I'm not a fan at all, but Ole got it right today (well I don't think he needed to go with McFred,) but his subs were spot on, and we played better today than we did in a number of other games this season.So many tantrums having to be bottled up until the next time we drop a point.
We are an awfully coached team
- Thread starter bond19821982
- Start date
Patterns of play are pre-drilled combinations of play. So for example when X player is on the ball Y player move here and Z player moves here, with all three knowing who X will pass to and what the player who will receive it is supposed to do with it next. You drill varieties of these patterns and that allows you to play quicker football, as players are reacting to things before they happen and not having to weigh up options when they get the ball in those situations.
For example the end result might be the difference between AWB seeing Sancho on the ball and reacting by making a run to overlap/underlap or AWB making that run before Sancho gets the ball because both he and Sancho have been coached to know that's what comes next (and with the CF making a certain run to create space for AWB because he knows what's coming too). In both cases the same thing might happen but in the latter case it happens a lot quicker, which allows for more incision and gets players into more advantageous positions.
Another example might be: Shaw makes a run up the pitch, Ronaldo drops deep, Shaw plays the ball to Ronaldo. Fernandes is drilled to make an arching run, being able to time it so that he's in the correct position and body shape to comfortably receive the ball from Ronaldo while facing the goal. Shaw (knowing in advance that the ball he's playing to Ronaldo will be going to Fernandes next) is able to aim the ball to the foot that allows Ronaldo to play a one-touch pass to Fernandes. Meanwhile Pogba (playing at LW) knows he has to stay wide to keep the opposition fullback engaged and offer a secondary pass option for both Shaw and Ronaldo. Because this is pre-drilled they're able to execute that combination at speed and with the right timing. Whereas if it wasn't pre-drilled Ronaldo might have to take an extra touch which kills the first time pass to Fernandes.
Those sorts of patterns are why you always see City scoring that same cut-back goal over and over again, for example. It isn't an accident, they've been drilled with different combinations of passing and movement to get their players into those positions.
Those patterns don't have to just be to break down opposition defences either. They can be to used to play through an opposition press too. And aside from incision they stop you from losing the ball as easily in dangerous areas.
Hope that's a clear enough explanation.
So you're criticising Ole's subs while also dismissively saying 'Lingard bailed him out'. Matic replaced the tiring Fred and provided the assist for the winner.
What the feck are you moaning about really? You're actually criticising him for decisions which ultimately won the game.
Thats all built on pass move. Which we have definitely implemented and improved on since the statue subuteo football of LVG and Mourinho.
I don't necessarily think the same little collection of set passing moves works or isn't predictable. The mighty city and there ‘patterns’ have drawn two blanks now this season. I suppose setting up these Patterns are a way of coaching and playing but its not the only way. Its not ‘patterns or you're shite’. Theres just no way we dominate possession and have started since project restart to score some pretty big hauls by accident or coincidence, thats just a stupid point to make.
Theres no way that our coaching staff just stick 11 players out on the pitch and say ‘erm yeah, try to win’. What do people think we do on the training ground? Shooting practice then hit the showers? Do you honestly think that Ole cant come Up with a crummy little passing move that any old fan from the age of 7 could? We used to plan stuff like that in primary school football practice. Its a pretty farcical point to try and make IMO
Everything that benefits Ole is him getting lucky and everything bad is Ole's fault so we should sack him and bring in someone good on Football Manager
The man who beat England with Iceland.
Perfectly explained. I have seen people here mocking things like "Patterns of play", "tempo", "tactics" as if they are figments of imagination and have nothing to do with actual football.
Where in reality, these so called figments of imagination are often the difference between a title winning team and a good one. A clear defined structure of play, defined roles and play patterns, combined with good passing and movement often elevates a team to another level, where even the average players look better than they actually are, helping them create and score more chances, break down deep blocks and even help them keep possession when down to less than 11 players.
Even today, we were so slow, tempo wise, so static, with extremely poor passing. But yeah, who needs "patterns of play" when we can wing it all the way to the title, right?
It is a beauty to watch really. Just pass the ball into the net 60 times a season like clockwork.
We weren’t slow. We controlled the game with a high line against a team parking the bus. We should have scored at least 4 today because of it. You play with patience against such severe low blocks which we did.
You can’t go on a long rant about not appreciating tactics and put today down to winging it for feck sake
I'm not moaning. I think he got lucky with those subs and I don't think if that's going to be his approach to subs we will be having many conversations on here where bringing matic on at the 87th minute will be producing wins. De Gea bailed him out by saving the peno too.
