Hard not to agree with this. Any individual player, no matter reputation, not showing the proper dedication, I would think has no future at any club in the PL, let alone us. Which only adds to the conundrum.
Workrate
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
Jose told them not to run too much even though Chelsea players were flying? Can't be true. I guess it's normal to save energy in some games but against the likes of Chelsea, Liverpool? I doubt it. Something is not quite right but it is not easy to identfy it.
That’s the point though. We’re seeing an aggregate of all of our games. So the stats reflect our general approach and tell us nothing about individual games. Individual game data would certainly be interesting though.
I think we have seen that our best football comes when we play at a higher tempo.
You are right, we need data for individual games. But I share the impression that Chelsea players looked more dynamic both on and off the ball. I'd be very surprised if they didn't cover more distance and didn't make more sprints.
We've had players like Rooney, Anderson and Shaw who aren't just looking slightly off. They're full on out of shape. Here for years.
I'm not saying every other club is better or anything but just being at Manchester United doesnt mean you're as fit as a Huddersfield player.
I do sometimes wonder if our players are over pampered and this extends to training and their personal life.
I'm sure every club has its slackers. You usually find out about them in that Soccer AM "laziest team-mate" question! I'd say its highly likely that a club like United, that recruits a higher caliber of player than most other clubs in the league, has no more slackers than the majority of teams in the league. So, again, it can't possibly explain why we're right at the very bottom of that table.
When Pep took over at City, one of the very first things he did was expel a number of players from training with the rest of the team, because their fitness wasn't up to the level he required. This is a team who are competing at the same level as us, who had, by the manager's own admission, multiple players who simply weren't fit enough. Fergie made reference in his book on more than one occasion to players who weren't as fit or well conditioned as others, even calling Tevez a "lazy trainer"...but then in the same paragraph brushed it off as something the club was willing to accept.
We've had players with obvious fitness level issues like Anderson and Rooney, play for us over prolonged periods of time. Luke Shaw is still at United.
So I don't think it is preposterous at all. I just think other teams, in particular City and Spurs (Liverpool to a lesser extent), train and condition their players to be fit enough for the type of football they want to play.
The problem we have is these teams doing this is clearly working. While we're sitting there letting every opponent we play out run us, and in a number of games already this season this has caused noticeable problems. At Anfield and on Sunday if you'd been told United were down to 10 men it wouldn't have been hard to believe. Against Huddersfield Mourinho claimed we were outworked. Away at Stoke and Southampton we were run out of having any control over the game. People have put this down to negative tactics, but at Southampton for example, Jose introduced a third midfielder to try and give us control over the game...and it made feck all difference as we just carried on being out worked.
I think a possible explanation is Jose's risk-aversion tactics: if you move too much, you lose shape and open spaces for counter attacks, if you move the ball quickly, you risk to lose it in dangerous zones, if you bypass the midfeld by hoofing the ball, you don't expose yourself to high pressing, etc.
Apparently, Jose regards high pressing and quick passing as involving too much risks. Or he doesn't know how to combine a quick and fluid build-up play with defensive solidity and tends to sacrifice the first. Deep down he remains a counter-attacking manager but new systems of play may have adapted to an extent to the risks of being counter-attacked when losing the ball. Difficult to tell really.
I think tactics are the most likely explanation, agreed.
I think it has been proved by various teams that work ethic takes you to the top plus having enough talent. We are surely lacking in work ethic and pace as has been proved by statistics.
Talent alone is not enough and we are also lacking on the talent front in comparison to the top clubs. Look at left back,right back,right wing and left wing for example and I´m not sure any of the players we have in those positions would play for other top clubs in England or Europe.
Our fullbacks Darmian,Blind,Shaw,Young,Valencia have the total assists of 1 this season. For example Azpilicueta has 5, Trippier has 4,Walker has 4, Holebas has 3, Kolasinac has 3, Davies has 2. So here you see that the 5 guys playing fullback for us are coming out rather badly in comparison to those guys. So many say Mourinho wants to play a counter attacking style football, can you do that if you do not have attacking fullbacks when breaking forward?
