He did well to finish 2nd last season, albeit under unique and unusual circumstances. That still didn't justify him being our manager though, he was never up to it and the board should have stuck with their original plan to part ways with him after 6 months and get Poch. I hope sentimentality never impacts their decision making again and they've learned their lesson.
Solskjaer's legacy and his future
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I was referring to how they will fit into gegenpressing. However let's tackle it from your aspect
Heaton - I could never understand Ole's obsession with experienced GKs. Having 3 experienced GKs caused him headaches during the Henderson-Romero-DDG era and saw Romero leaving on a free. So adding Heaton after losing Romero is moronic especially since he also gave Grant a contract extension.
AWB- He reminds me of FBs you would see during the 80s early 90s ie failed CBs who were incredibly solid in defending but have no idea in going forward. He'd probably struggle massively in gegenpressing and with Ten Hag/Pochs
Maguire - God knows what was crossing Ole's mind in allowing the club to spend 80m on him. He's too slow, his positioning is meah and he's certainly not a leader. Once again he's an old fashioned type of CB, a thin skinned version of Terry Butcher
Varane - the Rolls Royce of CBs. Unfortunately he's a bit injury prone which is a problem with gegenpressing as it requires every player to be in prime condition
McShane - McShane wasn't even United level in his prime let alone at age 35. Did the U23 really needed such average CB and did the coaching staff needed another Ole's matey as coach?
Telles - he's the reverse AWB ie his attacking game is flawless but he's got no idea of defending. Mancini tried everything with the lad to teach him how to defend to no avail. He'd probably survive if United switch to a 3-5-2 system
Bruno - mint signing. I can see him do well with modern managers
VDB - A modern CM who can play both as no 10, as a cultured B2B player or be groomed to a deep lying playmaker. God knows why Ole refused to play him especially since he played McFred instead.
Ronaldo - he'll struggle with gegenpressing in its pure form so Rangnick will be forced to make amends to it. Once again he's a signing Ole would do to paper the cracks
James - once again an incredibly outdated type of player. Sure we made a 10m profit out of him but we would have been better off using those 15m to actually buy a player who might have succeeded with us.
Pellistri-Diallo - they were barely ever given a sniff of first team football despite we needed a RW terribly back then. Which comes to no surprise considering that Ole would ignore talent like Hannibal Mejbri as well, preferring to give contracts to the likes of Mata instead. United way and all that
Sancho - a top top level winger who'll benefit immensely from gegenpressing. Similarly to VDB God only knows why Ole didn't play him regularly
Cavani - great short term signing. He'd probably suit gegenpressing better then Ronaldo would but he's injury prone (read my comment on Varane)
So we can group all signings into 5 categories
A- Those unsuited to the modern game (James, AWB, Maguire and possibly Telles)
B- Promising kids/talent he barely ever played and were left rotting on the bench (VDB, Sancho, Pellistri, Diallo)
C- Mateys (McShane, Heaton and to a lesser extent Ronaldo. We would probably have had King in that list if Ole had the final say on that)
D- Top players whom for one reason or another are past their prime and will probably struggle under the excessive pressure of playing gegenpressing (Varane, Cavani and Ronaldo)
E- Bruno.
Wonderful player and utter garbage manager. But he build a pretty decent team for RR to take us to the next level
The leaders of the club (if we have leaders) should have recognized sometimes last year that Ole doesn't have it. Ole always had a game or string of games that saved his job... but not this year. I still think bringing Ronaldo is what eventually lead to complete downfall of Ole. That's when the squad lost the balance and when Ole lost authority. I don't think bringing Ronaldo was a mistake, but we needed to offload at least Martial... Too many mouths to feed and Ole is too nice to do the "hard" things.
I hope he has learned a lot of the 3 years and that he will be able to become a decent championship level manager. No shame at coaching at championship.
I hope he has learned a lot of the 3 years and that he will be able to become a decent championship level manager. No shame at coaching at championship.
