United's dirty linen: should it be washed in public or behind closed doors?

[fastwalker]

More so in recent recent weeks it almost seems to be open season it terms of public airing of grievances from the United dressing room. And it is not just players either, we have heard Ralf Rangnick speaking with increasing openness about his frustrations with the team. I totally get that the dressing room is not a sterile environment and that leaks are always bound to happen. I even recall leaks during Sir Alex Ferguson's tenure, but what we are seeing now seems to be reckless abandon. The club is genuinely being made to look utterly dysfunctional. Whilst that may indeed be the case, it does bear remembering that a new manager is coming in to put this all back together and he will need to convince new players to come here. With the laughing stock that we are being portrayed as by players and manager alike, I am beginning to wonder why anyone other than a complete mercenary would come.

I totally get that sometimes it is right to expose malcontents especially when they are using the cover of anonymity to create toxicity. I also get that it can sometimes be titillating to hear about dressing room politics. However, the risk is that it could ultimately harm the club and divert our transfer targets elsewhere.

What do others think? Are you content for players and staff to vent their discontent openly or through their proxies or would you rather that discontent was kept behind closed doors?

 

[clarkydaz]

no fear of authority at the club anymore, players bigger than the manager. Recipe for carnage

 

[Elcabron]

There shouldn't be any dirty linen to wash in the first place.

 

[choccy77]

There shouldn't be any dirty linen to wash in the first place.

Yeah, we are not Chelsea

 

[Oranges038]

 

[AndySmith1990]

Our club is a mess, we all know it, everyone knows it, it's obvious by the way we play and the results. It'll be good to bring everything out in the open so there's nowhere for anyone to hide. There's been a severe lack of accountability and consequence for many of these players. I'll be happy if the ones responsible are named and shamed.

 

[Wednesday at Stoke]

It’s Manchester United, if it crawls, it sells news. I’m sure there is as much if not more dirty laundry at every other club that no one cares to report as it barely gets hits.

 

[Moriarty]

It’s Manchester United, if it crawls, it sells news. I’m sure there is as much if not more dirty laundry at every other club that no one cares to report as it barely gets hits.

Yep. United is the biggest soap opera of them all.

 

[Dante]

Yes, it should be aired.

When things are going well, you can afford to protect the players because at least they're doing their best.

But when things are going badly because of a lack of professionalism and effort, what exactly is there left to protect? United's players deserve this for themselves.

 

[Newstyle]

I don't get it, how can an organization be this mismanaged? If this were to happen at my company heads would fly.

 

[Reapersoul20]

It should be fixed in the WhatsApp group, but Pogba left so we're fecked now

 

[mattsville]

It's been done already in a respectful professional way has it not, for all to see, by hiring Rangnick, he has been vocal and honest but held back from full on exposure of the problematic players, we won't do that, those players just won't be there anymore.

 

[Loon]

I'm kinda hoping the current mess is now so public, and so toxic, they have to deal with it and be seen to be dealing with it. Maybe United needed an official whistleblower in Rangnick.

 

[Giant Midget]

Rather it’s public. It’s the only way the club can entertain us these days, certainly nothing enjoyable on the pitch.

 

[Red the Bear]

I'm getting exhibitionist vibe from this.
What's going on around here , first a thread about cuckholding and now this?

Anyway jokes aside, it's better done behind closed doors, the extra publicity and the pressure it will generate do us no good.

 

[flappyjay]

Our club is a mess, we all know it, everyone knows it, it's obvious by the way we play and the results. It'll be good to bring everything out in the open so there's nowhere for anyone to hide. There's been a severe lack of accountability and consequence for many of these players. I'll be happy if the ones responsible are named and shamed.

The managers, Ed Woodward and the players get all the stick. It would be nice to know what the rest of the support structure looks like. Who made the final decision on signings, who keeps renewing contracts of duds and then proceeds to overcharge for these duds.

