Why is our passing so garbage?

FrankDrebin said:
A lack of confidence and composure in playing a more calm possession style from time to time.

As mentioned above, we do have the irritating need to constantly play on the transition quickly, which more often than not rarely works.
Click to expand...
I don't think it is so irritating. As a team, we have too many players who aren't comfortable on the ball under pressure. Given that pressure is more a less a default state, we struggle. Lets see, having Amad, Cunha und Mbeuma (and maybe even Mount) available for most of the games, this issue might improve on its own, but in the middle of the park, I think the issues will remain as long as we don't add a player in midfield and specifically adress that issue on the training pitch. This hectic transition heavy style is what we tend to since the Ole days, the common denominator is one player. Doesn't mean he is at fault but that kind of football usually suits him quite well, so it isn't a shock, that we resort back to it as soon as the going gets tough.
 
Ole'sgunnarwin said:
That was exceptionally bad today. Especially in dangerous positions. Needs to improve
Click to expand...
Back in the Fergie days, we were one of the best passing teams in England and Europe. Even the bang average players like Cleverley would be good passers. Our general play was so smooth and pleasing to watch.

What's fascinating to me is even when we finished 2nd or 3rd in the league, our general play and passing was garbage. It seems to me that we are incapable of playing attractive football, no matter which manager comes. Hopefully, that's gonna change this season.
 
KingEric04 said:
Back in the Fergie days, we were one of the best passing teams in England and Europe. Even the bang average players like Cleverley would be good passers. Our general play was so smooth and pleasing to watch.

What's fascinating to me is even when we finished 2nd or 3rd in the league, our general play and passing was garbage. It seems to me that we are incapable of playing attractive football, no matter which manager comes. Hopefully, that's gonna change this season.
Click to expand...

If we check our stats back in time, we will see that the like of Scholes and Carrick had average 92%+ passing accuracy. In other words, whenever the ball goes to the midfield, there is less than 10% chance that we will lose the ball there.

Now we have Bruno (75%), Casemiro (80%) and Ugarte (85%). the likelihood of losing the ball when it goes to the midfield has almost doubled.

In the past years, we keep recruiting "specialists" (e.g. Casmiro and Ugarte are pure destroyers) who lack general "show up for the ball, pass and run" basics
 
Players like Bruno and Casemiro trying daft flicks all the time in dangerous areas, often gifting possession back. Ugarte can't pass more than 10 yards and has a dreadful first touch, one of our least press resistant players. Mainoo hides from the ball is almost always not in a position to receive the ball, leaving our defenders to try and pass through our midfield.
 
The players are just not good
Enough, look at city, Liverpool and Arsenal
we are mile and miles behind. If we happen to upgrade the mdfield to modric and alonso in their prime or xavi and insists on their prime the rest of the players are still shit and our tactics area even worse. Cunha and Mbeumbo not gonna fix that. We needed players comfortable in possesion. Hopefully I’m wrong about Cuna and Mbuembo but there playing behind the striker with feck all around them bar the wing backs making the occasional run.
 
ScholesBrain said:
If we check our stats back in time, we will see that the like of Scholes and Carrick had average 92%+ passing accuracy. In other words, whenever the ball goes to the midfield, there is less than 10% chance that we will lose the ball there.

Now we have Bruno (75%), Casemiro (80%) and Ugarte (85%). the likelihood of losing the ball when it goes to the midfield has almost doubled.

In the past years, we keep recruiting "specialists" (e.g. Casmiro and Ugarte are pure destroyers) who lack general "show up for the ball, pass and run" basics
Click to expand...
Our passing accuracy is shocking, especially Bruno's which is only 75%?! They can't even do the basics for feck sake. You put Phil Jones or Cleverley in the midfield under Fergie and they will do a decent job despite being bang average. So many of our "okay" players of that 2013 squad overperformed like Cleverely, Smalling, Evans, Jones, Wellbeck etc. I know that was all part of Fergie's magic but even when we bought solid midfielders like Mata and Matic, they looked lost and shocking.

Pogba also disappointed, Di Maria was iffy, Mkhtiryan was bad, Schweinsteiger was shocking etc. It's not like we always bought average midfielders. These are some pretty good names, not to mention Casemiro as well. Are you telling me that even these solid midfielders couldn't do the freaking basics?

I am not even asking them to overperform but just do their jobs as Keane would say.
Even with these solid midfielders we played garbage football. Many midtable clubs play an attractive and good football, so it's not like some pipe dream.
 