Well now the argument is that “patterns of play” make us predictable like City, who have drawn blanks twice this season already.
In any case I think it is false to say we have no patterns. The questions are whether our patterns are good enough, whether there’s enough variety, whether our players are sufficiently drilled in them, whether our players are intelligent enough to spot the openings for such patterns etc.
I doubt we will qualify from our CL group, and I expect us to be at least 7-8 points below league leaders come New Year. Hopefully, I am mistaken, but I can see Chelsea, City and scousers finishing above us.
Oh, I beg to differ. We were struggling to control the game against a side who were without their best player. Tempo was poor, passing was worse, and like throughout the tenure of Ole, we had to rely on the individual brilliance of players to bail us out, in this case, DDG and Ronaldo. Playing with patience does not break low blocks, as has been evident throughout the last few years.
I think, you are still wrong. The patterns of play, the user described aren't designed like "if A does this, then B does that". Of course some are more open, integrate several options, so "A has two option when he receives the ball on the left during built up, A) go for a carrying run down the side b) look to reach the CM who is told to make himself available for the pass" . The level of rigidness is obviously not fixed, it can vary pretty much but these sort of things enable teams to play faster. To add to the great post above, pre-drilled moves free players of some decisions - a player who receives the ball doesn't have to check the situation and decide out of 10 options to play to but he only needs to know which of his 2 or 3 plans seems to be the most promising and then execute. This decision then makes it easier for the rest of the team to react - some players know they are directly involved in the move so they act, other players know where gaps will be created so they are ready to close those gaps.
Again, nobody says United should go down the route of stifling our players with stuff like that. It should be seen as additional tools in the locker. We take so many touches, our players so often have to evaluate situations so the number of touches will go up and up.
These patterns of play can also emerge naturally, when a group plays together for a long time, they get used to each other and they experience, which moves work. This is in parts what is called partnerships or chemistry. Modern coaches try to be proactive and avoid waiting for these moves to emerge naturally by giving their teams these moves. Also that doesn't mean the manager is forcing these moves onto the players, I am pretty sure, the players are integrated in that process. But stuff like has so many advantages, beginning by making it easier to integrate new players and also by recruiting new players. If you know, that your teams needs for example a striker who can keep hold of the ball and bring in the inside forwards by intricate passing, than you know you shouldn't go for Lukaku.
Last edited:
5 games in and it looks like the players are running through treacle. So pedestrian it was a little pathetic at times. But so classy as well in passages. It was like watching a team of 10 Berbatovs play. No idea why we are so slow. Don’t think it’s coaching more tiredness or lack of match fitness…
Theres so many on here who love to tactically analyse us as if they know what they are talking about. Why arent they in the running to replace Ole? Because in fact they know jack shit. I’d love to see them pitch their coaching ideas to our coaching staff while the staff roll about laughing. Like phil jones said in his interview, people in their mums spare bedroom surrounded by crusty socks chatting shit on the internet. These people seem to prioritise slagging us off and crying about everything and generally being miserable and toxic about everything than watching the football and enjoying it. Its like they prefer us to lose to be able to moan more and try and vindicate ridiculous points they try to make about our coaching. They should start telling NASA how to build better space rockets while they are at it. I dont know why most of them dont clear off and become neutrals or focus on Fifa on playstation. ‘Supporting’ us is obviously a big negative in their life.
I have heard none of the ‘patterns’ or ‘brilliance’ arguments from any respected pundits, ex players or managers. Its total guff.
Whats your football coaching acumen? Your CV?
We do have a basic pattern of play, so to speak as we have players who are good on the ball playing the occasional good passes, but the general play has mostly been poor and I'm yet to see us consistently breaking low blocks and organised defences through our play rather than incidents of individual brilliance, so I am inclined to think that the patterns that exists are not good enough.
Very Very good team and fighting spirit today. Looks like the harmony inside the team is great. Credit to the players, manager and coaches
Have a read on zonal marking, a website ran by the folks who are doing tifo now I think. I am not saying, they tell the definite truth, be all and end all but they did a pretty good job showing how things can be described that happen on a football pitch. If you know, what might be possible, I think, there is no other conclusion than to think, that some teams make us of such stuff.
