There’s a feeling of inevitability about Ole losing his job

rotherham_red

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Who knows what order of preference the players are? It’s a tale the press spin in hindsight. With Ole, for example, there is every indication that Maguire was his first choice. That Wan Bissaka was his first choice. And yes, managers will get second and third choices until the end of time, due to the simple fact that we aren’t the only team in the market and more than one club cannot sign the same player.

Take Bellingham for example. People just go ‘ahh, shit recruitment team’. Players have choices, he went somewhere else. If his wish was to come to United, we’d have signed him. Reguilon and Haaland we opted against due to clauses insisted on, according to reports.

Ole’s ‘first choices’ are hardly that fecking creative. They are the best players on the market. It’s easy to walk into work and say ‘my first choice winger is Sancho and centre half is Upamecano’, and then throw a strop if they are not landed. These players are not easy to sign, and no club in recent times, maybe except Barcelona, has been able to just go and sign all of those types of players with similar status. City, Real - they have all missed out on players like Pogba, Sanchez, Havertz, Lautaro etc. If those are the sort of players managers are demanding before throwing a strop about recruitment teams and directors of football, they should go and get a PlayStation. There is little indication that we can’t sign some of the more attainable players easily. We, or almost any other club, will never be able to just land all the best players on the market.
All well and good saying this, but we're Manchester fecking United. If there's one club in the whole country where you can go and ask for your first choices and be reasonably confident that those above you will have the resources to get them, it's us.

Unless you think his time at Molde and Cardiff gave him a taste of the high life, Ole has shown that he can work with a lower budget, and even here, he managed to make do as best he could for those first six months of last season where he wasn't given the midfielder or Lukaku replacement he clearly needed. Again, unless you think he thought that Daniel James was going to be a pillar of his team? Something which his public statements both at the time and since, clearly contradict.

He didn't complain once about the trasnfers situation both on and off the record. He hasn't even said anything about the colossal feck up that was last summer either, which for me was much, much worse than what we've ended up with this summer.
 

Lebowski

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We didn't just miraculously finished third. It happened because in January we spent a lot of money on a player who helped us improve and collect a whole lot of points in the second half of the season. A lot more than our rivals for top 4.

Now, we are highly unlikely to replicate that sort of point-collecting form over an entire season, but with Fernandes playing for us the whole season, the players we did sign, less injuries for the likes of Martial, Rashford and Pogba, and time allowing the players to gel better and get used to the manager's system, etc, you'd expect us to be worth quite a few more points than the 66 we gained last season.

I don't know where that would put us in comparison to our rivals, but first we have to do our part.

I certainly don't automatically 'expect' United to finish behind anyone who is not City or Liverpool. Certainly not based on the recent transfer window.
Fair enough, and I hope you're proven right and we can replicate our post-lockdown form for a more consistent patch of this season.

You're right to say that there was a real lift after Bruno arrived and that it's therefore reasonable to assume that with a full season of Bruno in the side we should get more points. But there's a more pessimistic interpretation of the Bruno effect too- namely that a big money signing to fix a clear area of deficiency gave a lift to the entire side and caused our existing players to raise their game. By spectacularly failing in the pursuit of our main target and failing to sign a single player to improve our starting eleven this window, we've popped the bubble of positivity and given our better run rivals who Bruno helped us overtake in the end of last season the chance to pull ahead.

Like I said initially though, I hope you're right on this, it's just that given recent history and the start to the season, it feels to me more like Mourinho's final season than it does one of progression.
 

Lebowski

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Are you saying we don't have a team good enough for top 4 because that's complete nonsense
'Good enough' is open to interpretation and is mostly subjective.

What I am saying is that we had a team that battled for top 4 last season, followed by what I believe was a disastrous close season with awful preparation, off-field distractions and woeful recruitment. It is therefore logical that with all other things being equal, our rivals have taken a step forward in relation to us and it will therefore be harder to repeat the performance of last season's third place and three semi finals.
 

Maticmaker

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This whole pre season & subsequent start has dejavu written all over it.
...All over again!

