Ratcliffe involved in football decisions? | Not really; read the article

You can read this via archive - just seems a bit sad really. He fought with everyone, his coaches seem useless and it just reads a man slowly succumbing to external pressure and imploding. Hard to feel sorry for someone who got £10m pay off and £6.5m a year for getting a team to finish 15th mind you.

It also doesn't seem like anyone interfered at all - it points out some had offered him advice/their opinion but he clearly had final say and always would do on all selection issues and tactics. I honestly think it's no deeper than him ego tripping over the Wolves gamble backfiring and, likely, getting a grilling from Ineos on dropping points to such a poor team. His reaction is to demand multiple signings and the club obviously just says that's not how they want to/can operate.
 
It depends on the extent of it. Everyone has their opinion, is he exerting his authority? I’m wary of reports like this, it always sounds worse when summarised.
 
He probably would have had a better win ratio than Amorim if he had taken control of the selecting the team and tactics.
 
That headline is one hell of a reach, given what's stated in the article. But if you need something else to get angry about, there you go.
 
If he does what I think is right then I'm OK with it

If he does what I think is wrong then I'm not ok with it.
 
Is Mbeumo at right wing back a wild idea?

He did a lot of his best work at Brentford picking the ball up deep, hugging the right touchline and coming in on his left foot. I think he's also more direct and a better crosser of the ball than Amad. Also better with his right foot than Amad is, allowing him to go to the by line and cross/cut the ball back.

Amad on the other hand is better in the half spaces than Mbeumo, in my opinion.

To me, when playing Amad and Mbeumo together, Amad often seems to be in the positions that Mbeumo wanted to be in.

I mean, despite what The Athletic said re Semenyo, we all know that Amorim would have ended up playing him at left wing back. So would Mbeumo at RWB be that crazy?

Likely a mute point now as we hopefully will never see a 3421 being employed by a United team again.

Going forward, I think we are going to see Mbeumo become a far better player at United when played as a right sided forward, with a full back like Maz behind him and not getting in his way, like Amad would. And that is not a knock on Amad, its just he nature of having two very similar players playing different positions but naturally wanting to be in the same areas.
 
gaffs said:
Is Mbeumo at right wing back a wild idea?

He did a lot of his best work at Brentford picking the ball up deep, hugging the right touchline and coming in on his left foot. I think he's also more direct and a better crosser of the ball than Amad. Also better with his right foot than Amad is, allowing him to go to the by line and cross/cut the ball back.

Amad on the other hand is better in the half spaces than Mbeumo, in my opinion.

To me, when playing Amad and Mbeumo together, Amad often seems to be in the positions that Mbeumo wanted to be in.

I mean, despite what The Athletic said re Semenyo, we all know that Amorim would have ended up playing him at left wing back. So would Mbeumo at RWB be that crazy?

Likely a mute point now as we hopefully will never see a 3421 being employed by a United team again.

Going forward, I think we are going to see Mbeumo become a far better player at United when played as a right sided forward, with a full back like Maz behind him and not getting in his way, like Amad would. And that is not a knock on Amad, its just he nature of having two very similar players playing different positions but naturally wanting to be in the same areas.
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Considering neither Wilcox or Jim liked the 3 at the back it sounds more to me like he probably just said "Why doesn't he just play bloody Mbeumo at right back" in frustration.
 
gaffs said:
Bad owernship is allowing the shit show to continue and letting your manager try and prove his point with his shitty system and throwing good money at bad.
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Or just sack the manager and don’t hire a one dimensional manager.
 
I’m not excusing them for their failures but I think every manager except for Ole has expressed a deep disappointment in the board at OT. That doesn’t look like it will change with INEOS.
 
gaffs said:
Bad owernship is allowing the shit show to continue and letting your manager try and prove his point with his shitty system and throwing good money at bad.
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Then you sack him if it doesn't work. But you dont try and intervene when you have absolutely no clue what you are talking about yourself
 
Ratcliffe doing worse than Woodward if he's actively influencing footballing decisions
 
This lot remind me on shit what happens in low tier leagues (probably not England but in some countries). Local businessman buys a club, puts his friends on important roles and then they play live football manager. I was joking yesterday about Sir Jim telling Cunha how to strike the ball but it seems that i wasn't too far from that.
 
Godfather said:
Then you sack him if it doesn't work. But you dont try and intervene when you have absolutely no clue what you are talking about yourself
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I mean he did sack him. And Ratcliffe didn't directly tell Amorim to switch systems, he brought it up that maybe his system that wins 1 out of 3 games isn't working and to try something else (valid point).