Talent alone is not enough and we are also lacking on the talent front in comparison to the top clubs. Look at left back,right back,right wing and left wing for example and I´m not sure any of the players we have in those positions would play for other top clubs in England or Europe.
Our fullbacks Darmian,Blind,Shaw,Young,Valencia have the total assists of 1 this season. For example Azpilicueta has 5, Trippier has 4,Walker has 4, Holebas has 3, Kolasinac has 3, Davies has 2. So here you see that the 5 guys playing fullback for us are coming out rather badly in comparison to those guys. So many say Mourinho wants to play a counter attacking style football, can you do that if you do not have attacking fullbacks when breaking forward?
I'd rather play smarter than harder, why waste energy for 85 minutes chasing lost causes and then when you need to sprint in the final 5 minutes your legs are gone.
But having slackers dispells the idea you can't get away with it at United.
In anycase I think it's more to do with the physical make up of the team. Big, heavy guys or smaller less athletic types.
I think I agree most of it.
Also, with that kind of tactic plus not having a carrick like midfielder to dictate our tempo make us not being able to break the other team's and we look zombies and utterly average especially against good teams.
They did cover more distance sky put up a graphic straight after the game. And I think they covered somewhere between 5-10k more than us. I think they might have covered 113km and we were 102 or something.
The great coach Vince Lombardi said: "The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand"
I think you will never win the big titles if you do not match or surpass the work ethic of the best teams. Is it smart to sit back at away games against the other big teams and fail to win every time in the last 10 scoring 1 goal? We are just lacking and it´s there for all to see if you look at the stats. Guardiola got Mendy,Walker,Silva,Danilio for the fullback positions and they are flying. We have fullbacks that offer nothing attacking wise with 1 assists shared between 5 players. Fullbacks are very important in attacking sense in modern football and we are lacking there and on the wings.
Why not play smart and play hard. Working hard forces mistakes, getting to people quicker closes options, as in moving to space quicker opens up space, makes angles, creates passing options.
There is no point running around like a headless chicken, but if your whole team is working and putting in the effort you’ll more than likely win.
If I remeber rightly that great Barca team covered a hell of a lot of ground.
It's definitely something that's by design rather than our inability to do it.
We seem to play in an almost passive state for a lot of games (particularly away), where we would rather retreat and sit deep allowing our opponents to have the ball, as opposed to pressing high with the intention of luring our opponents into mistakes.
I always find that United make it easy for their opponents to play against them. Not in the sense that we lose a lot of games, or indeed concede many goals, but they will always allow their opponent to pass around freely and encroach into the final third, without ever really pressing with any sort of purpose.
This stye served us well at the beginning of the season, mostly due to the fact that we often got an early goal or certainly the first goal, which would then result in our opponents committing numbers forward, which would then allow us to counter late on in the game when they were tired. I think we've scored more goals in the last ten minutes of games than any other team in the league; that's obviously not by accident.
But this passivity starts to become detrimental when we don't get the first goal (Huddersfield and Chelsea). This is where Mourinho starts to show some of his flaws; he starts to run out of ideas, imo. Things start to become frantic and desperate. As we seen with the Chelsea game, we threw on Fellaini and started to launch the ball to try and cause some chaos. It's all a bit simplistic and obvious, imo.
I don't like this reactive, passive approach personally. I know it has served in very well in the past, and he's obviously a fabulously successful coach, but i'm not sure how well it's going to treat him now, or in the future.
We seem to play in an almost passive state for a lot of games (particularly away), where we would rather retreat and sit deep allowing our opponents to have the ball, as opposed to pressing high with the intention of luring our opponents into mistakes.
I always find that United make it easy for their opponents to play against them. Not in the sense that we lose a lot of games, or indeed concede many goals, but they will always allow their opponent to pass around freely and encroach into the final third, without ever really pressing with any sort of purpose.
This stye served us well at the beginning of the season, mostly due to the fact that we often got an early goal or certainly the first goal, which would then result in our opponents committing numbers forward, which would then allow us to counter late on in the game when they were tired. I think we've scored more goals in the last ten minutes of games than any other team in the league; that's obviously not by accident.
