Optimism for 25/26 season

Pughnichi

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It’s fair to say that Liverpool, City and Arsenal will maintain a good standard.

Who knows which Chelsea will turn up

But other teams throughout the league I’d expect to drop off.

Can Newcastle compete on multiple fronts. They struggled hugely last time around they were in champs league. Likewise Palace and Forest in Europe

Teams also look set to be losing big players. Cunha at Wolves. Hujsen and Kerkez strongly linked away from Bournemouth. Eze, Mateta, Mbuemo, Wissa all key players heavily linked to transfers.

With no European football for us, I’d expect a marked league improvement. We’ve seen Newcastle, Forrest and others have strong domestic campaigns not having to deal with juggling European competition

Hand in hand (weaker opposition, stretched with European campaigns and us concentrating solely on the league), it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if with more goals in the squad we quickly get from 17th back up to challenging for European places again
 
One game a week, can be no excuses in terms of fitness and performance levels.

With a decent fransfer window. Utd can definitely take advantage of the extra European places, with up to 9 or 10 teams in Europe, there'll be loads of Sunday games and rotation plenty of rotation for all those teams.

Focus on getting finishing as high up the league as possible and aim to win the two domestic cups.
 
Every top club wants to be in Europe so to say it’s a blessing in disguise would be misguided but the fact is there is going to be 9 clubs in Europe next season and I can say very confidently that it won’t be the same 9 in Europe the following year because managing that schedule is hard.


So that puts us at something of an advantage next year. Pretty much a one match a week schedule for the first 4/5 months means we’re actually in a better position for a rebuild because while we might be short £80m or so, half of that would have gone on the UCL salary bump anyway and that doesn’t even leave enough for one extra player let alone a rebuild.

Missing out on Europe means a minimum of 8 less games and to manage that schedule you need at least another 4-5 spare players for healthy rotation or everyone is knackered come February/March.

That sort of breathing space means that with our bloated squad of around 28 full first team players could comfortably be cut down to around 23 + academy. Perhaps even further.

So that gives us space to have a clear out of a dozen or so players and we only need to replace 5 or 6 but that 5-6 could transform our First XI and we can be in an advantageous position of playing our best XI every match, getting rhythm and familiarity while other squads are forced to rotate.
 
In terms of United, the optimism will mainly come from summer transfer business. Cunha and Delap would be a good start if they come off, but who else comes in will be important. Under Glazer regimes with Woodward, Arnold and Murtough, I wouldn’t trust them to make good purchases. The people in charge under INEOS seem more competent based on last summers business where there were no grandiose fees thrown around and the players brought in had the skills we needed. Mazraoui being a great bit of business for the fee we paid in my opinion.

One game a week means we can focus on making a good XI first and foremost, and take advantage of more time training between games and when playing teams who will be in Europe next season. There’s definitely a few teams over the years who punched above their weight when they had one game a week, leading to European football and then the following season, they can’t handle two games a week and slip back down the league.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
We won’t have to watch us play rubbish football as many times as we did this season. Or lose a European cup final. So that will be nice.
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And hopefully not see a free fall of clubs do the double over us
 
Just adding a competent keeper and a reliable striker should mean we finish top half. If we buy and sell well on top of that, and Amorim coaches decently, then top 6 is very much on. Big ifs, I know.

Also, as we can afford to go full strength in the domestic cups I'd hope for a good run in those too.
 
I feel a bit too drained from this season to be optimistic about the next if I am honest.

I will be in a few months. Looking forward to a new season with new signings. If I think Amorim should be here or not won't matter because I want us to do well.

But not now.
 
City and Chelsea will be interesting watches. Playing the club World Cup means they only finish this season at the end of June, 3 weeks off they’ll come into next years pre season about 2 weeks out from next season.
Liverpool and Arsenal will be top 2.
Playing once a week if we get our recruitment right could be massive for us next season.
I’m ready for a break from Football in all honesty for a few weeks.
 
I always get excited for a new season, it's the football stuff that normally ruins it a week in.
 
I have very little of it at the moment and the players we are linked with aren't helping either.
 
Well I'm extremely optimistic that the 25/26 season will happen.

Realistically if we can get a couple of good attacking players I think that will be a big improvement instantly. Being so unable to score makes it almost impossible for anything else to go right. You can be the best boxer in the world but if you don't at least have some pop in your own punches then you will get swarmed.

