually I somewhat agree with you. What I've been thinking about last few weeks is that the club lacks any direction or long term planning.

 

[shaky]

Mourinho bought seven players for over €350M. I think even Neville would agree that DDG has Mourinho´s approval as a goalkeeper. So that means 8 of 11 United starters hand-picked by Mourinho. That´s 73% of the starting 11 and 33% of the squad, not 5%. That´s if you accept the idea that players like Herrera, Rashford, Martial, Mata and so on are all complete rubbish. No wonder United are so rich, when they negotiated contracts with guys that have Neville´s math skills.

Well that's not strictly true if you realise that Zlatan was brought in as a stop gap, to do the job for a season or so, like he did well for us last year. Lukaku was signed as his replacement. Lindelof is getting eased into the team but it's going to take time. Bailly has been out for a while, so really it's only 4 signings who should be expected to be playing at their peak right now. Mhiki has been a bit of a let down, but he looked a great buy and nobody really questioned it at the time. Apart from that, you're still looking at 6-8 weekly first teamers left over from the Fergie/Moyes/LVG era.

 

[Vialli_92]

The long term planning from City since they appointed Thiki is the reason they are so successful

Guardiola would not be as successful with this City side if they didn't plan for his arrival years in advance and have all the foundations for success

United just panicked and picked Mourinho after the disaster of Moyes and LVG without having a long term plan in place for him to succeed

Put Guardiola in this Man United team and I don't think he would have many more points than Mourinho if not less

 

[ti vu]

Mourinho bought seven players for over €350M. I think even Neville would agree that DDG has Mourinho´s approval as a goalkeeper. So that means 8 of 11 United starters hand-picked by Mourinho. That´s 73% of the starting 11 and 33% of the squad, not 5%. That´s if you accept the idea that players like Herrera, Rashford, Martial, Mata and so on are all complete rubbish. No wonder United are so rich, when they negotiated contracts with guys that have Neville´s math skills.

7 of Mourinho signings and Lukaku was there to replace Zlatan. In number we're all well covered for CB but we're always stuck with this same injury crisis. Rojo's injury make. Now Bailly becomes a proper United CB by getting injury regularly, Lindelof signing is pretty reasonable.

Let say we didn't buy Lindelof and Lukaku but focus on add to other area and waiting for Rojo and Zlatan to return to best form. Are you confident with that squad, even if we have Mahrez, Griezmann, James...?

That leaves us with Matic whose position is a need. As good as Herrera last season, him and Pogba still leaves much to desire. With Matic, clearly Pogba has been released more and contribute more on the other of the pitch

 

[Stubble]

Stupid short term thinking if true. It's the successful history of the club and past achievements that keep the noodle partners rolling in. A sustained period of 5th/6th and the gloss will wear off pretty quickly and the cash will go elsewhere to where the ambition to succeed really is. Business wants to affiliate with success not mediocrity and a club settling for fourth best. Business is not blindly loyal or sentimental. This will also affect attracting the future fans and the best players. It's a policy of diminishing returns and we could sink pretty quickly on a number of fronts.

 

[Rhyme Animal]

Jose left them in a mess and Conte turned it round in no time.
I think Liverpool are aiming a bit higher than the league cup or Europa.

José left Chelsea as defending Champions is another way of putting it.

And Liverpool would gladly take the EL and League Cup, they've won nothing in fecking ages!

What are you suggesting they're aiming for? The PL? CL?

Can you see Jose giving promising youth players a chance?

He has done, just the other week we went crashing of the League Cup with McTominay in a key position on the pitch that I think other managers wouldn't have given him (indeed, he doesn't look ready).

 

[The Outsider]

Jose left them in a mess and Conte turned it round in no time.

He did yet recall the season before most were premier league winners.

 

[mike bird]

Glazers and Woodward are easy scapegoats for lazy journalism.

Carragher article yesterday hits the nail on the head. This has nothing to do with executive management and more to do with the football manager.

We spent more than Chelsea and Liverpool. Two teams that play a much better brand of football than we do.

I see now we value opinions of people like Carragher. We simply dont have a good team, Jose was dealt a bad hand from the start, and this is why he is frustrated. Yet, I see progress, and enjoyed some of the games we played this season.

People trying to bring him down in every corner, forgetting this is a man who won multiple titles over and over again. Heck, he won two titles for us last year. What did his beloved Liverpool win last year, nothing. What did he win as a manager, oh, he is not a manager. He is just another armchair manager who shoots his mouth like no tomorrow. If by any miracle Utd win a major title like CL this year, he will be singing a different tune and will be praising Jose. That is what they do, they have to sell.

 

[mike bird]

If you bothered to read all the words in my setence you would have seen the clause stating that he has only been sporadically successful in the last decade by having a perfect team available to him. Obviously that is not happening anytime soon at United, so my point stands why hire him knowing that...