But this passivity starts to become detrimental when we don't get the first goal (Huddersfield and Chelsea). This is where Mourinho starts to show some of his flaws; he starts to run out of ideas, imo. Things start to become frantic and desperate. As we seen with the Chelsea game, we threw on Fellaini and started to launch the ball to try and cause some chaos. It's all a bit simplistic and obvious, imo.
I don't like this reactive, passive approach personally. I know it has served in very well in the past, and he's obviously a fabulously successful coach, but i'm not sure how well it's going to treat him now, or in the future.
Probably a problem with fitness if a referee outsprints a player (lingard).
Well Chelsea must be really fecked because they're both out-sprinting every Chelsea player in that gif.Probably a problem with fitness if a referee outsprints a player (lingard).
I want to see Jose on the side of the pitch with an Indianna Jones whip next match, lashing those son's of bitche* until they run more. Whip them like a government mule
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This issue with distance covered is nothing new. It was the same previous season as far as i remember, was it ? I would be shocked if Jose does not have those reports on his desk after each game. So, he must be ok with that. He likes predictable football with predefined tasks and limits. That has nothing to do with workrate. I beleive that he does not want players to move from the position if that will open up the space behind them. Yes Matic may look like an exception but in fact he is not. He is only doing what he is asked to do but his task is different..
He is garbage collector covering more positions but always , really always behind the ball. He never , unless we are already behind , position himself in a progressive role offering himself in a triangle or doing pass and move in a way to leave the ball behind his back. He is clearly instructed to do so, same as others. If you want to move in the space you have to play with more risks. Jose does not like that and he obviously has no idea how to high press. High pressing is very difficult because you have many playees out of position and you have to cover that. Those things have to be trained a lot to be fluent .
I do not beleive that Jose does waste time on geggenpressing in training sessions and logically our forward players have no idea how to do high pressing. In high pressing attackers are first line of defence. Ours are useless in that and it is not even their fault. Also i beleive Jose doe not trust his CB's. Someone mentioned Rio an Vida here. Alex simple had all trust in the world for those two. Sometimes he would leave them alone and let others wreak havoc. Maybe Jose would have different approach if he has those two available. Instead it appears to me that he is shielding his CB's way two much.
He is garbage collector covering more positions but always , really always behind the ball. He never , unless we are already behind , position himself in a progressive role offering himself in a triangle or doing pass and move in a way to leave the ball behind his back. He is clearly instructed to do so, same as others. If you want to move in the space you have to play with more risks. Jose does not like that and he obviously has no idea how to high press. High pressing is very difficult because you have many playees out of position and you have to cover that. Those things have to be trained a lot to be fluent .
I do not beleive that Jose does waste time on geggenpressing in training sessions and logically our forward players have no idea how to do high pressing. In high pressing attackers are first line of defence. Ours are useless in that and it is not even their fault. Also i beleive Jose doe not trust his CB's. Someone mentioned Rio an Vida here. Alex simple had all trust in the world for those two. Sometimes he would leave them alone and let others wreak havoc. Maybe Jose would have different approach if he has those two available. Instead it appears to me that he is shielding his CB's way two much.
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You don't need to run much for joses style. It demands mental rather than physical stamina. Concentrate and dont make any mistakes. That's us.
Interesting piece here which explains Liverpool’s declining km. They’ve abandoned the gegenpress.
I was at an event recently and one of the speakers was involved in data analytics in sport and one of the things he reiterated was that some of the stats in football - relatively modern though they are - are already outdated and being disregarded by clubs. Distance run was one of them. He was of the view that clubs are now more concerned by number of high intensity sprints per game, some recovery metric (can't remember the exact definition but it seemed to be the measure of how quickly they could repeat high intensity sprints) and something along the lines of 'key involvements following high intensity sprints' (which seemed to be an umbrella term for the impact they had on the game following high intensity sprints).
I may have paraphrased some of that incorrectly and no idea where United fall in terms of those stats, or whether they change the picture, but I suspect there may be a bit more to it when some teams are playing in what might be perceived as a passive way.