I hardly have an issue with how the article laid it out. He wasn't storming into Amorim's office non stop, he essentially brought up two valid questions after a year of dogshit results. I promise any owner who's actually invested/cares about the club day to day probably suggests things similar to this to their underlings as well.

Now if he was directly trying to tell Amorim what to do, I'd have a way bigger issue with it.
 
OverratedOpinion said:
Considering neither Wilcox or Jim liked the 3 at the back it sounds more to me like he probably just said "Why doesn't he just play bloody Mbeumo at right back" in frustration.
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We don't know when it was said. The Mbeumo comment may have been at the time of signing, not in the recent push for four at the back. As you say, it would make no sense to suggest that it was in recent weeks, especially with Mbeumo being at AFCON and the indications that Amorim was moving to four at the back.

As with all of these longform Laurie Whitwell / Athletic articles, there is a lot of content and snippets of information, but they often lack any order or context. Which is guess is what happens when you are a journalist and you are picking up information from multiple sources, who may or may not have been in the room when it happened.

They get clipped up and all of a sudden the narrative is "Ratcliffe is meddling and demanding Mbeumo be played at wing back", when it could easily have been him saying "could Mbeumo also be used at right wing back", when discussing the transfer and how versatile the player could be.

Like the article he wrote about United summer window that people talk about daily. Amorim wanted a midfielder but Wilcox signed Sesko. Zero context about who the viable midfield targets were and if it was possible to move any of current midfielders on to make room.
 
Godfather said:
Then you sack him if it doesn't work. But you dont try and intervene when you have absolutely no clue what you are talking about yourself
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He clearly does have a clue because the general consensus is that this squad was not equipped to play Amorims system and likely wouldn't be for some time.

Amorim admitted that himself last week...
"We don't have a lot of players and we need to adapt, but they already know and understand why we are changing."
He even admitted that from day one he didn't have the players...
""When I came here last season, I understood that maybe I DON'T have the players to play well in that system"
Which led him to get spikey and refuse to clarify those comments pre the Leeds game.,...
https://www.goal.com/en-us/lists/ma...-formation-tense-exchange/blt10e0b59034fe98d6

I know fans don't like it, but the owner and DOF should have a say, especially when in this case the decision was seemingly quite binary.....

1. Continue to play in Amorims way and "struggle" until he gets all the players he needs, which the owner / club has to fund.
2. Adapt to a 433, potentially improve results in the short term and build towards Amorims goals in the long term, which as per the Athletic article, Wilcox said he was willing to work with Amorim on.

All very strange that Amorim was looking like he was ready to adapt, did so v Bouthmouth and Newcastle, then reverted v Wolves. For me, this was about him trying to prove a point, not about doing what was best fr the team / club. That led to players becoming confused and likely passing that onto Wilcox to feedback to Amorim.
 
Irwin99 said:
I’m not excusing them for their failures but I think every manager except for Ole has expressed a deep disappointment in the board at OT. That doesn’t look like it will change with INEOS.
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Pretty standard for a manager to blame others after they get sacked for underperforming. Not good for future prospects if they say they had everything going for them to be a success and they were still shit
 
gaffs said:
He clearly does have a clue because the general consensus is that this squad was not equipped to play Amorims system and likely wouldn't be for some time.

Amorim admitted that himself last week...
"We don't have a lot of players and we need to adapt, but they already know and understand why we are changing."
He even admitted that from day one he didn't have the players...
""When I came here last season, I understood that maybe I DON'T have the players to play well in that system"
Which led him to get spikey and refuse to clarify those comments pre the Leeds game.,...
https://www.goal.com/en-us/lists/ma...-formation-tense-exchange/blt10e0b59034fe98d6

I know fans don't like it, but the owner and DOF should have a say, especially when in this case the decision was seemingly quite binary.....

1. Continue to play in Amorims way and "struggle" until he gets all the players he needs, which the owner / club has to fund.
2. Adapt to a 433, potentially improve results in the short term and build towards Amorims goals in the long term, which as per the Athletic article, Wilcox said he was willing to work with Amorim on.

All very strange that Amorim was looking like he was ready to adapt, did so v Bouthmouth and Newcastle, then reverted v Wolves. For me, this was about him trying to prove a point, not about doing what was best fr the team / club. That led to players becoming confused and likely passing that onto Wilcox to feedback to Amorim.
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That is some proper waffle. The brilliant idea of Ratcliffe was to play Mbeumo as RWB. Yeah shows of real insight. Owners should NEVER interfere with tactics of their managers. It never leads to anything useful. If you arent happy with the manager sack him but don't try to sell a professional football manager your idea of strategy and tactics. DoFs and their roles are not in discussion here. This is about Ratcliffe and his interference
 
Godfather said:
It's a sign of bad ownership and never ever works.
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I'm not really sure I buy that.