Joking apart there is a sense of here we go again, its not just what players we sign..or we don't sign, whether the Manager is being supported or not, we still, even after moving some players on and doing some recruiting still have what amounts to a motely crew, overall.
Lack of consistency in any aspect of the club, Ownership, Management, Football Performance is evident. new players come in make a splash, then seem to get swallowed up in whatever malady is affecting the dressing room and they are no longer part of the solution, but become almost inevitably another (albeit newer) part of the problem!

Bruno's arrival and the line up that Ole put together thereafter in the restart last season looked for the first time in ages that you could name our best XI, but that achievement of reaching third in the PL was somehow dissipated when we bombed out of (eventually) three semi-finals in the knockout competitions, we won nothing once again.

The phrase Manchester United is all about winning trophies, was once our mantra, its now in danger of becoming a 'laugh line', especially for Liverpool comedians!
Maybe its the Covid-19 factor, the lack of live matches with fans in attendance, or simply we have become conditioned to thinking things will never change and each season is like a 'Ground-hog Day'?
 

Rozay

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All well and good saying this, but we're Manchester fecking United. If there's one club in the whole country where you can go and ask for your first choices and be reasonably confident that those above you will have the resources to get them, it's us.

Unless you think his time at Molde and Cardiff gave him a taste of the high life, Ole has shown that he can work with a lower budget, and even here, he managed to make do as best he could for those first six months of last season where he wasn't given the midfielder or Lukaku replacement he clearly needed. Again, unless you think he thought that Daniel James was going to be a pillar of his team? Something which his public statements both at the time and since, clearly contradict.

He didn't complain once about the trasnfers situation both on and off the record. He hasn't even said anything about the colossal feck up that was last summer either, which for me was much, much worse than what we've ended up with this summer.
Well there isn’t ‘one club in the whole country you can go and ask for your first choices’ though. There’s about 4. And we don’t only compete with clubs from this country either.

And I didn’t say he complained. I was responding to a statement from another poster. And if last summer was so terrible, and a ‘colossal feck up’, whose fault is that? We spent 150m. The players we signed were hardly forced on the manager. It has turned out that Maguire, Wan Bissaka and James aren’t all that, but he wanted all 3 and got them. Whatever his plans were for James are irrelevant. He wanted to sign him, and did. I imagine he looks years ahead when targeting a player, so him not seeing him as a pillar of his team for the coming season matters little. Fergie didn’t see Ronaldo as a ‘pillar of his team’ for the coming season when he bought him, players are also bought for the future.

Again, your post reads like that of a computer game player. ‘He wasn’t given the midfielder or the striker’. But he WAS given the centre half, right back and a winger. He said a number of times that the plan to overhaul the squad was one set across about 3 years. Are you going to point at all the gaps that were not plugged in his FIRST window as some sort of club failing? We spent 150m. Yes, it wouldn’t take 3 years if we could just have bought everyone in the first window, but it obviously doesn’t work like that. There’s no Abramovich here. I’d prefer to plug a few gaps and continue to consider, before plugging a few more. Real tried to buy a new team for £350m last summer and it didn’t do anything for them.

I think Ole has more to answer for personally. He demanded we spend more than half of his entire budget last summer on Maguire, who is no better than Smalling who he already had. Perhaps he should have put that £80m towards the midfielder and striker that he needs. And also not spend near 20m on James, who is a bit rubbish. Maybe get Meunier in for free instead of near 50m on AWB. But he was the one who wanted to ‘change the culture’ by buying overrated and overpriced Brits, and he’s gotten what he’s gotten from it. I also think he should have bought a ‘proper’ midfielder over buying Bruno, which has just served to unbalance the midfield selection. He’s the one that has worked himself into a situation where his better three midfielders are all Pogba, Bruno and VDB - who typically all want to do something similar on the pitch and don’t compliment each other. One was already here and he added the other two over 6 months this year. Why not target someone like Partey instead of Bruno? Or at least instead of Donny?
 

Champagne Football

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There seems to be an awful lot of fake news in relation to Man Utd being released by the media. Seems to be trying to destabilise the club.