In Germany there was something very close called Spielverlagerung, I think, one of the authors there went on to go to Borussia Mönchengladbach. Rene Maric is his name:
https://www.derbund.ch/sport/fussba...tet-in-der-bundesliga-gelandet/story/12809712
*edit: seems to be at RB Salzburg by now
Ole can't win then if that's your view. When a sub works then he 'got lucky', if the sub doesn't work it was a shit decision.
Good thing I didn't make that point then.
Obviously we have some structure, patterns and ideas. Solskjaer, McKenna and Carrick aren't new to football. The question is how much emphasis they place on that aspect of the game and how good they are at actually coaching it. Because that's where the expertise comes in, not in spotting the problems or making up patterns like any idiot who has read a bit about tactics can do. This isn't secret knowledge, it's just difficult to implement.
Not every team places the same emphasis on these things. But in the case of our particular team, it's what we're clearly lacking in a lot of games. You can see it in the amount of times our players are isolated when they get the ball, the amount of times they're unable to play one-touch football, the amount of times they get caught out of position in transition, the amount of times we struggle to play out from the back effectively etc.
Looking at a specific example that everyone can see, take Matic's habit of dropping into defence that has been widely noted and complained about on this forum (I think it even has it's own thread). Now a CM dropping into the back three like that is a standard thing, but for us it doesn't seem to work well as it sees our other midfielder left isolated. One of a few possible things is happening there:
1) Matic has decided to do that on his own and nobody has corrected him, which is a coaching problem.
2) Matic is supposed to do that but other players aren't taking up the correct positions on time to stop our other midfielder being isolated, which is a coaching problem.
3) Matic is supposed to do that but the coaches don't think other players need to take up positions to stop our midfield being isolated, which is a coaching problem.
To your point, I don't think our coaches are so clueless that the basic concept of a CM dropping into a back three to help a team build out from the back is some radical idea to them. In fact Carrick specifically spoke about being instructed to do similar by LVG in the past. It's a standard idea and shape to take up when building from the back. But knowing what do do and wanting to do it isn't the same as being able to coach the players into doing it effectively or as part of your team's overall plan of how to play. I can't imagine anyone in their right mind saying the effect of Matic dropping into defence as he does is a positive one, so straight away that's a coaching problem everyone can see that lingered far too long.
You could compare these flaws to our set-piece problems last year, for example. Obviously all of Ole, Carrick and McKenna know how set-pieces work and have plans for what we should do at set-pieces. It would be ludicrous to suggest they just sent the players out there and let them figure it out. But despite having that knowledge and intent, they weren't actually able to coach us into being tight on set-pieces last season. So they brought in Eric Ramsay as a set-piece coach to specifically to deal with that problem, as they obviously felt having a specialised coach focusing on that area would improve us.
Well I want us to do the same thing in terms of our positional/possession play. As with set-pieces the argument isn't that our current coaching staff know absolutely nothing about these elements of the game. It's that they aren't able to coach those elements of the game to a high enough level, so need to bring in someone who can do better. And, possibly, that they're not placing as much weight on that area of the game as they should given that of the four supposed contenders for the title this season we're the one who look the most undercoached in that regard.
Its a crap little website by people who think they know stuff and dont.
If all is so, you’ve just discovered something ground breaking in football - go and get the manager with best patterns, get rid of your expensive players for some cheap league 2 ones who will play for 2 grand a week because they will nail it anyway with the patterns in place.
Literally if there was an ounce of truth in this guff its a groundbreaking moment for football.
Half of people in the UK think that Boris Johnson is an idiot. Why they are not in the running to replace him? You can exchange him with Trump for the argument to make equally sense. Or not.
I am an interested fan who likes data, football and Manchester United. I also happend to read a lot at Zonal Marking and Spielverlagerung, now I often consume videos of people engaging with Football, tactics and data wise. I don't claim, I am an expert at all. But enough to know, that there seems to be a layer in football, that you don't know. Which isn't a criticism - I don't think it is necessary to go that deep into a topic. But to deny its existence without knowing anything about it makes you look pretty weak.
No it isn't. Stuff like that is around since quite a while. You not knowing about it, doesn't mean it isn't there. With all due respect.
Arguing with another member
So you read clueless crap on the internet so you are an expert in clueless crap. Round of applause for you
It's actually very simple on the so called patterns of play.
It is the right player at the right time at the right space. In words it's simple. In practice it is not. That's why players need to understand and at the same time practice moving into space and more importantly vacating that space and moving into another space.