As players that golden squad will always be held highly but ole will and should serve as an example that Man United is about the club first, not mates FC.
In a few years the bitter memories of him as a manager will fade and we'll remember him as Ole the player.
As a player? Great.
As a caretaker? Good.
As a manager? Well..
But u cant blame him for
1) getting the job full time
2) allowed to make those high profile signings
3) allowed to stay after villareal.
Alot of this is boards mistake really. Hardly surprising molde and cardiff manager isn't our standard.
Still a legend for me.
As a caretaker? Good.
As a manager? Well..
But u cant blame him for
1) getting the job full time
2) allowed to make those high profile signings
3) allowed to stay after villareal.
Alot of this is boards mistake really. Hardly surprising molde and cardiff manager isn't our standard.
Still a legend for me.
Cult hero and club legend as a player, small fish in a big pond as a manager
Nothing wrong with that, not every ex-player is destined to be a great manager
Nothing wrong with that, not every ex-player is destined to be a great manager
Thanks Ole!
Thanks for being a decent (5.5- 6.5/10) interim type manager and helping us settle a bit after Jose's toxicity and Van Gaals destruction of the squad during their tenure.
The fact people are still complaining about him still after he has gone says alot about the fan's mindset at the club.
I like Ole's team more than Jose's, Van Gaals and Moyes's - felt I could watch our matches with a bit of heart and passion. Shame that success wasn't there - but to be honest, the success achieved by Van gaal and Mourinho was not that wonderful to me.
A player who managed the club because he loves it and was given the job by the poor owners was not really his fault. I think people got fustrated with Ole's freedom to manage a long time - which is again something I blame the owners for rather than exactly Solskjaer.
Thanks for being a decent (5.5- 6.5/10) interim type manager and helping us settle a bit after Jose's toxicity and Van Gaals destruction of the squad during their tenure.
The fact people are still complaining about him still after he has gone says alot about the fan's mindset at the club.
I like Ole's team more than Jose's, Van Gaals and Moyes's - felt I could watch our matches with a bit of heart and passion. Shame that success wasn't there - but to be honest, the success achieved by Van gaal and Mourinho was not that wonderful to me.
A player who managed the club because he loves it and was given the job by the poor owners was not really his fault. I think people got fustrated with Ole's freedom to manage a long time - which is again something I blame the owners for rather than exactly Solskjaer.
Another great video from Adita.
I honestly thought people knew but just chose to ignore it. There were stories about it on Twitter too.
Bringing in a load over priced english defenders that will be a burden to get rid off for years to come, it is unbelievable that we paid 80 million for a donkey in Maguire that has no leadership qualities whilst chelsea got a leader and a brilliant defender in thiago for free who is probably still faster and more mobile than Maguire even in the twilight of career.
Also watching over our midfield becoming weaker than it has ever been under all the other post fergie managers with herrera and basically pogba (our best two midfielders before he arrived) as well walking for free whilst he has been in charge.
Also watching over our midfield becoming weaker than it has ever been under all the other post fergie managers with herrera and basically pogba (our best two midfielders before he arrived) as well walking for free whilst he has been in charge.
Did you miss the bit where Maguire was by far our best defender for 2 seasons?
If true does that really say a lot? For £80 mill he should have been better than Liverpools and Cities best defender. In fact wasnt he a world record price for a defender? FFS how can you defend that?
He was likeable as a player but I found his whole managerial persona off-putting.
I didn't know and apparently neither did many others.
Ole scored a legendary goal but this leaves a sour taste.
