[Cee90]

Still frustrated this morning that we didn’t pick up the 3 points. It feels like 2 point lost to me.

 

[Coops73]

Should of won this, we were the much better team. Greenwood ahead of James and Pogba definitely made the difference when he came on.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

Lads and lasses. Great to be back and finally having something to moan about eh?
Felt like a pre season game TBH

 

[Feed Me]

It’s a decent point all things considered. There was a visible improvement during the game, which suggests to me there was an element of blowing the cobwebs away. The beauty now is that the games come thick and fast, meaning we should get rhythm, while our deep squad should theoretically place us at an advantage versus smaller sides with shallower pools. All of our games are winnable, whereas our top four rivals - on paper - would appear to have tougher fixtures so it’s all to play for. I would be starting Greenwood and Pogba in the majority of matches from here on in.

As an aside, interesting to see people get on Martial’s back as usual but Rashford getting a relatively free ride. Both need to sharpen up considerably but only one has good PR.

De Gea should not play for the club again. Sick of the sight of him.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

It’s a decent point all things considered. There was a visible improvement during the game, which suggests to me there was an element of blowing the cobwebs away. The beauty now is that the games come thick and fast, meaning we should get rhythm, while our deep squad should theoretically place us at an advantage versus smaller sides with shallower pools. All of our games are winnable, whereas our top four rivals - on paper - would appear to have tougher fixtures so it’s all to play for. I would be starting Greenwood and Pogba in the majority of matches from here on in.

As an aside, interesting to see people get on Martial’s back as usual but Rashford getting a relatively free ride. Both need to sharpen up considerably but only one has good PR.

De Gea should not play for the club again. Sick of the sight of him.

You think Rashford’s work was all about PR?

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

I think the goal wasn't De Gea. I'd blame Maguire and Lindelofs pace before De Gea. The shot was too powerful. I blame Lloris for the draw. He was excellent. They also parked the bus but we still cut them open which is unusual and a positive sign.

 

[FootyGirl88]

He's a proven, high class, player . Only problem with him is age.

Yep - he was doing well when he came back into the team before the lockdown. Not sure why Ole didn't start him.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

Yep - he was doing well when he came back into the team before the lockdown. Not sure why Ole didn't start him.

Squad rotation. He’ll get plenty of chances

 

[Andersons Dietician]

First half wasn’t great at all but there were certainly signs in the second half that looked like we were at it.

That pass from Pogba to Rashford offfft, Bruno played a couple of nice ones to Martial as well.

 

[Grizzly B]

Before Christmas we would have lost that game after going 1-0 down, so I don’t feel too bad that we got a point.

Created enough to win the game, when our opponents were sitting deep which is something we have really struggled to do.

A lot of positives from the game and reasons to be optimistic that we can get top 4.

 

[Buster15]

It’s a decent point all things considered. There was a visible improvement during the game, which suggests to me there was an element of blowing the cobwebs away. The beauty now is that the games come thick and fast, meaning we should get rhythm, while our deep squad should theoretically place us at an advantage versus smaller sides with shallower pools. All of our games are winnable, whereas our top four rivals - on paper - would appear to have tougher fixtures so it’s all to play for. I would be starting Greenwood and Pogba in the majority of matches from here on in.

As an aside, interesting to see people get on Martial’s back as usual but Rashford getting a relatively free ride. Both need to sharpen up considerably but only one has good PR.

De Gea should not play for the club again. Sick of the sight of him.

Martial made little or no significant contribution. Whereas Rashford was far more involved.

DDG is so frustrating. One terrible error followed by a very good save.
I just think his concentration is all wrong.

 

[Feed Me]

You think Rashford’s work was all about PR?

Don’t be silly. His work outside of the pitch has been fantastic and he deserves nothing but credit for that. My point is that he gets a free ride for a poor performance in comparison to someone like Martial. They were both well below par, although I thought Tony was marginally better.

 

[Feed Me]

Martial made little or no significant contribution. Whereas Rashford was far more involved.

DDG is so frustrating. One terrible error followed by a very good save.
I just think his concentration is all wrong.

Martial was a world class save away from a brilliant goal and I thought he was better in the second half when dropping deeper to knit the play together. I don’t mind when he comes to the ball like that because it creates space that the likes of Rashford and Greenwood can ghost into.

De Gea is a disaster at this stage. His frequency of mistakes is higher than any United keeper I have known. We pay a King’s Ransom for the privilege of this crap.