We don’t have many reliable passers in the team. Everyone’s strengths lie in difference places. Ugarte is a defensive clogger who can’t pass. Mainoo is great with the ball at feet with passing being one of his weaker attributes. Colliyer is limited. Dalot is mediocrity personified and reliant on physique. Mount is a decent but safe passer. Bruno is highly creative but also inconsistent. Cunha and Mbuemo look to have other strengths.

Ideally we’d sign two midfielders who are proper passers in that their core strength is in running football matches. But sadly not that much has changed since the days of Mcfred.
 
KingEric04 said:
Back in the Fergie days, we were one of the best passing teams in England and Europe. Even the bang average players like Cleverley would be good passers. Our general play was so smooth and pleasing to watch.

What's fascinating to me is even when we finished 2nd or 3rd in the league, our general play and passing was garbage. It seems to me that we are incapable of playing attractive football, no matter which manager comes. Hopefully, that's gonna change this season.
Click to expand...
 
bgoodall said:
Is this the new version of the Static, slow motion zombie passing thread?
Click to expand...
Yep. We've done a full 180. We've injected so much urgency into our play to the point that it's gotten too much and, it's compromised our composure. Add some preseason rustiness, an Ugarte, and this is what you get.
 
Rejecting Kroos joining us last minute was a mortal sin for LVG (it was a great escape for Kroos though). We were denied a proper midfielder for 10 years
 
Missed the game today but watched our previous 3. Was our passing really that bad? I thought we've been pretty good in the US tour (amazing by last season's standards) with our quick and fluid passing that gave teams no time to react, which is what I want to see at the highest level of any sport.

Reminds me of an upgraded version of Ole-Ball in his first year(?) where we won so many penalties because teams couldn't deal with our speed of play. That was quite a fun watch overall. It also suits our current personnel.
 
Pronewbie said:
Missed the game today but watched our previous 3. Was our passing really that bad? I thought we've been pretty good in the US tour (amazing by last season's standards) with our quick and fluid passing that gave teams no time to react, which is what I want to see at the highest level of any sport.

Reminds me of an upgraded version of Ole-Ball in his first year(?) where we won so many penalties because teams couldn't deal with our speed of play. That was quite a fun watch overall. It also suits our current personnel.
Click to expand...
You can read Amorim analysis in his thread. He basically admitted we played like without a midfield!

You shouldn’t take previous games as positive without understanding the context: teams usually rustier in the first games of the tour. Toward the end, when their fitness improve, the edge of raw technical talent may be overcome by superior physicality. Our midfield is a mismatch. We don’t have that level above technical ability to dominate. We lack physicality so teams can outfight to overrun us.

We’re now discernible worse than under Ole. For all the stick McFred, Pogba, Matic used to get, they have some strength that allowed us to play counter attacking football. This midfield, is weak slow physically, all while is worse technically.
 
ti vu said:
You can read Amorim analysis in his thread. He basically admitted we played like without a midfield!

You shouldn’t take previous games as positive without understanding the context: teams usually rustier in the first games of the tour. Toward the end, when their fitness improve, the edge of raw technical talent may be overcome by superior physicality. Our midfield is a mismatch. We don’t have that level above technical ability to dominate. We lack physicality so teams can outfight to overrun us.

We’re now discernible worse than under Ole. For all the stick McFred, Pogba, Matic used to get, they have some strength that allowed us to play counter attacking football. This midfield, is weak slow physically, all while is worse technically.
Click to expand...
This is a passing-specific thread. Yes I have acknowledged our personnel issues in midfield. I think that's something all United fans can agree on. And yes I get that we had the physical and fitness advantage in the 1st 2 US tour matches and from today's highlights it was evident that we seemed physically weak in midfield and defence, littered with individual errors.

I am saying that the team's passing build up and chance creation has generally been pretty fluid and slick. Especially the defence and attack (with wing-backs being an important outlet).

This makes me want to watch the whole match when I get the time. Maybe I'll better understand how bad we were. Seems like it was giving last season vibes.
 
Pronewbie said:
This is a passing-specific thread. Yes I have acknowledged our personnel issues in midfield. I think that's something all United fans can agree on. And yes I get that we had the physical and fitness advantage in the 1st 2 US tour matches and from today's highlights it was evident that we seemed physically weak in midfield and defence, littered with individual errors.

I am saying that the team's passing build up and chance creation has generally been pretty fluid and slick. Especially the defence and attack (with wing-backs being an important outlet).

This makes me want to watch the whole match when I get the time. Maybe I'll better understand how bad we were. Seems like it was giving last season vibes.
Click to expand...
The passing in midfield is a void. The slick combination anre between attackers and wing backs. This is Everton and they were able to stifle us to this extend. Imagine what would happen against much superior team at everything: passing, defending, pressing and finishing.