What are you talking about dude? Please stop, Jose won everything with an Inter Milan team that were the minnows at the time, even in Italy. I tell you, the ignorance in this place, people even are making stuff up.

After Inter he managed to dethrone Pep and won La Liga with a bunch of prima donnas of players. And his team broke all the records in goals scored that season.

Then he came back and in two years delivered another title for chelsea.

The guy is a serial winner, you might not like him, but that is what his CV is saying. With ifs and buts, yeah I am great manager too.

 

[davidmichael]

Can’t really blame the Glazer’s or Woodward when Jose is the one that’s identified the players and picks formations, tactics and the team.

Jose said when he came in he preferred “specialists” for each position yet plays a winger (Young) at full back, two different 10’s (Mata and Mkhitaryan) as a right winger, a striker (Rashford) as a left winger and a defensive midfielder (Blind) at left back.

Jose said he wanted only 4 players in the summer and the only one he didn’t get was Perisic, Jose is the one who persists with a 4-2-3-1 despite it negating our best player (Pogba) and rotating everyone other than our striker (Lukaku) even though he’s going through a horrible run form wise.

Haven’t we spent £300-£350 million since Jose took over as a manager ? In which case the question needs to be on his transfer selection as other than Pogba and in spells Bailly the signings haven’t been anywhere near good enough, other teams have done far better with far less money.

If our squad isn’t good enough after spending £300-£350 million then something is extremely wrong as that is a ridiculous amount of money to spend on players that aren’t good enough and aren’t even playing in their best position/role.

 

[edgar allan]

He did yet recall the season before most were premier league winners.

Very true, just like when Ranieri was sacked the season after winning the league.

 

[edgar allan]

José left Chelsea as defending Champions is another way of putting it.

And Liverpool would gladly take the EL and League Cup, they've won nothing in fecking ages!

What are you suggesting they're aiming for? The PL? CL?



He has done, just the other week we went crashing of the League Cup with McTominay in a key position on the pitch that I think other managers wouldn't have given him (indeed, he doesn't look ready).

I am sure Liverpool are doing everything in their power to avoid having to compete in the Europa cup.

 

[gajender]

The long term planning from City since they appointed Thiki is the reason they are so successful

Guardiola would not be as successful with this City side if they didn't plan for his arrival years in advance and have all the foundations for success

United just panicked and picked Mourinho after the disaster of Moyes and LVG without having a long term plan in place for him to succeed

Put Guardiola in this Man United team and I don't think he would have many more points than Mourinho if not less

This is the biggest myth which we as Manchester United fans use for City's current success and our failings , there was no grand plan for Guardiola or some great foundation laid out for him both managers prior to him had quite different styles and even player recruitment was fairly normal with out catering to typical Guardiola style. Otamendi , Mangala are not typical Guardiola defenders ,City had ageing fullbacks ill suited for Guardiola's system .

IF City were planning for Guardiola then they did very poor job of preparing for it because he had to completely Overhaul the team in two seasons ,make some adjustments with players positions and himself adapt and evolve to make it work in such spectacular fashion.

 

[Monte Clift]

Woodward should be a commercial director and accountant, no where near football matters. If it looks like an accountant and sounds like an accountant... We should hire Mino Raiola Soprano or Jorge Mendez. Killers. We would have world's best players in 24 months.

 

[roonster09]

The long term planning from City since they appointed Thiki is the reason they are so successful

Guardiola would not be as successful with this City side if they didn't plan for his arrival years in advance and have all the foundations for success

United just panicked and picked Mourinho after the disaster of Moyes and LVG without having a long term plan in place for him to succeed

Put Guardiola in this Man United team and I don't think he would have many more points than Mourinho if not less

Myth that never dies.

 

[tony54]

Just so we set the record....

One main reason we didn't re invest the Ronaldo money back in the days was because of the owners PIK loan. Whatever who's made up later it was clear as daylight that part of the Glazers business plan was first to get rid of the PIK loan as soon as possible, and that was only achievable in 2010 and after that re invest the majority of future profits. The reason Fergie&Gill didn't spend a fortune the last year before retirement was they wanted to leave a war chest to the new manager who was coming. That was the message from the club at that time. Right or wrong is debatable.

Regarding Sir Alex and spending money it was also clear that he was losing touch with the market, especially agent fees and their influence the last couple of years of his managerial career. Not paying agent fee's in the Hazard debacle was a miss judgement based on his inability to accept a new era with more power to agents and players.

Finally regarding today. We have invest poorly the last five years. Thats a fact. Buying Lukaku and Lindelöf was because of Zlatans and Rojo's injury. That throw us back one season. We have upgraded only three spots, Martial, Bailly and Pogba. Matic is a Carrick replacement. The rest is expensive squad material with astronomical wages comparing to their input. My personal biggest disappointment is why we didn't buy Sadio Mané and Thiago Alcantara. I blind could have spottet their talent, it was right in front of us for at least 12 month and they was available for peanuts. Grrrrrr Sometimes I shake of anger when I think about it. Give me Moyes for five minutes in a closed room and Im ready to go to jail afterwards. I hate him for this!!