He inherited a side that finished 2nd and won two cups and progressed them to a side that finished second and won nothing. And had more time and more money to achieve less. If he didn’t have the playing career with us he did there would not be a single argument that he was anywhere close to Mourinho regardless of how toxic that turned in the final months
There is also a good invetsigation on his business dealings, agent relationships and conflicts of interest, which surprisingly is rarely if ever discussed here.
http://josimarfootball.com/the-double-agent/
One of the key parts:
"As the coach of Manchester United’s reserve team, Molde FK and Cardiff City, Solskjær has been a part of 21 transfers of players represented by the agency he himself had co-founded"
Before I am accused of "character assassination" - I do not necessarily think that he is a bad person and of course innocent until proven guilty. We all know that Fergie was no saint, and many managers have problematic parts of their biographies. I just think that the picture of Ole as a person with superior-to-other-managers moral qualities (which is often drawn here) is very questionable.
There is also a good article on Athletic describing his mistreatment of multiple players - suddenly telling Smalling to go a couple of days before the end of transfer window, promising Lingard game time and reneging, getting pissed off at VdB agent comments and deliberately freezing him out, asking the team for feedback/what is wrong and then immediately saying "I am the manager it is my decision" when Baily pointed out that one of the things is wrong is favoritism and picking a blatantly unfit Maguire over him. Again, not the worst things and happens with most managers I guess - but as one of the players put it according to the article "Ole is a nice guy but not a good man manager, people tend to confuse the two".
That is a fair point. But I also think our board could have done something worse than Ole.
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Considering his only competition for best defender was lindelof, that doesn't say much, he's barely an improvement over smalling and I honestly preferred blind over him.
I hadn’t seen this at all. Shocking if any of it is true.
I'm sure he was also the best defender in the teams that got relegated. That says more about his competiton than him as a footballer.
Amazing the kind of revisionism goes on here with regard to OGS, his tenure and the players he's signed for insane money.
I wanted Jose gone long before we sacked him, but your post is a prime example of double standards that are often applied when comparing Ole to Jose.
You are picking the worst time under Jose - before he was sacked and for Ole you are picking the end of last season. If we compare like-for-like:
1. End of last full season (May 18 Jose, May 21 Ole). Both 2nd places in the league, under Jose 8 points better. Under Jose we qualified from CL group, under Ole we did't. Made EL final under Ole, but under Jose we actually won it in previous season. So basically the results are slightly better under Jose. Here on Caf the manner of defeats (vs Villareal & Sevilla) and general on-pitch performances lead to some doubts about the manager, prevailing opinion is that "we need a couple of players to challenge" in both cases.
2. Summer after last full season. Under Jose we sign Grant, Dalot and Fred. Under Ole we sign Sancho, Varane and Ronaldo. The result: Jose tries to gets himself sacked, we are 6th when he is, Ole does not try to get himself sacked, we are in a worse free fall, on fewer points and 8th whilst having bought much stronger players (somehow you did not mention that we could fall further under Ole). many players are unhappy and lost belief in manager in both cases - the only difference is that Ole is better liked on personal level which does not really matter once both managers are out of the door.
Not arguing against the fact that the squad is better now, but from what we know it is the result of a work of a transfer committee where the voice of the manager is just one of the voices. So any credit (or criticism for that matter) of Ole should be limited here - which is bad news for Ole defenders since without it they do not have much to stand on beyond "better atmosphere", which is frankly not much of an achievement especially considering all Ole's flaws.
poor form ,friend. Went from asking why Ole skeptics didn't weaponize details from an alleged rape to dismissing it and brushing it under the rug. It's not actually the 1st time, look at the date, it's Feb 2020, it was actually posted on the caf at the time but many would rather avoid it than make speculations about its credibility or use it to push an agenda. Even sounds like a good way to get one banned and deservedly. Also has jack to do with being a shite football manager.
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Legacy? Lowered standards where finishing 30+ points behind league leaders was being celebrated as progress while mostly playing god awful football. He was good at conning people with United DNA nonsense I’ll give him that.
All of this is bs. Norwegian journalists dont touch this. There has been a trail - and he walked free. Long after Ole was coach that dude moved to russia, and are now wanted for not meeting for trail in another case.