You'd wonder is Man City secretly behind it or something like that.
 

Infra-red

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It does feel a bit like the start of the 2018/19 campaign, where in the minds of the majority of fans/media, the season was a write-off almost as soon as it began. They were of course proven to be correct in their predictions.
 

Hisha

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Ole has zero tactical understanding of the game, or at least he hasn’t shown any sign of it yet. He might have been a good choice for 6 months after Jose. But keeping Ole more than that is a huge mistake. The sooner the club replaces him with a proper manager, the better for the club and for the fans.
 

MikeKing

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'Money isn't always relevant' is a far cry from your earlier claim of minimal funds. A bit of goalpost moving there.

Even this summer, we still spent around €90m, including a €40m midfielder and an experienced, highly rated left-back. It wasn't a great transfer window for many reasons - including apparently chasing Sancho well beyond what would have been reasonable - but the whole 'minimal funds' thing is and always has been nonsense.
I did not move. That's because I do agree that we have spent a lot of money. Conceding to that isn't something I'm opposed to, I'm contesting the relevance of that statement to anything we're discussing. Everton has spent a lot! City has spent a lot! Everyone has. Clubs that traditionally has never had much money to spend goes crazy in the markets sometimes now. So what?

Minimal funds is in the context of the traditional expectations of this club. Not in terms of money but in terms of quality. If you still keep those expectations around for Ole, keep that same energy for the transfers and if you don't see any discrepancy between the expectations and judgements made on those two aspects around here, I can't help you. My point was never "Ole hasn't been backed so needs more time" It's more like, we wont improve if we keep making the same mistakes and it's a shame if Ole can't do anything about that.

I'm operating on the simple notion that quality players, good players that fit together in every position will make a good team. Maybe it's not a fact, but it's a simple logic I've always found to be true. In some cases you have great managers doing magic, but the quality around them does exist at the highest level. In the state we've been after SAF I wouldn't expect any manager to come here and do well unless he already had quality players to work with. I don't think we would have won the CL with Sancho or even the PL, I just get the sense that we could do a lot of improvements that we refuse to do because we're afraid of failure. If spending money is a problem, we're right to build slowly but we should all get insight to if that is un purpose and what will come of it, or else it just feels like we're being dicked around by Ed, and we can understand if the manager himself felt that way.

Besides the money we spent, there was a lot of quality, talent and possibilities but also a work to be fixed. We have got a left back to compete with Luke which is good, and a direct replacement for Lingard who sucked. But what about upgrading on even our talented but unstable players like Matic, Pogba, Mata, James, McTominay, Fred. We could have sold Fred and gotten a better player, on the back end of the season he had. Not that I don't like Fred but doing things like that seem impossible for us. It's like we're stuck with the guys we have and we keep throwing money at them for them to stay, like Jones etc. We need to do it all to improve.. move players on, go get better players, young players, experienced players etc.. we're always silent and really at a stand still, which is the biggest point and it has a direct effect on the teams ability to improve.
 

Siorac

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I did not move. That's because I do agree that we have spent a lot of money. Conceding to that isn't something I'm opposed to, I'm contesting the relevance of that statement to anything we're discussing. Everton has spent a lot! City has spent a lot! Everyone has. Clubs that traditionally has never had much money to spend goes crazy in the markets sometimes now. So what?

Minimal funds is in the context of the traditional expectations of this club. Not in terms of money but in terms of quality. If you still keep those expectations around for Ole, keep that same energy for the transfers and if you don't see any discrepancy between the expectations and judgements made on those two aspects around here, I can't help you. My point was never "Ole hasn't been backed so needs more time" It's more like, we wont improve if we keep making the same mistakes and it's a shame if Ole can't do anything about that.

I'm operating on the simple notion that quality players, good players that fit together in every position will make a good team. Maybe it's not a fact, but it's a simple logic I've always found to be true. In some cases you have great managers doing magic, but the quality around them does exist at the highest level. In the state we've been after SAF I wouldn't expect any manager to come here and do well unless he already had quality players to work with. I don't think we would have won the CL with Sancho or even the PL, I just get the sense that we could do a lot of improvements that we refuse to do because we're afraid of failure. If spending money is a problem, we're right to build slowly but we should all get insight to if that is un purpose and what will come of it, or else it just feels like we're being dicked around by Ed, and we can understand if the manager himself felt that way.