 

[DRJosh]

If it detracts from the work and plans that ETH will put in motion, I much prefer it all be kept away from the prying eyes of the media and public. The players have to have their engagements with the media overseen by the club with specific expectations explicitly written into their contract

 

[Red00012]

Yes it’s time to burst their bubbles

 

[Foxbatt]

Leaks have been going on for a long time. Once players started to go to SAF about Moyes the whole thing collapsed. Then it went from bad to worse.
The whole lot should be sold and cleaned up. I don't care if it's Ralf or Ole. The manager is the most important. Players should not be briefing against the manager.
One of the reasons PSG don't win the CL is because players can get onto their chairman.

 

[RedDevil@84]

The players have been leaking info and washing dirty linen in public. Albeit, not leaking parts where they look shit.

I would rather have full disclosure and Rangnick come out and name and shame them

 

[Red Shorts]

Last thing we need is more open drama.

Silently move on the trouble makers, close the chapter and build a squad of characters who believe in the club, not the circus

 

[mancsarered]

Sell them, replace them with better characters, then air their dirty laundry. Some of these deserve to have their reputations destroyed for what they've done to the club.

 

[Tap]

Yeah, we are not Chelsea

We are now worse than Chelsea.

Ultimately, the leaks and airing need to stop by getting rid of the “influencers”.

 

[choccy77]

We are now worse than Chelsea.

Ultimately, the leaks and airing need to stop by getting rid of the “influencers”.

Well, we can at least afford a washing machine.

 

[foolsgold]

Closed doors, but there needs to be some executions in career terms.

 

[Jippy]

Not sure why anyone's surprised a club in crisis has loads of leaks giving out stories to the press. It happens at literally every club going.

People like to gossip (and plant stories for whatever reason), it's the bedrock of news journalism from Twitter staff moaning about Musk, to Tory scum planting the Basic Instinct smear against Angela Rayner to ETH looking at penthouses in central Manchester. It's not reflective of terrible culture at United in and of itself, although there's a boatload of other evidence of that.

 

[Amir]

Well, we can at least afford a washing machine.

Which is probably leaking.

 

[Bobcat]

no fear of authority at the club anymore, players bigger than the manager. Recipe for carnage

This. They downed tools under Ole this season and they seemingly never picked them up again for Ralf.

Maybe they dont like Ralf. Fair enough, but i would still expect them to show some goddamn professional integrity. They let the club down, they let the fans down and they get paid obscene wages. Bunch of entiteled swine

 

[Toblerone92]

These reports that some players believe ‘ETH will not be strong enough to lift the club’ really drive me up the wall. Why would want to undermine a manager who hasn’t even arrived yet? I really hope whoever is responsible for the leaks recently is exposed and swiftly moved on.

 

[Danish Wizard]

Let us get it all out now, once and for all, so hopefully we can move on forward now.

 

[manichester]

It has beeen going on for some time and not been dealt with, the more that comes to the surface about mismanagement the better. Maybe someone will then get a grip.

 

[Laurencio]

We've been served some glossy illusion of harmony by the players and the club for years. What we are seeing now is the reality at the club, and probably has been for years. It was unveiled under Mourinho, hidden by Ole, and is now coming to the forefront again.

We have essentially had a media image of a "united" club of kind-hearted professionals who are "nice", often criticised as too nice to win anything. We've tried to protect that image by having players trot out platitudes and making token statements to the press. From the nonsensical "we go again" posts on social media, to the endless "player A is working hard" statements and PR teams producing fluff pieces.

It has been clear for years now that our owners and by extension our board of directors, do not care about the club's football activities in any way other than as a means to increase revenue. Which essentially means champions league qualification and player's media popularity/image rights take precedent over the squad's ability to win trophies.

Perhaps there hasn't been enough pressure on the club's commercial activities to incentivise the decision-makers into making the necessary changes. Whatever the reason, handling it internally has clearly not been working for us. I don't think handling these issues quietly is even an option with decision makers like this.

Time will tell how this will all work out, but hopefully our owners now feel incentivised to give more freedom and power to people who are actually competent enough to fix this mess. Because this is bound to have an effect on the commercial value of the club. If that happens, then this barrage of crap might be worth it.