Josimar is a paranoid norwegian football magazine (where all of this originate from) that has made a brand on spectulations and construction the case based on what they want their outcomme to be. It might be a good business idea, but it is not a reliabel source or proper journalistic work. If there was something in this, and Ole had dirty hands, the police would have been all over it along time ago.
Well, you seem to forget that football under Jose and Van Gaal was allmost imposible to watch. I’d agree with you on that was the case for Ole as well the last two months (just in a very different manner), but the 3rd and 2nd place under Ole was mostly entertaining.
That is a hugh factor in all of this as well.
Another hugh point, is that we got 2nd due to Chelsea and Liverpool’s injurys and problems — not becouse we where THAT good. I think Ole made the mistake of attributing this fact to our own performance, and by that thinking we where ready to challange for the title —we are absolutly nowhere near a 90+ points season. Ole should know that.
Maybe. And even so, that should have ended six months later once he served his purpose.
I thought Ole was cleared of all this a while ago…
It's old, it's known. I'm not going to bother reading the article, but this is what happened:
In 2016 Molde (the club) and Ole bought Babacar Sarr from Sogndal. He already had rape accusations against him at that point, but I don't know if that was known to them. He was then accused and charged for another rape while a player for Molde, it was a big media case but his identity wasn't officially known at first (the club and Ole knew, obviously). The club chose to not suspend him, and Ole chose to keep playing him. How people feel about that is up to them, he wasn't convicted of anything.
Ole then made him captain, while under investigation for rape, which is far more dodgy. After a match later that season the players went out partying and he raped again. Everyone at the club knew that he was accused of raping someone in that exact situation before.
In February 2019 Molde let him go to a Russian club for free. He was a good player from the perspective of the Norwegian league, so worth millions. Coincidentally it's pretty hard for the Norwegian court to get hold of someone in Russia because of no extradition treaty, so they couldn't. Molde helped him get away, deliberately. This was three months after Ole went to United, so it's on the club and not him. Jim Solbakken, a very dodgy agent who's a close friend and business partner of Ole, was involved.
Sarr later went to Saudi Arabia, and as far as I know it's unknown where he is now. Interpol have been looking for 2 years.
So to sum up, there is absolutely no doubt that Molde acted reprehensibly and morally bankrupt. There's also no doubt that Jim Solbakken was involved. How it reflects on Ole is a bit more murky.
Old news, why are they jumping on this again?
I know it sounds unbelievable, but AWB started as as a right winger.
I understand a full back not being excellent up front, and if he at least tried himself I would be content. But what enrages me about AWB is the cowardly way he plays. Of course, in our current squad he's really useful because of his excellent defensive skills, if you swap him for TAA for example, someone who would often expose his CBs and DMs, then you will truly see how bad Maguire and McFred are.
Ole made the point about Liverpool having injuries which needed to be considered when judging the season. Obviously many people slated him for it, despite it being an obvious fact.
Zero trophies, a team in a free fall, no style of play, and all opposition fans cheering his stay at United.
Sky showed a graphic there comparing his Utd team to Rangnick's Leipzig side. We are basically at the bottom of the league for every stats involving any sort of effort. Pretty damning, really.
It was amateur hour, with an amateur in charge of a gifted squad. Varane and Ronaldo must have been completely bemused coming into that situation.
Looking at those stats this morning and realizing that all his coaches responsible for that mess are still here, is troubling.
His legacy is a very poor one and it’s going to take time to get these players back into the proper mindset and doing proper sessions and coaching again.
Looking at those stats this morning and realizing that all his coaches responsible for that mess are still here, is troubling.
His legacy is a very poor one and it’s going to take time to get these players back into the proper mindset and doing proper sessions and coaching again.
... sounds like you still don't know, and only read the title. Because I doubt you have a subscription.
He hasn’t got a legacy..also absolutely not a legend either, just because he scored the winner in a final ? Lee Martin did too and it set us on the way to total dominance for nigh on 30 years so he’s more of a legend than Ole ever will be