Besides the money we spent, there was a lot of quality, talent and possibilities but also a work to be fixed. We have got a left back to compete with Luke which is good, and a direct replacement for Lingard who sucked. But what about upgrading on even our talented but unstable players like Matic, Pogba, Mata, James, McTominay, Fred. We could have sold Fred and gotten a better player, on the back end of the season he had. Not that I don't like Fred but doing things like that seem impossible for us. It's like we're stuck with the guys we have and we keep throwing money at them for them to stay, like Jones etc. We need to do it all to improve.. move players on, go get better players, young players, experienced players etc.. we're always silent and really at a stand still, which is the biggest point and it has a direct effect on the teams ability to improve.
Okay, so first and foremost: saying that "minimal funds not in terms of money but in terms of quality" makes absolutely no sense. Funds mean money. Quite literally. That's what it is. We can't buy players with chicken (though I'd love to see Ed and Judge trying to haggle by offering a couple of goats).

And now I'm not actually sure what your point is. That our recruitment is not good enough to challenge for major trophies regardless of how much we spend on players? I agree with that but it's not much of an insight, more like the bleeding obvious; you yourself say that even if we bought Sancho we wouldn't win the PL or the CL which is insane if you think about it: at that point we'd have the league's most expensive defender, midfielder, and attacker playing for us - and still we wouldn't expect to challenge. Or is your point that we're not ruthless with underperforming players and instead keep giving new contracts in the hope of a mythical resale value that never seems to materialise? I agree with that, too.

Or that we should be even more ruthless and ditch even decent but not great players to get top class or at least potentially top class players in instead of them? That'd mean a lot of player turnover, a radical overhaul - I wouldn't be against that but with our recruitment and the success rate of our signings, I wouldn't be optimistic. It's basically what Van Gaal did, except his signings almost invariably turned out to be shite or OK at best, with the possible exception of Martial and the jury's still out on him overall.

Also, this is now murky territory, made even murkier by COVID. Available funds are a somewhat known constraint: the club's finances are public, everyone can see what we can realistically expect to spend on wages and transfers in any given financial year. Or, to be more precise, what our net transfer spend can be. But beyond that? Maybe the manager wants to get rid of half the squad and get new players in instead; maybe he prefers only a few additions at a time because he doesn't want to deal with that much extra uncertainty. Maybe the club wants to move on more players and get more in but can't find buyers because of the ridiculous contracts we give to squad players. Maybe the manager's preferred targets were completely unrealistic (see Grealish and Sancho). We just don't know. I have my opinion on it, of course, as do most people: I don't think the club could pull of an 8 in, 8 out summer, considering how much time we seem to spend with preparing bids and monitoring situations - but again, maybe the manager doesn't even want that.
 

Stretender

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I don't know how people look at Ole and conclude he is a manager who can revive Manchester United.

He will not survive the next 6 games.

Tactically poor, weak in the dressing room always picking players based on reputation rather than form.

He will be fired before Christmas.
 

DJW

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I don't know how people look at Ole and conclude he is a manager who can revive Manchester United.

He will not survive the next 6 games.

Tactically poor, weak in the dressing room always picking players based on reputation rather than form.

He will be fired before Christmas.
Sad but absolutely true.
Akin to a lame deer, I feel sorry for him but it’s inevitable.
Will never be good enough simply put.
 
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Foxbatt

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I do not think it is inevitable. This team has got the ability to beat any team in the PL, if they get it right. Getting it right is the main issue with United.
 

Amir

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Fair enough, and I hope you're proven right and we can replicate our post-lockdown form for a more consistent patch of this season.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not optimistic at all, as I have no faith in Solskjaer. I'm just rulling out the idea that we should expect to be leapfrogged because others invested more recently.
 
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I don't know how people look at Ole and conclude he is a manager who can revive Manchester United.