Good post. Talking about players we should have got. The one I would have loved to have got was Pedro who went to Chelsea for peanuts. Far better than miti has been and puts a shift in every match .

 

[Sterling Archer]

What age are you, 12?

Irrelevant. I speak with passion for my team and am worked up considering the Club is being used purely as a financial piece. Here's the thing though....I had a much more thoughtful comment earlier (quoted again below) which I mentioned you in for your own thoughts. Yet you ignored it completely and picked out a little bit of banter that was not even directed at you to insult me. Very unnecessary.

Fantastic way to look at it.

@Fully Fledged @golden_blunder

It's not simply a matter of which players we signed, which ones we let go. It's the big picture. Manchester United lacked ambition from the top down. The same drive that led to us knocking Pool off their perch and amending CL failures has gone.

United win the Champions League in Moscow and then our 20th Premier League title cementing our status as the most successful English club. But that's the end of trying.

We were dismantled in two CL finals by a great team. Did we let that spur us on to building another great team? Did we try to win another CL? No, we withered away and settled.

The fact that City won that Premier League title in the last minute against QPR should have driven us to reassert ourselves for another several years. We let a 8 point lead slip away meekly. The purchase of RVP was frankly a hail mary for one last glory before SAF retired. And then we hired a mid table fraudster to take over.

This club stinks of ego and business priority at the top over football passion. That's why we are here now.

They own the club and that is not going to change anytime soon. If you want to support Man Utd you have to accept that the Glazers are a fundamental part of the makeup of the club until they decide otherwise. It is best to come to terms with their ownership because that is something we can't change.

This is in fact a very reasonable outlook. I had it myself during the earlier outage over there Glazers years ago, when we had fans fracture off and start a new club. But in light of some recent inner workings about the owners settling for 4th place, I find it harder to just take it. Heck, it's not even about just rooting against them... It's more that I want other fans to give the manager more of a chance. Back him up and recognize that they board is making it a bit more difficult than was apparent to me before.

Also, Happy New Year. To you as well @golden_blunder

Have a drink be merry. And let's hope our team doesn't step onto the pitch with a hangover tomorrow

 

[Rory 7]

Holts’ point is not just about money and investment in players. It’s about the owners lack of vision for the club on the pitch. Why do we get caught up in this transfer spending debate continuously?

The reality is the Glazers have completely mismanaged the post Fergie transition. They allowed our most successful ever managers’ back room staff to be dismantled by David fecking Moyes, sacked him nine months after giving him a six year deal to replace him with a man who has no connection to the club or English Football. They then sacked this man on cup final day, after winning the cup!

These owners sat on their hands while City invested in local youth recruitment, haven’t invested one penny in the stadium and have extracted hundreds of millions for themselves. By any measure these are rotten owners. Just because they are spending big on a few players now doesn’t exonerate them. All the big clubs are spending big now. The issue at United is a complete lack of vision at a sporting level from the time SAF retired. That’s not just about transfer spending.

 

[Will Absolute]

It's a nonsense article. It doesn't matter what level of success satisfies the Glazers - and how does some English journo know what these notoriously close-mouthed Americans think anyway? - they've fully backed Mourinho to implement his vision for the club, and he's made a mess of it.

 

[Smores]

It's a nonsense article. It doesn't matter what level of success satisfies the Glazers - and how does some English journo know what these notoriously close-mouthed Americans think anyway? - they've fully backed Mourinho to implement his vision for the club, and he's made a mess of it.

Something is really wrong with our fanbase right now. He's made a mess of it? Seriously?

The sense of entitlement is just pathetic, rival supporters i know are genuinely laughing at all these articles of fans losing patience etc. Fecking grow a pair

 

[Valar Morghulis]

We don’t need another Green and Gold campaign, we need a fecking sniper.

Well I hope he's running extended mags because he's gonna have to shoot a lot of people I love the Glazers, I hope the club gets passed down to their children. Cheer up!

 

[soapythecat]

Well I hope he's running extended mags because he's gonna have to shoot a lot of people I love the Glazers, I hope the club gets passed down to their children. Cheer up!

If you genuinely love the Glazers then you are a top class muppet.

 

[Siorac]

Probably. The thing is what if the marquee signing each year, the one that takes up the majority of our budget is someone the club wants, not the manager. That he gets the lesser lights, but the Glazers/Woodward get the big publicity one. Keep doing that and you end up with a team that will never work.

Lukaku was definitely not a publicity signing. He's hardly a shirtseller.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Lukaku was definitely not a publicity signing. He's hardly a shirtseller.

I am contradicting myself here, but surely for that money they should be a shirtseller.