[saivet]

Not called anyone out today, but basically said the defenders aren't good enough and all our attackers are low on confidence. Improvement..

 

[sunama]

Lukaku wasn't always so static, was he? It's like he's got cement in his boots. Just bafflingly bad play from a centre forward.

Has he put on weight? If so, that could be it.

 

[Camy89]

Tonight's game: Frustrating and slow. First of all, it looked promising in the first 15mins when there was pressing and attempt to win the ball. This was coupled with the fact Valencia actually lost possession and allowed us to build up another attack. However, after 15mins, the build up was incredibly slow, very static movement from the players especially in the midfield and almost no pressing. The reason for this? Who knows.

Valencia looked dangerous with their cutbacks and constantly penetrated the right flank. This went unpunished for the the whole of the first half. Fortunately for us, their finishing was poor and quite honestly scraped a draw, at home.

There was a clear disconnect between the players and many wayward and stupid passes.

Lukaku, he had a couple of good chances, but for the majority was incredibly poor. His movement was non-existent, to the point the commentators mentioned it live on BT. He ambled about expecting the delivery rather than going to try and work for it and support the midfield.

Sanchez was poor again and rightfully substituted by Martial, who, quite honestly, was a breath of a fresh air. He seems the only player (perhaps maybe Rashford too) who will actually take on a player.

Set pieces were overall poor, with a couple of decent free kicks.

Overall we never genuinely looked like winning. There was a lethargic feel about the whole thing and by the end I felt myself being pleased we didn't concede rather than scoring. That's not a good opinion to have.

Moving forward: In my opinion, the Mourinho rot has well and truly set in. There is a toxic feel about the club it's quite clear the players are not connected/in sync on the field, that has been apparent for some time now.

Mourinho is currently floating on a life raft of winning the Europa league and finishing 2nd last season. Since then our rivals have made significant improvements to allow them to compete, most notably Chelsea and Liverpool, we are some way away from being on their level, controversial as that may seem. I understand this isn't all Jose's fault and blame must be put on Woodward for the stagnation the club has seen over the summer.

Regardless, once there is a divide between manger and players, it is a wound that cannot be healed. We will continue to see performances like this until the upper echelons on United see fit to make a change.

Personally, I cannot see either Mourinho or Pogba being here next season. Mourinho will have been forced out eventually (that, to me anyway, is inevitable, it just remains to be seen what timescale is given to this) and Pogba will be happy to move on from this, quite frankly, shit show. From there I hope we can appoint a forward thinking, approachable manager who can build the team into a free-flowing, attack minded and tactically astute team we need to even think about pushing for the league again, let alone Champion's League.

 

[Berbaclass]

Don’t see why we played Matic and Fellaini together from the start. Too negative from the get go.

 

[Ban]

That’s the spirit

I know, right.

 

[Mick321]

Disgusting interview, he’s a disgrace and I can’t blame any of the players for despising him. It must be a horrendous place to go to work each morning, despite the cash they are only human and he inspires no one, hangs people out to dry and plays cowardly football.

 

[Minimalist]

Jaysus. Jose’s post match interview is so depressing. Basically saying we over-achieved massively last season. He’s not wrong tbf. It is hard to believe that this same squad of players finished ahead of every club bar City.

But everyone told us we were wrong to expect things to slide back this year?

Our worries about the playing style were unfounded? We got 2nd, why did we care if we played like Stoke?

Having feck all chances created was just a by-product of being a counter-attack team (even though we clearly aren't)?

I mean it's almost like we knew this was likely to happen.

Should have sacked him in the summer when he was mouthing off like a tit.

 

[AltiUn]

This team would've demolished Valencia, even without a manager:

De Gea
Dalot Bailly Lindelöf Shaw
Pereira
Fred Pogba
Sanchez Rashford Martial​

That entire team would lack any chemistry with half of them bang out of form sadly. Also I wouldn't have Lindelof anywhere near our starting 11.

 

[SteveJ]

Operating Theatre of Dreams.

 

[Sultan]

Bad news: he’s not quitting

Good news: nobody got thrown under the bus (apart from his defence, his midfield and his attackers) no individuals though. That’s good

There was an indirect dig at Woodward.

 

[Seven Seas Sardines]

Bailly and Lindelof together? Did you not see the Brighton game? They are dreadful together.

At home in the CL against a ball-playing team is a different beast than away in the PL to teams playing the Mourinho way lumping it up to giants.

 

[wolvored]

I thought we didn't play too badly in the second half. There is still life in this team and this manager.

Wheres the white text?

 

[saivet]

Ohh and he also spoke of how phenomenal last season was finishing 2nd and making the FA Cup final..

 

[MJJ]

zZzZzZz the theatre of dreams

Maybe he is trying to summon Zidane.

 

[Sultan]

The worst case scenario would be to drop down to the Europa League.

 

[SAFFID]

Am I the only one who is worried by the fact that Mourinho only made one substitution tonight? And that was in 76th minute! To me that says; Mourinho was satisfied, not only with the result, but also with the performance. And THAT boggles my mind. Or of course it says; Mourinho doesn't trust any of the players he has on the bench, except for Martial (who he doesn't like either).

 

[Im red2]

The blame lies at the top, they are the people responsible for running the club.

 

[Siorac]

Comically terrible game between two hilariously inept teams.

You can, however, play fun drinking games with this current United side. Depending on how you want to approach the game - whether protecting your liver or getting plastered is the aim -, you can either drink every time we string together three consecutive passes in the opposition half or drink every time Lukaku miscontrols a ball.