I 100% get getting involved with players playing in positions, but getting cross and holding those he pays to account because of another shit performance is bad owndership? Nah. Pretty sure this happens in small companies up to corporate companies at board room level. I doubt he acts much differently at Utd than he does at INEOS and it seems to have worked there.
 
We do need a new sporting director IMO, I think Jason can do the technical director role as he was brought in to do.
 
You can spot the people on here who don't have professional careers, as they seem completely oblivious to how a company functions internally. In what world wouldn't owners and execs get involved when a manager is tanking the performances of their team and risking significant monetary loss. United are a business ffs
 
Andycoleno9 said:
This lot remind me on shit what happens in low tier leagues (probably not England but in some countries). Local businessman buys a club, puts his friends on important roles and then they play live football manager.
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Alan Wright's recently been appointed as our 'Head of Professional Development', working with the U-18 to U-21 groups.

His career topped out when he was recommended by Jason Wilcox - who played with him at Blackburn, and remained firm friends - to coach Man City's Under-16s. When Wilcox left City, Wright was also replaced shortly after him. He then spent 18 months working for a very mid 'player management agency'.

Now he's fallen right back into a cushy job at United.

Best in class.
 
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AndySmith1990 said:
You can spot the people on here who don't have professional careers, as they seem completely oblivious to how a company functions internally. In what world wouldn't owners and execs get involved when a manager is tanking the performances of their team and risking significant monetary loss. United are a business ffs
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Yeah, I'd imagine he goes around telling all his managers around Ineos to put their staff in different positions, maybe even ones they've never worked in before, or don't even have the skills for.

Why would football be any different?
 
Godfather said:
That is some proper waffle. The brilliant idea of Ratcliffe was to play Mbeumo as RWB. Yeah shows of real insight.
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Tell me how playing Mbeumo at RWB is any crazier than putting Amad there?

Looking forward to your razor sharp analysis.

Godfather said:
Owners should NEVER interfere with tactics of their managers. It never leads to anything useful. If you arent happy with the manager sack him but don't try to sell a professional football manager your idea of strategy and tactics. DoFs and their roles are not in discussion here. This is about Ratcliffe and his interference
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Its is not about him interfering with tactics. As I tried to explain to you, the binary choice that Amorim and the club had. One which Amorim was coming around to, but for some reason reverted back to type. He was coaching his team to play four at the back. His players were on board.

You are talking like Ratcliffe had this wild new idea of playing four at the back and he was the instigator of all of this.

Very likely that there have been many discussions within the hierarchy about our current squad being more suited to a 433 than a 3421 and how long / how much it would take to get the squad into the shape that Amoirm needed to provide a level of consistency and really compete.

Wilcox gave Amoirm the chance to adapt and wanted to work with him long term on Amorims 3421 vision, but Amorim would rather have quit than adapt.

In the same way he refused to adapt in the EL final for the betterment of the club. Big Ange was able to. He would rather lose his way, than win by another mans method.

Good luck to Amorim in finding one of the many jobs that allow him to play 3421. It won't be in the Premier League, that is for sure!
 
I posted the below in a different thread.

He plays there for his national team.

I dont think he would have proposed that idea to Ruben or he wanted him to play there. Probably, when Amad was injured and Ruben was so adamant with his wing back role, he may have just floated that idea.
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Cutch said:
Pretty standard for a manager to blame others after they get sacked for underperforming. Not good for future prospects if they say they had everything going for them to be a success and they were still shit
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I don’t think everyone is that dishonest and plenty will accept their failings.

Again, it doesn’t have to be either/or, both things can be right. Amorim has been bad (true) the board could have signed a midfielder or got rid of a few more players after an abysmal season last year (true).

Jose was not the right man for the job (true) , having a board that only buys you Fred and Dalot the summer after Man City wins the league by nineteen points is ridiculous and will not close the gap (true).
 
gaffs said:
Tell me how playing Mbeumo at RWB is any crazier than putting Amad there?

Looking forward to your razor sharp analysis.
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This is simply not his job. You won't find proper managers when they get the impression the club's owner is interfering with their decisions. Also playing our biggest goal threat this season in that position is hardly a brilliant idea.
 
AndySmith1990 said:
You can spot the people on here who don't have professional careers, as they seem completely oblivious to how a company functions internally. In what world wouldn't owners and execs get involved when a manager is tanking the performances of their team and risking significant monetary loss. United are a business ffs
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To be involved is one thing, meddling is something completely different. Ok, tell me this; do you think that Tuchel, Fergie, Pep, Klopp, Simeone, Jose, LVG.... would allow football "advices" from owner or DoF? Especially rookie DoF like Wilcox.
 
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