He will not survive the next 6 games.

Tactically poor, weak in the dressing room always picking players based on reputation rather than form.

He will be fired before Christmas.
make up your mind.

my bet is that you will be proved wrong on both counts.
 

Foxbatt

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It is going to be extremely interesting on this forum tomorrow no matter what happens.
 

Lebowski

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Don't get me wrong - I'm not optimistic at all, as I have no faith in Solskjaer. I'm just rulling out the idea that we should expect to be leapfrogged because others invested more recently.
Interesting - so you think that the club have done what was expected of them and given the manager all the tools he needs, you just think the manager isn't good enough to deliver. That seems to be the polar opposite to the prevailing opinion.
 

MikeKing

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Okay, so first and foremost: saying that "minimal funds not in terms of money but in terms of quality" makes absolutely no sense. Funds mean money. Quite literally. That's what it is. We can't buy players with chicken (though I'd love to see Ed and Judge trying to haggle by offering a couple of goats).

And now I'm not actually sure what your point is. That our recruitment is not good enough to challenge for major trophies regardless of how much we spend on players? I agree with that but it's not much of an insight, more like the bleeding obvious; you yourself say that even if we bought Sancho we wouldn't win the PL or the CL which is insane if you think about it: at that point we'd have the league's most expensive defender, midfielder, and attacker playing for us - and still we wouldn't expect to challenge. Or is your point that we're not ruthless with underperforming players and instead keep giving new contracts in the hope of a mythical resale value that never seems to materialise? I agree with that, too.

Or that we should be even more ruthless and ditch even decent but not great players to get top class or at least potentially top class players in instead of them? That'd mean a lot of player turnover, a radical overhaul - I wouldn't be against that but with our recruitment and the success rate of our signings, I wouldn't be optimistic. It's basically what Van Gaal did, except his signings almost invariably turned out to be shite or OK at best, with the possible exception of Martial and the jury's still out on him overall.

Also, this is now murky territory, made even murkier by COVID. Available funds are a somewhat known constraint: the club's finances are public, everyone can see what we can realistically expect to spend on wages and transfers in any given financial year. Or, to be more precise, what our net transfer spend can be. But beyond that? Maybe the manager wants to get rid of half the squad and get new players in instead; maybe he prefers only a few additions at a time because he doesn't want to deal with that much extra uncertainty. Maybe the club wants to move on more players and get more in but can't find buyers because of the ridiculous contracts we give to squad players. Maybe the manager's preferred targets were completely unrealistic (see Grealish and Sancho). We just don't know. I have my opinion on it, of course, as do most people: I don't think the club could pull of an 8 in, 8 out summer, considering how much time we seem to spend with preparing bids and monitoring situations - but again, maybe the manager doesn't even want that.
It's semantics at this point as I've filled in some of my views to be understood plenty, even if my initial wording was carefree. But yeah funds is money and I haven't argued that.

If you're still unsure what my point was, I'll break it down once more. Money spent in it self doesn't equate to success - however, quality players do. Quality players cost money, we have spent a lot of money, but not only on quality players. Some signings work out, others don't. Some clubs right their wrongs quickly, we don't. Some clubs build to take the next step, we don't. The thing is, Ole might be judged on the basis of his full second season and expectations should be higher at this point, however in my opinion it is not inconceivable to think we might regress this season before coming back stronger next season after a bunch of young ones have grown a bit.

I think our team could have challenged for PL and CL with Sancho and might even have won it with a great CB and LB. We didn't go that route, so I don't think the inevitability that is felt here has it's roots in a truthful place.

We bought one old striker and got one on loan, when possibly we could have gotten a real competitor to Martial like Haaland. Even with a release clause, if he came here and was successful he probably would have wanted to stay. Like you say we don't know certain things and there is a possibility Ole didn't want him and wanted Cavani but hey I wouldn't put my money on that.

I don't mean we should have done 8 in 8 out. I don't believe we'll be able to do that either. As a matter a fact we aren't even able to do our actual strategy, which is to not do that so yeah... It's just that we're so far behind on our business and we probably could do a scaled down version of that like 4 each window, if we did invest a bit more heavily.
 