I may have paraphrased some of that incorrectly and no idea where United fall in terms of those stats, or whether they change the picture, but I suspect there may be a bit more to it when some teams are playing in what might be perceived as a passive way.
Good read, thanks for that @Pogue. It's all about balance!
Explains a lot, I remember posting this time last year that despite the second balls off of corners being a major weakness, our defensive numbers from open play were elite and didn't really take a hit till the injuries in key positions exposed our depth.
The lack of a press is as much to do with personell as it is the additional fixtures, the first wasn't rectified and I think the varying systems we've played this year is indicative of that.
We can't really press teams in to submission anymore because of the correlation between the two factors. The likes of Milner and Can in a midfield away to Spurs is a far cry from Wijnaldum/Lallana being able to dominate the big sides in transition. It's a huge balancing act.
On the plus side technically we should beat the dross more comfortably but we're still a fair ways away from what I think Klopp is aiming for and that's down to recruitment.
Thanks for sharing. Basically, stats about intensity (say, sprints) are more relevant than stats about extensity (distance covered). United don't fare well about sprints too - about 15th so far. The other top 6 teams are top 10 with City 1st in that regard. But there are question marks over whether a style with great intensity is sustainable during the whole season.
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Any one can out work players like fellani mkh matic smalling blind darmian ibra and lukaku lingard.
They are not prime athletes, even though ibra is super fit he's not knows for his speed and workrate.
Agreed. I remember an interview from Darren Fletcher about United's approach in his time at the club. The message was typically about bringing intensity to the game. They felt against most sides, that if they at least managed to match the other side's intensity, their superior quality would win out. It was when they let their intensity slip that they dropped points. You can't get anywhere without work.
I think Jose is aware of this. I think our distance stats must be tactical. I don't think he'd accept laziness.
I don't go along with the "more distance covered is necessarily better" argument.
Surely, a good tactic would be to have more possession, make your opponents do more chasing to tire them out, then go for the jugular and score goals late on in the match. Isn't this what we have been doing so far this season? Opponents covering more distance, but we are scoring a higher percentage of late goals.
Another factor as well is the high number of games we play in a season. We played an insane number last season, so players have to pace themselves better if they are to last the season and avoid Arsenal style burnouts from March onwards. Despite that, we won two trophies last year and are well placed this year, even though the style of football isn't always easy on the eye.
Surely, a good tactic would be to have more possession, make your opponents do more chasing to tire them out, then go for the jugular and score goals late on in the match. Isn't this what we have been doing so far this season? Opponents covering more distance, but we are scoring a higher percentage of late goals.
Another factor as well is the high number of games we play in a season. We played an insane number last season, so players have to pace themselves better if they are to last the season and avoid Arsenal style burnouts from March onwards. Despite that, we won two trophies last year and are well placed this year, even though the style of football isn't always easy on the eye.
I always had Mourinho teams down as hard workers. I’ve got a half arsed vibe this week.
Agreed Katie. That's something we've not done since LVG imposed his dreaded philosophy on the club.
I feel that it is important that we play at a high tempo when attacking. That doesn't mean that we have run like headless chickens when not having the ball. Preferable to make our opponents run more with our possession play when we have the ball, to tire them out, and then attack them at a high tempo.
Also agree. I know it's easier said than done but we should have the ability to up the tempo more. We see it every now and then under Jose but then seem to revert lackadaisical stuff with no movement or urgency. Not only do players not dilly dally to the point of having nowhere to go or pass to, but it pulls and moves the opposition defence around meaning we should be able to run in behind. It's also way more interesting to watch.
Matic does seem to work pretty hard though, and there's not really any excuse for the others barring Ibra due to his age.
I think it's a fairly simple. If we want to get away with working less hard than all of our opponents, it has to be down to one of two things, either a) we have a game plan based around this that actually works, or b) we're so much better than everyone else that we win every game with something to spare anyway.