Amorim specifically acknowledged it in his own analysis that we struggle with build up. We may hope we can offset last season shortcoming in goal with the new signing, but game management may limit how much we can climb up the table.
 
If you play the likes of Ugarte, Casemiro and Bruno in midfield, you cant expect them to pass like Carrick or Scholes. It is what it is.
 
Compare Bruno's pass accuracy to Ødegaard's, and the latter is consistently almost 10% percent better. Is this predominantly player or the system?
 
matsdf said:
Compare Bruno's pass accuracy to Ødegaard's, and the latter is consistently almost 10% percent better. Is this predominantly player or the system?
Click to expand...
Odegaard is thrash mate. Only does safe passes. Does he have as much assists and chances created as Bruno? What a weird comparison.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
Because we love to sign players for literally every other position every summer and ignore midfield entirely
Click to expand...
And when we do consider midfielders. We either want them to be attackers or defenders. When looking at midfielders we look at goal contributions or tackles and duels and end up ignoring actual midfielders. The other day someone responded to a post about getting Wharton over Baleba with - "what does he actually do?"
 
Yesterday Everton were smothering the man in possession as they didn't feel any threat from a switch to the other wing or long ball in behind the line.

Its hard to get time on the ball if you can't keep the opposition honest
 
ZainCRse7en said:
Odegaard is thrash mate. Only does safe passes. Does he have as much assists and chances created as Bruno? What a weird comparison.
Click to expand...
They are both 10's, I don't see how it's a weird comparison. He also had 8 assists to Bruno's 10 last season, not a huge difference.
 
Fox outside the box said:
How have we ignored it entirely?

In the last 3 years we've signed, what? 6 midfielders?

Ugarte, Mount, Casemiro, Eriksen, Sabitzer, Amrabat.

Now we can debate if they were the right signings, if they've worked out etc but to say we've ignored it entirely seems a really strange thing to say. We've spent like £200 million and signed at least 1 every year.

Appreciate Sabitzer and Amrabat were loans but they still count as attempts to address midfield/not ignoring it.
Click to expand...
Really crap, nearly all cheap solutions. It's not taken seriously.
 
Ekeke said:
I think we play a lot of sideways passes that our opponents are easily predicting we will play and stepping in to take the ball. Everton looked a bit sharper than us today in general so when the ball was up for grabs usually an Everton player was reacting slightly before our players
Click to expand...
We literally forced the ball forward constantly.
 
ZainCRse7en said:
Odegaard is thrash mate. Only does safe passes. Does he have as much assists and chances created as Bruno? What a weird comparison.
Click to expand...
It is depended on what system do you want to have..
If you want a system that is stable, possession and consistent. Odegaard type player is better than Bruno..
If you want a system that is gamble and aggressive, then Bruno type player is better than Odegaard, but you need to expect it might lose the possession for every single pass in the mind.
 
I know it's not just the midfield who are to blame for the lack of passing skills, but it's an area of the pitch where it's most important. And I just can't see any combination of Ugarte, Casemiro, Mainoo, Collyer providing all the attributes (including passing) to be a successful pairing there. I think you'll buy someone.
 
Hammondo said:
Really crap, nearly all cheap solutions. It's not taken seriously.
Click to expand...
Shifting the goalposts.

I responded to the assertion that it had been "entirely ignored".

I acknowledged that we could debate the quality of those transfers. That's not what I'm responding to.

The objective fact is it hasn't been "ignored entirely". The post I responded to stated we had ignored it every summer. This is just simply not true.

Spending £200 million suggests it's been taken seriously. Immnot sure where you're getting that from. The transfers not being correct or working out is a completely different thing.

People just use words and don't consider what they actually mean.
 
klayton88 said:
Players like Bruno and Casemiro trying daft flicks all the time in dangerous areas, often gifting possession back. Ugarte can't pass more than 10 yards and has a dreadful first touch, one of our least press resistant players. Mainoo hides from the ball is almost always not in a position to receive the ball, leaving our defenders to try and pass through our midfield.
Click to expand...
This pretty much sums it up
 
We can’t get out if the habit of the long cross-field Hollywood ball that leads to absolutely nothing 99% of the time we throw away possession all the time
 
Red Indian Chief Torn Rubber said:
Its no our passing. Its the gap we keep letting develop between our midfield two and 3 cbs in and out of possession that's the issue because we constantly face 3 man midfield departments. Our defensive central 5 need to work better as a cohesive unit.
Click to expand...

Agree those 5 have to connect better but last night for instance, the basic passing and first touch of a few was just bad. No system or relationship between players can cover for that.
 
To answer the original question , it is all down to personel. Our midfield is all wrong.