Amir

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Interesting - so you think that the club have done what was expected of them and given the manager all the tools he needs, you just think the manager isn't good enough to deliver. That seems to be the polar opposite to the prevailing opinion.
I don't think the club has given the manager ALL the tools he needs (or wants). I also think that no manager in the world gets all the tools he needs all the time. You just have to work with what you have got - and Solskjaer has been given plenty. In previous windows, certainly, but he was also given potentially good additions this summer as well, even though it was nowhere near a perfect window.

Part of the praise Solskjaer has been given is due to the young squad he built. And the thing about a young squad is that with proper coaching, you'd expect it to improve within, whether you sign new players or not. So the idea we can't go forward because we signed 'only' VDB, Telles and Cavani is just wrong.

For me it seems like the only way for Solskjaer to succeed is if you provide him with the perfect squad, full of expensive first-team players and backups. That's just not going to happen.
 
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golden_blunder

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It's just funny how it's quietly assumed that Poch will be his replacement. I'd like to see us show a bit of interest in Nagelsmann and Marco Rose.
Of course it’ll be Poch as there is no compensation to pay to a club. Just like Mourinho and Lvg. It was a minimal compensation for moyes.
we don’t do a full recruitment process, we interview people who are available
 

Maticmaker

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I do not think it is inevitable. This team has got the ability to beat any team in the PL, if they get it right. Getting it right is the main issue with United.
Sadly it seems whether they are 'getting it right' in any particular game is down to the team itself and how it reacts to, or 'in-game manages,' any given situation and at such point the reaction of the manager is almost nullified . True managers can make substitutions, but what happens when, as against Spurs, Ole really needed to, or could easily have made, 7 or 8 substitutions?

Of course you can argue that once players cross the 'white line' onto the pitch its down to them and not the manager. That's where the captain's role is very important , who would you say was (currently) Ole's 'man on the pitch? Who is the one he would rely on to 'in-game manage', issue instructions to others, hand out 'bo****kings, lead by example, etc.

I once heard the captain of one of my local non-league sides, come to the edge of the pitch and shout to his manager, " I'm playing shite boss, take me off" -self sacrifice indeed...and the manager did! They still lost 4-0 but that was the score when the captain went!
 

Mr PG

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Ole often displays very serious judgement flaws.
1. Playing the same starting team endlessly even when it's clear they're fatigued/ making subs too late (even with Fred and McToninay on the bench)
2. Starting Daniel James against lower opposition who park the bus.
3. Playing Lindeleof endlessly even error after another eventually leading to conceding goals (happened with DeGea too.
4. Playing Rashford in FA cup tie even after it had been clear he had a back injury(I had told my mate Rashford had been playing with back injury for weeks before they eventually found back fracture)
5. Starting a midfield of an unfit Pogba and Matic against a fit side has to be the stupidiest decision I have seen this season. Displays a disturbing randomness to his decision making and he deserved the sack for that alone .I had predicted it would be a disaster if he gambled on that midfield before the game.
 

Bastian

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Of course it’ll be Poch as there is no compensation to pay to a club. Just like Mourinho and Lvg. It was a minimal compensation for moyes.
we don’t do a full recruitment process, we interview people who are available
Unfortunately so. Given the amounts we've wasted on transfers and wages, you'd like to think a DoF should be installed and given the leeway to have a big say in managerial appointments.

We're still working from a silver bullet theory. SAF was an anomaly. And Ole is about as far from SAF as he possibly could be.
 

jamesjimmybyrondean

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Ole often displays very serious judgement flaws.
1. Playing the same starting team endlessly even when it's clear they're fatigued/ making subs too late (even with Fred and McToninay on the bench)
2. Starting Daniel James against lower opposition who park the bus.
3. Playing Lindeleof endlessly even error after another eventually leading to conceding goals (happened with DeGea too.
4. Playing Rashford in FA cup tie even after it had been clear he had a back injury(I had told my mate Rashford had been playing with back injury for weeks before they eventually found back fracture)
5. Starting a midfield of an unfit Pogba and Matic against a fit side has to be the stupidiest decision I have seen this season. Displays a disturbing randomness to his decision making and he deserved the sack for that alone .I had predicted it would be a disaster if he gambled on that midfield before the game.
He wouldn't do all this if he wasn't heavily reliant on individual quality
 

Mr PG

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If we fired Ole today, no other top 6 team in the top 4 league's in Europe would be expected to hire him. Which means we either know something they don't or the other way round.