 

[Buster15]

Matic has to start. He has the ability to bring the ball out through dribbling or a penetrative pass at a much faster speed. And he was a clear difference maker as soon as he was on the pitch. As much as Fred has done well this season, he always has a mistake in him and needs that cover of another midfielder behind him.

Agree with you on Matic. He gives us more balance in midfield and is physically stronger. And that was evident as soon as he came on.

By the way. Great to be talking about football instead of shaving your bum hair.
Someone will understand that.

 

[Dante]

Don’t be silly. His work outside of the pitch has been fantastic and he deserves nothing but credit for that. My point is that he gets a free ride for a poor performance in comparison to someone like Martial. They were both well below par, although I thought Tony was marginally better.

Rashford's Player Performance thread has 65 posts while Martial's has 62. Both received a similar level of excuses versus criticism.

Neither got a free ride over the other.

 

[Drz]

Was having a shi*ty day yesterday, and come game time I just felt it was not going to go our way today.
But superstition aside, have to say Spurs stature and Mourinho are a good fit. The constant diving and persistent fouling from their team served them well.
If any United player put their foot in late in a challenge or fouled the opposition coming from the back 3 times in a game they'd probably be sent off for two yellow carded offenses. Yet Lamela didn't even get a card for his offenses.
Noticed since Mourinho took over at Spurs, the level of "tactical fouling" produced by their team overall has gone up to "sh*thousery" rank.
They will get away with it on the short-term, it will be particularly helpful for Mourinho's cowardly approach to the game, but long-term I don't think it will help them.

On our side, Keane was harsh, but the goal we conceded was poor team play by those involved, Marcus's touch laying it off to the opposition (not the first time this exact thing has happened), Maguire not dealing with it, De Gea fluffing at a shot hit right at him.
Overall we played well but lacked sharpness, and we lost confidence for a bit after taking a hit from a goal conceded against the run of play.
In the first half decent, but lacking penetration in the box. In the second, much better, with the opposition in "spectator" mode, but not taking our chances.
Martial should have had a brace. And Lloris made a fantastic reaction save from Rashford's 1st half attempt.

Pogba seems football ready, but needs to learn how to press the opposition without tripping them. He was so good when he came on though.
Rashford on the other hand seems to need more game time and football fitness to get into his groove.
I love D. James, but his decision making compared to the start of the season seems a bit impaired. On a few occasions it was evident that he chose the safe lateral or back pass when forward option(s) were available to him. So maybe a confidence issue that needs resolving there.
The good news is Greenwood. He really looks the part now: attitude, technique and general composure on the pitch when he stepped-in. He is a genuine threat to the opposition, even if played on the right, and he has earned his starting spot. A shame he shot just wide when he got his chance, but the more he plays the more I feel confident he will endeavour to carve out chances.

Enjoyed watching the team play again.

 

[mitchmouse]

To be honest, I'd have settled for one point at the start, given the strange circumstances. But given how quiet we kept Kane and Son, I am a bit disappointed now. The goal we gave them was like schoolboy defending and it is time for DDG to be replaced: mistake after mistake after mistake. Can't really disagree with Keano's rant. On a positive side: we defended beer in the second half andI actually thought Shaw had a good second 45 minutes. Pogba had one of his most effective displays and Bruno is one of the best players we've bought in years. We still ned to top-class midfielders or one and a winger who can actually cross the ball. Over all a 6.5 or 7 out of 10.

 

[Web of Bissaka]

MoTM -- Black Lives Matter

Worse player -- Black Lives Matter

 

[Web of Bissaka]

Spurs is officially not a top team.

We, United, the players known for big game raisers this season, didn't raise their game.

 

[Jericholyte2]

The key point I’ve taken from this game, and it’s something we’ve known for a long time, is that we cannot build on the CB partnership with Maguire and Lindelof. There just isn’t the pace to handle speedy forwards.

It’s fine having one of them as the Rio-Vidic axis showed, but you cannot have both CBs be as slow as these two are. We need to have Bailly in as Maguire's partner until we can identify a fast, quality CB to partner him more long-term.

 

[Dante]

Rashford's touch wasn't that bad under the circumstances. The only other thing he could have done is take the ball away from goal. But he wanted to keep relatively central so as not to lose the goal-scoring chance. It was an understandable decision.

Sanchez deserves the credit for defending well.