 

[KomodoBadger]

Well, at least we didn’t lose...

 

[korenmanutd]

At home in the CL against a ball-playing team is a different beast than away in the PL to teams playing the Mourinho way lumping it up to giants.

Except it's actually us trying to lump it to giants in PL away games, while they play attacking free flowing football against us.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

But everyone told us we were wrong to expect things to slide back this year?

Our worries about the playing style were unfounded? We got 2nd, why did we care if we played like Stoke?

Having feck all chances created was just a by-product of being a counter-attack team (even though we clearly aren't)?

I mean it's almost like we knew this was likely to happen.

Should have sacked him in the summer when he was mouthing off like a tit.

Are those questions aimed at me?

 

[Im red2]

Maybe he is tired after his World Cup run (see Harry Kane).

He is far too slow and his football brain is the size of an atom .

 

[JohnnyKills]

We started a bit like the Spurs game, plenty of effort but little control. Then we blew ourselves out.

Valencia looks like he's coming to the end now. But Shaw did well and Matic was better than he has been.

We should give Rashford and Martial a run together now, with Sánchez on the bench. It's not like we're going to lose anything by trying it.

 

[Minimalist]

Are those questions aimed at me?

Nah not directly at you but an awful lot of people said these things (or dismissed them rather).

 

[FootyGirl88]

There was an indirect dig at Woodward.

I don't know why Woodward is even putting up with it - the football is one thing but slagging off your boss in public is another

 

[Darkhorsez]

Operating Theatre of Dreams.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

Comically terrible game between two hilariously inept teams.

You can, however, play fun drinking games with this current United side. Depending on how you want to approach the game - whether protecting your liver or getting plastered is the aim -, you can either drink every time we string together three consecutive passes in the opposition half or drink every time Lukaku miscontrols a ball.

Aye

I don't think it should be understated just how shite Valencia were.

 

[sunama]

The Arsene Wenger jokes aren't funny, it's scary that people have such short memories they'd actually welcome him.

Many would welcome Wenger. Then in a few months, those same people would want him sacked, too.
They simply want another toy to play with.

If you sack Jose, you need to have a better replacement ready....and that's not Wenger.

 

[Handsome Devil]

Was our Dear Leader Ed there tonight?

 

[RedNed77]

He is definitely not at his best and is losing confidence with every miss. And as you pointed out, we do not create as many clear-cut chances so "if you snooze you lose".

Confidence is so important in football and right now, we don't have any. Not in the players, manager or tactics.

On his day he’s great. But he had a fallow patch of 8-10 weeks last year where he was awful. I’m just not sure we can accommodate that if it’s going to be a regular occurrence.

 

[TMDaines]

I don't have a problem with us losing - but there's something seriously wrong with the performances. Not sure if it's lack of effort or something worse - complete brain freeze. Every time United have a match, I look forward to it, every friggin time - and every time I watch professional players resembling our local Sunday league. It's absolutely nothing to do with trophies, or even winning.

Yeah, it’s not good. It isn’t an acceptable level of performance, but I don’t see XI men not trying. I see an XI low on confidence and lacking real leadership and direction. By far the biggest factor in succeeding in sport is having that team spirit and believe. It’s why Fergie could make our squad men look like world-beaters.

If Mourinho went tomorrow, top managers would love to take charge of United as there is a lot of potential still there and the team are at their lowest ebb. They couldn’t be playing worse.

 

[BeforeKeanetherewasRobson]

We'll have to at least draw in Valencia to get out the group.

Nah, we'll beat Juve home and away. Piece of piss, we're just lulling them into a false sense of security by pretending to be average.

 

[wolvored]

Jaysus. Jose’s post match interview is so depressing. Basically saying we over-achieved massively last season. He’s not wrong tbf. It is hard to believe that this same squad of players finished ahead of every club bar City.

He said we massively overachieved, and hes right. we had luck that Chelsea were way off the boil

 

[SuperiorXI]

No, again, I disagree. I imagine Pogba’s average position was quite a bit deeper than Fellaini’s. Fellaini was more advanced on the right, with Pogba having to constantly drop deep on the left to get moves started.

Fellaini and Matic were absolutely not a double pivot or two holding midfielders today.

You are missing the point. This club demands quality of the highest calibre. If you play an XI with two players of the Fellaini/Matic calibre against the likes of Valencia you are dead. We're not Everton.

 

[BusbyMalone]

Operating Theatre of Dreams.

And Jose's the anesthesiologist

 

[pascell]

What did Jose say post match, anyone any links?

 

[Darkhorsez]

Was our Dear Leader Ed there tonight?

Yes

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Nah not directly at you but an awful lot of people said these things (or dismissed them rather).

Fair enough. The warning signs were definitely there. Our keeper making as many saves as keepers at relegation clubs. Our chance conversion stats through the roof despite creatiing very few chances. It was obviously not sustainable.

 

[Fooza]

The worst case scenario would be to drop down to the Europa League.

By the time we do there'll be a good chance we are way off top 4 and nothing to play for in the premier league.

 

[Yagami]

The worst case scenario would be to drop down to the Europa League.

I think we will. This was a must win game, imo. I can see us losing away to Valencia and both games against Juve.

Usually, despite being José out, I'd still back him to get a reaction out of us after a bad result or poor run, but it doesn't seem like it's going to happen. I expected us to beat Wolves, beat Derby, comeback against West Ham after going a goal down, and expected a win tonight. It just doesn't look like we're going to pick ourselves up anytime soon.