We dont have a dictator who can keep the ball under pressure, we dont have a mobile ball winner.

We have far too many number 10's , and we cant keep playing players out of position just to get them in the team, another prime example of this is Dalot, clearly a manager's favourite but the team doesnt function with him at left or right wing back.
 
Marwood said:
Agree those 5 have to connect better but last night for instance, the basic passing and first touch of a few was just bad. No system or relationship between players can cover for that.
Click to expand...
That CAN happen I agree. Especially when we were being ludicrously ambitious with passing attempts in our deeper 3rd. Cosrjbv us possesion connstantly.

But for me the tactical issue still remains. Just think back to how Conte's center 5 functioned as a unit. Most people would think it was down to the quality Kante and Matic had. Yet the unit of the azpicuelta, luiz, Cahill and those 2 and how they functioned seamlessly as one block in and out of possesion was the key.
 
We don't have any centre midfielders that are comfortable in possession of the ball with the exception of Mainoo though he doesn't get on the ball enough.

The centre midfielders we have don't have good positional sense that's why there are so many gaps in midfield.

We don't focus on trying to keep the ball for the sake of keeping the ball.

Not playing with a 3 man midfield like every other top club does.
 
Fox outside the box said:
How have we ignored it entirely?

In the last 3 years we've signed, what? 6 midfielders?

Ugarte, Mount, Casemiro, Eriksen, Sabitzer, Amrabat.

Now we can debate if they were the right signings, if they've worked out etc but to say we've ignored it entirely seems a really strange thing to say. We've spent like £200 million and signed at least 1 every year.

Appreciate Sabitzer and Amrabat were loans but they still count as attempts to address midfield/not ignoring it.
Click to expand...
Ok, let me restate my original stance. We have signed players for the central midfield position, but we have mostly ignored the actual attributes needed: technically gifted players who are comfortable on the ball, can dictate the tempo of the game, and can progress the ball forward.

Instead, we've usually gone for a combination of stop-gap solutions and/or "destroyers".
 
NZT-One said:
I don't think it is so irritating. As a team, we have too many players who aren't comfortable on the ball under pressure. Given that pressure is more a less a default state, we struggle. Lets see, having Amad, Cunha und Mbeuma (and maybe even Mount) available for most of the games, this issue might improve on its own, but in the middle of the park, I think the issues will remain as long as we don't add a player in midfield and specifically adress that issue on the training pitch. This hectic transition heavy style is what we tend to since the Ole days, the common denominator is one player. Doesn't mean he is at fault but that kind of football usually suits him quite well, so it isn't a shock, that we resort back to it as soon as the going gets tough.
Click to expand...
Yea, the midfielders just immediately pass the ball to attacks then they are not putting them onto a good situation. We are expecting good attacking play that starts from a poor position.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
Ok, let me restate my original stance. We have signed players for the central midfield position, but we have mostly ignored the actual attributes needed: technically gifted players who are comfortable on the ball, can dictate the tempo of the game, and can progress the ball forward.

Instead, we've usually gone for a combination of stop-gap solutions and/or "destroyers".
Click to expand...
Fair enough. Still think your stance on saying its being "ignored" probably isn't the best way to look at it.

Ignoring something implies you're aware of it but making a conscious choice not to address it. Cas had a brilliant first season, I certainly don't recall many/any saying he was awful. I'm fact, there was a lot of discussion about him being one/the best 6 in the world.

Obviously second season didn't go as well and now people are pretending like this was the case all along.

We've maybe got it wrong and hindsight is a wonderful thing but I think you're adding an element of unnecessary frustration by telling yourself that this is something we're choosing to do, ignoring what was always glaringly obvious etc.

Sometimes things just don't go as planned. I'm sure we signed the likes of Casemiro and Mount in the that they would address some of these issues. Rightly or wrongly I feel like the intent has at least been there.

We may have to agree to disagree, I think your stance just seems a little harsh though.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
Ok, let me restate my original stance. We have signed players for the central midfield position, but we have mostly ignored the actual attributes needed: technically gifted players who are comfortable on the ball, can dictate the tempo of the game, and can progress the ball forward.

Instead, we've usually gone for a combination of stop-gap solutions and/or "destroyers".
Click to expand...
Re progress the ball forwards, do you mean with their passing or in terms of dribbling?
 
I didn't see the game, I thought it was on Thursday but this is one of the most disappointing threads I've seen in ages. There seems to be complete agreement that we are rubbish. No hyperbole, no exaggeration, people just calmly pointing out that we are rubbish. The usual defending of the manager saying it's the club, the structure, or whatever is not here. People saying we are rubbish and people agreeing.

It is really quite depressing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.