Now Ole is talking the talk. So he does understand that. But at this moment in time he or the coaches are not able to implement it for sure. I would put more onus on the coaches than the manager. Maybe our midfield is simply not good enough? For sure our corners are not good enough.
It is the right player at the right time at the right space. In words it's simple. In practice it is not. That's why players need to understand and at the same time practice moving into space and more importantly vacating that space and moving into another space.
Now Ole is talking the talk. So he does understand that. But at this moment in time he or the coaches are not able to implement it for sure. I would put more onus on the coaches than the manager. Maybe our midfield is simply not good enough? For sure our corners are not good enough.
Ah so when the decisions go against him it’s bad management and when they work it’s also bad management. I see.
So you think there's nothing wrong with bringing on a 33 year old DM at the 87th minute in a 90 minute game? You don't think it's a bit off that when Jesse is being told he's coming on and he is fully kitted out that Sancho is surprised when Ole says to him you're coming on too and he has to pull off his training top. If you're going to bring on an £87 million player do you not think that's a conversation you have at half time with the player? "Hey Jadon, I'm going to give you a run for the last 20 minutes, be ready". That wouldn't be a normal approach to sub management, no? Lingard for Ronaldo midweek. Inspired sub in your opinion? What I'm saying is the approach to substitutions is going to cost him eventually. Delighted when it worked today, but De Gea won that game with his peno save, not Oles subs.
We set up well today and it was a good win. We need to cut out the stupid individual errors though. Maguire's form is also a concern.
Yea, when you decide not to read what I've said, that's what it is.
What’s control? We peg teams back now to the point it’s only counters and deflected shots going at us. Fans have been pointing out how open we are to counters because that’s literally all that’s been coming our way as of late.
Not far off top scorers last season, top scorers this. If we are achieving that without any patterns of play then feck me we are some side.
It’s blatantly obvious that it’s just buzz words used by fans who have no clue what they’re talking about and are confusing their inability to spot patterns of play with the absence of them.
I still remember this forum going mad after the Newcastle away game under Jose about how we didn’t play a diamond only for Jose to reveal post game that we actually did.
Even then it boils down to being limited while watching it on tv anyway.
Actually no. A good manager would never decide beforehand in an important match during an important phase. Bringing on Matic such late I would say was a good defensive move. I felt that Ole didn't want to lose the game so late in the game. A point obviously would be better than no points. Today it worked for him. He probably would have made a different decision if the referee was competent and we got the penalty and scored.
Thank-you for stating the obvious to these people.
Exactly this. We dominated and VAR was West Ham MOM
Ole's subs were effective and I thought Lingard was super. Even ignoring that cracking goal he really linked midfield and attack well.
Lets not kid ourselves though....
we didn't control the game. It was far too open and even, despite the stats saying we probably had more pops at goal. We arent making the most of our possession. It might be tactical or the style of those players but we continue to play really direct football. Bruno constantly trying to get the ball to Ronaldo ASAP.
despite having 2 holding midfielders we don't look that secure. Same issues as last season.
In attack we had a decent first half and Fabianski made some good saves. In the second though I thought we looked dull at times and uninspiring. A draw would have probably been a fair result.
I dont think we've made much progress from last season in terms of tactics, style of play or control of games. There will be plenty of games like today we will drop points in I fear
Lets not kid ourselves though....
we didn't control the game. It was far too open and even, despite the stats saying we probably had more pops at goal. We arent making the most of our possession. It might be tactical or the style of those players but we continue to play really direct football. Bruno constantly trying to get the ball to Ronaldo ASAP.
despite having 2 holding midfielders we don't look that secure. Same issues as last season.
In attack we had a decent first half and Fabianski made some good saves. In the second though I thought we looked dull at times and uninspiring. A draw would have probably been a fair result.
I dont think we've made much progress from last season in terms of tactics, style of play or control of games. There will be plenty of games like today we will drop points in I fear
A normal approach to sub management is to sub people in and out due to how that godamn match develops, no? Don't tell me Sancho needs to be told at half time to be prepared, it's his job, isn't it?
Yeah I’m inclined to agree with you. Probably related but our coaches seem to have a very poor understanding of space and positional play, or at least can’t communicate it to the players. We can bash our midfield players as much as we like, but they’re also not helped by the fact that they’re often left isolated without good passing options or synchronised movement so they know where to pass quickly.
You literally called is a strange decision despite it helping us win the game.