Edgar Allan Pillow
Ero-Sennin
We used Park to man mark Barca, right? It is not really something that should surprise our staff imo. It's been a tried and tested tactic and would work well with a player like Pogba. After this match, I'd not be surprised if other teams resorted to this too.I think we are being a bit harsh on Ole. Maybe he did miss a bit in his substitutions this match, but he is somewhat limited by his personnel. If Kimpembe gets sent off in the first half, which he surely deserved (how is the foul on Shaw not even whistled, much less a second yellow), we are all talking about how brilliant his game plan was. Plan A was the right plan, and it was working IMHO, but it’s hard when two of your four key attackers get injured.
Man-marking rarely happens at this level. I think the staff was understandably surprised. Pushing Pogba out to the wing in a midfield 4 would have forced Tuchel to either push Marquinhos out to mark Pogba, or pull Alves up to mark him leaving space in behind.
I disagree that Shaw was a problem, or that one game defines our left side attack. Martial was poor, missing Lingard’s pass that was slightly behind him, but I’m not going to let that change my opinion of his overall ability.
I believe that even Sir Alex Ferguson, the greatest manager ever, made a tactical mistake on occasion. Let’s not condemn OGS for a loss that, frankly, we all thought was the most likely outcome when we saw the draw. Throw in a bribed referee and it was never going to happen.
I'm not harsh on Ole. After Mou, he's something that rekindled my excitement in watching United play. But at same time, we should accept that both in player quality and tactically we were behind PSG. No harm in accepting that, learning from it and moving on rather than bucking down into "we did the best and no improvement was possible" way of thinking.