 

[simplyared]

Easy with hindsight but looking at the way the game developed we could have started with a stronger line-up and been in front going into the break. Fred shouldn't be making the starting line-up. Vastly overrated on here imo! Obviously Pogba from the beginning. Greenwood has matured and is imv the best prospect in the PL right now. Has that extra edge and should be starting games for us. A real gem! Spurs played in true Mourinho fashion (wouldn't be happy if I was a Spurs fan) : boring and defensive! Not many clear cut chances for us. Thought Martial should have done better with one of them though. However on the whole a decent performance with more positives than negatives. I'm optimistic!

 

[Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber]

de gea has been in shocking form this season

 

[gajender]

The key point I’ve taken from this game, and it’s something we’ve known for a long time, is that we cannot build on the CB partnership with Maguire and Lindelof. There just isn’t the pace to handle speedy forwards.

It’s fine having one of them as the Rio-Vidic axis showed, but you cannot have both CBs be as slow as these two are. We need to have Bailly in as Maguire's partner until we can identify a fast, quality CB to partner him more long-term.

Rio was rapid but I never thought Vidic was slow either and both of them were brilliant one on one defenders as well as you need to be when playing for top teams who attack consistently but neither of Maguire and Lindelof exude that confidence when isolated.

 

[Glorio]

I'm usually a big fan of him but I thought Wan Bissaka was dreadful going forward today. I often think it's an unfair accusation people level at him but there must have been three or four times he got it and did nothing of any worth today.

Other than that, good to see Pogba looking fighting fit and the unbeaten run goes on. Spurs away was never going to be a walk in the park!

Onwards!

Wan Bissaka picked up markedly and consistently in his attacking play before the enforced break, and I actually seem to remember a game (maybe wolves) where for the most part, he was our best attacking outlet. With him, I think it's a confidence, rather than an ability issue, as he never had to go forward when playing as a fullback at Palace.

I suspect that the more we play after the break, the more confident he'll get.


Nail on the head in your last comment - this isn't Norwich guys, it's the first game back from the longest break the players have every known, and we dominated the game for good periods against Spurs. It was a decent performance

 

[Backrow Singer]

I thought we were fine, second half I thought we played pretty well to be fair. A really poor bit of defending and goal keeping has cost us 3 points.

It’s just a matter of being more clinical in both boxes. In between the two boxes I think we’re looking good on the whole but if you don’t take the chances you create and you gift goals to the opposition, it doesn’t show for anything.

 

[Glorio]

Could unrealistic expectations be getting the better of us guys?

I think we're being overly harsh and quite disrespectful to the level of opponent we played. Spurs conceded a lot of goals prior to the break, but that was without the workmanlike Son defending from the front, and also against lesser teams where they had to take the initiative and attack.

This was a very different scenario, and we may be underestimating how good José is at parking the bus. This wasn't a typical low ranking PL team hanging on for dear life just because they lacked quality. This was a big game, against high quality internationals in a team that played in the Champions League final last year, and were no doubt motivated due to the magnitude of the game.

It's the kind of game pundits would have called a "José defensive masterclass" had Spurs survived. The minute we let in a goal, it was always going to be an uphill task. Don't forget Spurs turned the free flowing City over, and we did manage to unlock them, albeit via a penalty.

We also created a decent amount of chances considering, as chances don't just mean shots on goal. Unfortunately the lack of sharpness showed in the accuracy of the shots, and also the speed in getting said shots off as we saw with Martial and Rashford.

On the side, If I were a Spurs fan, I'd be wondering what José's feeling so smug about to be honest. They needed the win more than we did, and a draw is not a bad result for us away against the most difficult team (on paper) left for us to play.

 

[freddie the red]

Pogba showed last night why he's very much many people's dream and other's nightmare.
All Utd fans know that he has everything to make him one of the best midfielders in the world, skill, physique, athleticism, height, dribbling, passing, heading, scoring etc., etc. but, but when he can't be arsed he's a liability and over 3-4 years now he's been the latter and not the former.
So damned frustrating.

 

[Brightonian]

I thought more than anything else it was a really promising performance. Yes, it's frustrating because if we'd played them when originally scheduled we'd have battered them, and because we were the better team, and because it was a mostly past-his-best Mourinho doing what he used to do so reliably back in his glory days, and because at full fitness we would have been able to push that little bit harder in the second half and been that little bit sharper and won the game.

But we learned key lessons. Pogba and Bruno definitely can play together, and indeed must play together from now on whenever possible. In most of our remaining games of the season, oppositions will defend deep and therefore Greenwood is a better option on the right than James. Fred or Matic should be the third midfielder most of the time, as McTominay excels when the opposition is better than us, but can struggle when the opposition is inferior (as was the case yesterday).