If our improvements are Liam Delap then I think we will have many of the same issues.
 
I was devastated on Thursday but now I'm really looking forward to next season. Should be a lot of new faces and also a lot of dross shipped out. The rebuild begins tomorrow and honestly it couldn't possibly get any worse than this season.

Even if we finish 10th it's still a massive improvement and it'll be fun dishing out some revenge on clubs that have been taking the piss all season.
 
As long as we replace Rasmus, Garnacho and Onana I'm very opimistic about next season. I'd be happy if we get top 6 with a couple of new signings.
 
1 game a week. Total club reset. Hopefully a few ins/outs and we win a few games in a row score a lot of goals and bring fun back to watch us play
 
glad to see this thread

it's been a shit few days and it's hard to lift the cloud.

a good preseason alone should see an improvement in player understanding of what they need to do and the transfer window will be pivotal

with less games it is time to gut the squad. Possibly some unpopular sales but enough to cover psr issues and free up enough to rebuild.

Vivell made a good start with Heaven and Obi so I'm hoping for another 3 or 4 players of this profile to join Cunha and Delap potentially

hoping to see a new technically good, physical midfielder and a more reliable goalkeeper

As far as the transfer market goes it suits us to be competing with Brightons and Bournemouths for prospects. Rather that than wasting a summer chasing some elite player.
 
Not having games in Europe and having more games against lower league teams in the cups could be massive. Get a bit of momentum, less injuries and watch us fly.
 
I'm optimistic in that we can use this as a opportunity to wipe the slate as clean as possible and try and start to piece it back together.
 
Quietly confident we will perform well next season with a few key replacements in. Less games is a financial burden but should help from a squad perspective.

Wilcox et all need to earn their money this summer with both ins and outs.
 
You'll do better than Palace and Forest I'm sure as for sides not used to Europe at all constant Thurs-Sundays take their toll as the season goes on. Spurs keep Ange and they'll be dead by December playing CL and prem.

Recent example would be Brighton going from 6th to 11th by playing up to Europa league last 16. Girona in La Liga massively struggled with all the extra games and weren't far off being relegated.

Trouble is Man. United just getting up to the giddy heights of 8th-9th won't satisfy the big hitting old players in the media so that will continue creating external pressure. If you're in top 7 most of the season that will be different.
 
Decent transfer window and good pre-season and we will be fine. Clear out the deadwood and players who don't want to be here. Whats not to be excited about. Eventually things will turn around. If it doesn't happen this coming season and Amorim doesn't sort things out then he will be replaced and we will try again. Some people put far too much of their energy and happiness into supporting United. We can't change what will happen as fans so just try and enjoy the ride.
 
I'll really need an effective transfer window to feel optimistic. And frankly we haven't done that going back to even when Sir Alex was here the last few seasons
 
hard to be optimistic until the window plays out and we see this 'reset'
 
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I'm sure the excitement will come back when we're getting close to the new season, IF we can make anything of the summer.

The worry is that we might struggle to attract players to join what appears to be a complete circus and graveyard for talent. Especially now that we can't offer big wages, or even decent transfer fees.

If we can't massively improve this squad, then I think it'll be more concern than excitement.
 
foolsgold said:
I'm always optimistic but every season, really what's the point if you're not?
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Maybe it's because this season technically isn't over yet and I'll feel completely different in a month or so, but this is the first time that I have absolutely zero hope or optimism whatsoever.

Hopefully that's a good sign? Hey look, I did it!
 
Drizzle said:
Just adding a competent keeper and a reliable striker should mean we finish top half.
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Strongly disagree. It’s such a simplistic view. You can’t separate the performance levels in either end from the team in between. We lack pace, dynamism, strength and intelligence in both defence and midfield.
 
No congestion means small squad, can clear out lots more players than before, players stay more fit as there is less travel, better recovery between games, less rotation (basically none needed)... People always severely underestimate the impact of this when it's been shown to be a huge advantage year after year. Especially with 9 or 10 PL sides in Europe dealing with the struggles.

Add a striker and Cunha... It doesn't take that much to turn things around, for a year at least. Keeping it up when we get back in Europe is a different question.
 
We can be optimistic about Amorim rebuilding once again (as he did in Sporting) and we can only pray for being successful again.
Generally I am optimistic before every game, sobering usually starts during 5th minute of match.
 
Watching our Prem games this year it's incredibly hard for me to have any optimism for next season.
 
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