 

[Vernon Philander]

Air and share

More $$ for the football universe

 

[wolvored]

If TH can get a grip, weed out the moaners, (Lingard and Pogba will be gone, but probably another 2-3 doing it), get back to winning ways, it will hopefully go away to an occasional moan. A player moaning he isnt getting enough playing time or the like, but the intensity of it will hopefully have gone.

 

[Zen86]

These reports that some players believe ‘ETH will not be strong enough to lift the club’ really drive me up the wall. Why would want to undermine a manager who hasn’t even arrived yet? I really hope whoever is responsible for the leaks recently is exposed and swiftly moved on.

Don't believe everything you read. Inventing stories about Manchester United players/staff makes for easy clicks. It's been turned into one big soap opera.

 

[Skills]

It should all be behind doors. Remember, we're trying to sell the same players you're shitting on in public.

One of my biggest issues with the clubs been we've given all our managers license to talk shit about our multimillion pound assets. Ten Hag luckily doesn't seem to be interested in playing games in the media, so hopefully will keep things under wrap.

 

[JPRouve]

I often wonder how young or naive some of the fans are, we are talking about several dozens of adults who are not friends but colleagues, at the best of time it's unlikely that the majority like each others or have any relationship that is beyond a professional one. Secondly when things are going poorly result wise competitors get upset and as much as some of you have the idea that Premier League players are for some reason not bothered about winning, they actually are, that's how they ended up being at the top of world Football which includes the Premier League.

So knowing these two things, most players are likely extremely frustrated with themselves and others, the only thing that fixes it is relative success, it's only scenario where there is no laundry being washed in public or where there is the illusion of harmony. And I don't care much about it being behind closed door or not, as long as it's washed.

 

[fezzerUTD]

I often wonder how young or naive some of the fans are, we are talking about about several dozens of adults who are not friends but colleagues, at the best of time it's unlikely that the majority like each others or have any relationship that is beyond a professional one. Secondly when things are going poorly result wise competitors get upset and as much as some of you have the idea that Premier League players are for some reason not bothered about winning, they actually are, that's how they ended up being at the top of world Football which includes the Premier League.

So knowing these two things, most players are likely extremely frustrated with themselves and others, the only thing that fixes it is relative success, it's only scenario where there is no laundry being washed in public or where there is the illusion of harmony. And I don't care much about it being behind closed door or not, as long as it's washed.

You only had to go on one of the threads in here yesterday and it was full of wwe comparisons and sayings. Enough said.

 

[Bilbo]

We all need to understand that there will always be issues within the football club. Players not getting on, unhappy with a lack of game time, or the tactics, or any other infinite number of things that occur whenever you put a group of people together in a sporting environment. They are human beings living a life that none of us can relate to.

I would always be a strong advocate of keeping issues behind closed doors, but in this moment it feels unavoidable because of what is going on. We have a lot of problems. Many of these players will be hurting from everything that has happened, and many are probably desperate to try to defend themselves from the criticism. Others are leaving the club and probably don't mind burning bridges. It's a sh!tshow and it's not going to get any better until Ten Hag starts his job.

 

[haru krentz]

Jose did it and got plastered here, did he not? the hypocrisy by some of you now what is other benefits of talking bad about your own players in the public except of channeling your anger and frustation? ZILCH, NADA, NOTHING. Talking bad of someone in the open rarely have positive impact except making that person detest you even more which is happening to RR, don't get me wrong i think some of these players deserve the bashing but bringing out things we already know to the public is counterproductive imho, bet all of our oppositions are enjoying the comedy right now.

Our club is a mess, we all know it, everyone knows it, it's obvious by the way we play and the results. It'll be good to bring everything out in the open so there's nowhere for anyone to hide. There's been a severe lack of accountability and consequence for many of these players. I'll be happy if the ones responsible are named and shamed.

Including Ralf then. Listen, i've never expected much from him from the start, he's been out of managerial job since a decade even then his achievement as manager is so-so hence i'm not shocked that we are what we are today but him showing not ounce of responsibility nor humility is bemusing, everything is everyone else's fault not his, eventhough he's had more time to implement his tactic or pick uncommited players out of matchday squad.