Behind Ole is a rookie Carrick, Mike Phelan was coaching in Australia and the first team coach was from Tottenham's academy.
 

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Of course it’ll be Poch as there is no compensation to pay to a club. Just like Mourinho and Lvg. It was a minimal compensation for moyes.
we don’t do a full recruitment process, we interview people who are available
Depressingly true. Who cares about getting the right man, when you can get the cheap man?
 

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I don't care about formations, that's dictated by availability of players. I look at the approach to the game, the movement of players and the positions they occupy. All these things give a far more clear view of the intention of the tactics. Beating big teams in one off games means nothing. By your logic, dropping points to "poorer" managers makes him a poor manager, no? At the end of the day he didn't even bring us within the same stratosphere as City and Liverpool in terms of points, the comparison is just not there between Ole and the top managers. There's no proof at all that he is or could be at their level.

I agree, James probably is a LW. He's still been poor there whenever he plays and anybody with eyes can see he's currently nowhere near the standard we expect. Not only that, but technically he is really far behind in aspects that are required of a winger for us. The problem for me is that he's so far away that I don't think he can be coached to the required level. I could find 18 year olds with better technique than him. Greenwood for a start. If you think differently then good for you, we'll see who is right.

Whilst on paper our defensive record looked good last season, we played a very negative way for the most part. The drop back and counter was relied on heavily, with Fred and McTominay shielding the defence in a lot of games. So yes, statistically we did look good, but we had to play a certain way to achieve that. Jose did something similar with a worse defence only a couple of years earlier for us.

Of course I enjoy the way we create goals if they're good. Every team scores good goals, but that doesn't mean they play great football. My overriding opinion is that, more often than not, we look laboured and one dimensional in attack. There are many aspects to our attacking play which don't work for me and you can obviously say we aren't a well drilled team in comparison with other teams in our league. Even teams lower down the table, who play a more aggressive and expansive style of football. Let's not forget, this is what many fans and people around the club were telling us we would get by sacking Jose and hiring Ole. Whilst I agree that we do need more depth on the right, Ole still has Greenwood to play there. Even though he is young, he is a top level talent that performs way beyond his years. So to make out he is completely hamstrung there is daft. Plus he has decided to play James there too. I don't know where you are getting the idea that I don't watch games from, especially when I'm not alone in my opinions. I'm certainly not following what others are saying, I said most of this before a lot of them did anyway as I could see the issues straight away under Ole. But perhaps you instead need to ask whether me and all these other people are right and you are not? For what it's worth, I have a season ticket and go home and away watching United. Do you? Don't come out with idiotic statements about whether I watch games, just because I don't share your beliefs, when not many others do either.

I heard the players say they were happy under Moyes, LVG and Jose. I don't buy into everything they say but judge them based on what I see on the pitch. For somebody that questions how much football I watch, you sure do base most of your opinions on statistics and soundbites. I don't buy into these constant fitness excuses from Solskjaer. This has been going on for a long time now and there is more to it than fitness. The players walk around the pitch half of the time or just look completely lost. Either A) Solskjaer is terrible at ensuring his players are fit, or B) He isn't motivating them to fight on the pitch. I read quotes from our players saying that they gave up when we got a player sent off vs Spurs. What is that all about? Did you ever see that happen under Ferguson, a true motivator? Something is 100% off in this aspect. Unless the players have just lowered their standards like some of our fans seemingly have and think this is acceptable. Whichever way you look at it, Solskjaer is responsible.