The later is out the window straight away as we're distant second in the table to a team who work harder than us. The former doesn't really apply as our game plan often seems to suffer due to our static play. On Saturday for example we were unable to apply pressure in the way we should have been, or control the game against a team with inferior quality footballers, because our players don't seem to be able to press or close space up as a unit. They're reluctant to cover the ground as a team to do it, so Brighton always managed to play the ball up the pitch. When we get the lead our players then are reluctant to cover the ground to close out the space again, so we end up under needless pressure on the edge of our own box, hoofing the ball to no one. All of this was basically down to us just not working hard enough. If it's a tactic, what IS the benefit of it?
We don't have a team filled with poor athletes as you seem to suggest. If we do it's because they are not fit enough. Even if it's not because of that we need to look at the fact it is giving teams we play an advantage...and the fact that City are currently easily ahead of us and we need to look at areas we can improve....because at the moment nothing I see in our performances suggests we're capable of catching them.
Games where we are rolling teams over 4-0 aren't the problem. Games like Saturday or against Chelsea though, are still happening far too frequently. If it was just games like Chelsea away you could understand to a degree...but we shouldn't be looking like the lesser side against the likes of Brighton, Southampton, Huddersfield, etc. just because they decide to put a shift in and get themselves organised.
The benefit, presumably, is that we punish them on the counter when they end up with most of their team in our half. Which has regularly been a feature of our football this season tbf. And could have happened against Brighton if we hadn't been so careless with the opportunities we had to break on them after we scored. For all the negativity on here, we're 13 games in and have averaged over 2 goals/game (almost identical goals/game as the season we last won the league). Which makes us more prolific than every other team in the league, bar one, while conceding the least goals of anyone. So whatever tactics Mourinho is using this season, they're not as spectacularly ineffective as you seem to be implying here.
For me, we've definitely suffered from individual players not performing (especially our attacking midfielders like Mikhi/Mata) - as well as missing Pogba when he was injured - and that is making our attacking football much less effective than it should be. I don't think the manager should avoid criticism for these players underperforming. It's his job to sign the players we need and get them to perform at their best. However there's been enough good football played by us this season to see what he's trying to get out of us on the pitch and to see that it's very effective when properly implemented.
Counter attacking has been a feature in some games. Another feature of our games this season though has been camping on the edge of our own area while the other team occupy all the space, and we're not able to mount counter attacks. Or trying to put pressure on a team ineffectively when we're looking for a goal. It hasn't happened much at home. It has happened in nearly every away game.
We're not doing badly but we are a somewhat distant second when we want to be first, and no one can really argue that our performances compared to City's merit us being any closer to them than we are...so I wouldn't like it if any of our players had the attitude of "this'll do". We need to improve, and, again, if other teams are outworking us, and we need to improve, there is a very obvious way to do so staring us in the face.
Again, if we were counter attacking effectively in every game we played, and that was why we cover less ground, fair enough...but even if it is why we cover less ground, we don't always counter attack effectively. Sometimes we don't counter attack at all. Sometimes the opposition sit off knowing the expectancy and pressure to win is on us more than them, and we look clueless about how to pressure them effectively. Sometimes like on Saturday and against the likes of Huddersfield, Chelsea, Southampton, etc...we just don't seem to be able to win or keep hold of the ball in any area of the pitch.
I haven't looked at the stats, but I do think it's noticable that we aren't the hardest working side in the league.
This is an issue for me. Fergusons best sides were full of workers, in fact, every side that's won the premier league has been.
This is an issue for me. Fergusons best sides were full of workers, in fact, every side that's won the premier league has been.
To be honest that's not my recollection, we were capable of it for tactical games but most of the time we played in 2nd gear only putting real effort in when that wasn't enough.
I'm not sure i even disagree with that approach. I know this place wants games killed off within 30mins every game but it's a long season and managing energy is important.
Fergusons latter sides had the likes of Valencia, Fletcher, Park, Rooney, Evra, Rafael etc who would all work hard and fight for everything. I don't think theres enough of that in our side at the moment.
I actually think for a lot of sides we would be realitivley easy to play against. We give the opposition a lot of time on the ball.