There was only one thing from the game yesterday that feels like a problem that might persist going forward, rather than just lockdown rustiness, and that was Wan Bissaka's choices. He has to play to his strengths, and not try and be something he's not. He will never have the close control to dribble at defenders, and our attacks fall apart as he dummies back and forth trying to gee himself up to have a go. He needs to watch lots of videos of peak Gary Neville, and follow suit: defend unstoppably (he's already got that part on lock), and cross early, from deep. Don't dawdle on the ball and don't dribble.

 

[Brightonian]

Pogba showed last night why he's very much many people's dream and other's nightmare.
All Utd fans know that he has everything to make him one of the best midfielders in the world, skill, physique, athleticism, height, dribbling, passing, heading, scoring etc., etc. but, but when he can't be arsed he's a liability and over 3-4 years now he's been the latter and not the former.
So damned frustrating.

I don't really see what he did yesterday that had anything to do with him being not arsed or a liability. He worked hard, actually defended quite effectively (Spurs barely had a decent chance in the period he was on the pitch) and obviously did his thing well in attack. I don't dispute he can have the qualities you mention, but he didn't show them yesterday so it seems harsh to bring them up.

 

[Glorio]

Is there a more frustrating attacking pair than rashford and martial? I dunno what they do in training but as soon a as the start whistle blows their brains lose any football intelligence. Sometimes they have some moments of magic but after a game like today they seem more like flukes than actual ability

35 goals combined, and you call those flukes? The way folks are carrying on, maybe we should just sell the whole squad of hopeless oafs. Honestly, I don't know where people crawl out from with these entitled views. You'd think Spurs just came along to fly kites and watch us run past them.

 

[Stevondo8]

1st half was lackluster, but perhaps to be expected given the time off and the lack of game time in preparation, they’ve had a longer off-season followed by a shorter pre-season to get back into the swing of things. Maguire and DDG massively at fault for their goal, and first half especially they were getting through our midfield far too easily.

2nd half was much improved I thought. Fitness looked good as spurs clearly tired and dropped deeper and deeper. Pogba rinsed Dier well and truly in build up to penalty, maybe could have pinched a win too but on reflection draw probably about right.

 

[Bilbo]

Wow I got extremely drunk yesterday so I barely remember the game apart from us being much the better team and Pogba playing well. Will watch the replay and report back

 

[Feed Me]

Rashford's Player Performance thread has 65 posts while Martial's has 62. Both received a similar level of excuses versus criticism.

Neither got a free ride over the other.

Sorry I should have been more clear. I was factoring I’m not just RedCafe feedback but also Sky Sports coverage. They were quite vocal about Martial’s lack of involvement. Yet at one point, Neville said Rashford “looks really sharp”. He didn’t.

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

What formation did we use when Pogba came one? Thinking 4-3-3

 

[Withnail]

I think the goal wasn't De Gea. I'd blame Maguire and Lindelofs pace before De Gea. The shot was too powerful. I blame Lloris for the draw. He was excellent. They also parked the bus but we still cut them open which is unusual and a positive sign.

De Gea of a few seasons ago does not get beaten by that shot.

Regardless of the defensive errors in the build up there's is definitely something up with him.

Let's hope it was rustiness and he can get back to his best but I'm losing patience that he can get his consistency back. Its odd as 29 isn't old for a keeper.

 

[Buster15]

What formation did we use when Pogba came one? Thinking 4-3-3

Why do we get so hung up on formations.
442, 433. The best teams don't stick to a specific formation.
The best teams play the most flexible and fluid styles and adapt to the constantly changing conditions.

 

[jamesjimmybyrondean]

Why do we get so hung up on formations.
442, 433. The best teams don't stick to a specific formation.
The best teams play the most flexible and fluid styles and adapt to the constantly changing conditions.

Cause its how I know the shape of the team .

 

[lysglimt]

we now have made so much progress that we are sitting here complaining about the players and the manager for not beating Spurs away. That should tell us something.

 

[diarm]

Will Chelsea give us many more chances to close the gap though

Every side I've seen so far have looked leggy in their first game back. Sure, City looked comfortable against Arsenal but only after they'd self imploded as only Arsenal can.

I think Chelsea will struggle against a Villa side who have 90 minutes of football in their legs and are now battling frantically against relegation.