In game management is obviously a problem too. The late substitutions (Ighalo on for 2 minutes vs Sevilla) when clearly nothing is working, or watching a team continuously exploit an issue over and over and over before they finally score or nearly score. Case in point, against Brighton, they attacked a lot through central areas and down our left at times, pulling our defence across the pitch. Their left back was jogging into our area completely free on numerous occasions and they should have scored from the opportunities. Eventually he hit the post, after being picked out completely unopposed. A good manager would spot this and prevent it from happening. Another example from recently is how Spurs did the same again. Shaw had obviously been told to stick to Lamela and Jose saw this. He asked Lamela to drag Shaw inside and have runners exploit our left hand side. Carnage ensued. Where was the in game management there? The problem got solved eventually...when the ref blew for full time. So you might try and swerve this point, without any statistics to lean on, but the problem is clear and obvious. You need to start actually watching games.

Your point about his CV is absolutely laughable. By this stage I'm thinking you are a failed politician or Solskjaer's mum. I made that point as another example as to why he hasn't proven himself that he can be good enough to take us to winning trophies. It wasn't a point made in isolation, but it is a factual statement. You can't point to anything on his CV and make a case for him being good enough to beat Klopp, Guardiola etc to the PL trophy. The same in the CL. He has managed at such a low level it isn't even comparable. Winning a one off game doesn't mean he can compete with the best, tactically. It means his tactics, sit back and counter, work better against teams that attack ie City, Liverpool etc. That is exactly what that tactic is designed for. If he could compete with them tactically, then he would have the diversity to overcome more teams and finish with more than 66 points, closer to these teams at the end of the season. By your logic, Aston Villa have proven that they can compete to win the PL and CL because they smashed Liverpool, which is obviously a complete fantasy.
When I say you don't watch the games, I am obviously talking about the intend Ole has brought in the team, not the physical action of watching our games. A lot of people watch our games, but spit out a lot BS about how they think Ole is preparing the team. And they say again and again and again the same arguments that you have outline above.

If you do not see how most of our players have progressed under Ole, there's not conversation to be had indeed as you just have taken a stance.
Just because your stance is popular does not mean it's right.

I don't know what's that story about counter attacking football and what not, we have changed formations multiple times against many strong teams in the league to win those games, it's very flexible if anything. You are stuck at those 66 pts. We had a bad start, for various reasons. We need to continue the process and build on the progress of the team. There are many positives that are outlined every week by people who analyze United, yet, you choose to focus on those who only say negative. That's on you, if you refuse to see the team and how they are united behind the ideas of Ole.

Why you are stuck on calling anything fast and direct counter attacking football and try to undermine it is mind blowing to me. Fine... City scored a counter attacking goal, the only one btw, yesterday. Everything else they tried, they didn't score. Goals happen when the team move the ball fast, at first intend, and basically surprises the defense. I am not sure what else is to be said on that topic.

For me Ole or Flick, it's the same story: they have not managed at higher levels maybe, but the way they play show some great intend in football. We will win games when we can execute the ideas we have on the game, which is high intensity all over the pitch. You may not want to watch that kind of game, but it's one that gets players excited.
 

Gasolin

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Dec 22, 2007
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People here are focused on the results and sure, they should. But one thing they should appreciate is that never, even under intense pressure, and that has happened multiple times now, Ole has thrown any of our players under the bus. Unlike Moyes, LVG, Jose, who all had someone to blame. All of them, and we're talking about *proven* managers.

Yet, Ole, a winner, has protected the team. He is probably destroying them during internal meetings but never has he shown anything outside, given any meat to chew to the press. That's phenomenal mental strength, that you find only from the SAF teams. That's what he's making sure the team understands. We should applaud him for that, because he's showing that he has the shoulders to take the pressure, and keep going. When this will finally get into the players' mind, we will start seeing a lot more from that team. A team btw that tried 28 shots and 14 on target. They play for the manager. They play for Ole. They play for Manchester United. Not all managers before him in the last 8 years can say the same about our players.
 

Bondi77

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Jun 28, 2019
Messages
7,203
I will bet that Ole lasts at least for this season and any comparisons to the time of Jose at the club whom could not keep his mouth shut or refrain from publicly throwing his players under the bus are ludicrous.