So, we spent a big wad of cash on Rooney, What do we do now?

[johno]

I think making this a poll would limit it too greatly so I am just leaving it open, but I will at least give you guys a pointer or two as to what I mean....


We have only 2 quality wingers on the team and now 4 quality strikers plus Scholes and Kleberson who can be link men, so the top of our attack is fine. Rio will be back soon, as will Heinze and Brown should not be too far off either... that means the defence is taken care of.

Scholes is Scholes and Kleberson looks to be good back up to him imo... certainly better backup than we have recently had including Veron because he was more of a CM and not really an AM.

Djemba Djemba may not be the complete article at DM however, he is showing a marked improvement over last season and I think he is all around better than Phil Neville and even Nicky Butt at this stage of their careers, meaning he has excellent close control, decent vision, can make the longer passes and tackles well. He is also physically better than them in terms of pace and I'm not sure about stamina. As a backup to Keane for another season or two I think he would work fine, and also mature into the player we need to replace our skipper.

Ronaldo is coming into his own... he has earned the respect of the league and is double teamed almost every match we play. If this continues we need to exploit this... one way to do that is to have another player who can wreak havoc on markers... Rooney is not a dribbler but he uses his pace and strength well and hopefully when he is on the pitch he will be enough to take 1 defender away from Ronaldo. If he is not good enough to do that, we will see decent but not great numbers from the Portuguese teenager, no one not named Ronaldinho can consistently beat 2 men.

Giggs needs to be more consistently threatening because he should be drawing as much attention as Ronaldo, but he has been slightly off form for a while now and our balance of attack is suffering, hopefully he too can benefit from more freedom with the arrival of Rooney but one does not know.


So back to my question: What do we do know? With all this money spent we are not likely to be going out and spending money on another position despite a lack of QUALITY depth on the wings. If Giggs gets injured or loses form the best idea would be to move Ronaldo to the left and then allow Fletcher/Miller or even Kleberson or Eagles to play on the rightside of the midfield. Allan Smith is another option, but Fergie has said he bought him simply as a centerforward... we will see if that holds because now we have Ruud, Saha and Rooney, 3 strikers more talented than he is, but of course not everything is about talent. Smith has played on the wings before and is likely to be a better option on the RW than any other player we have save Ronaldo. His work rate and tackling would aid the team and he is a decent crosser and of course it would give Ronaldo another target for crosses and would add another scoring threat. I am not sure if I would rather him or Miller to be honest, I guess I have not seen enough of Miller....


All in all, who do we play in place of Giggs/Ronaldo when we need another body on the wings, or do you guys see us buying/getting another winger in January?

Also, do we sell O'Shea? I say no... his value is low right now.... it will get higher once he plays well and we dont desperately need the money so we should let his value rise...

And another question... is Richardson ready, or any other B teamer?

One more... Do we sell a defender at all? I mean, CB's Rio, Heinze, Brown, Silvestre... FullBacks, Neville, Spector, O'Shea, Heinze, Silvestre... we are loaded there now... my first guess would be not right now, but someone will be going at the end of the season... I would lean towards Silvestre or Brown, because O'Shea is younger 1 and 2 has not had many injury problems...

[Nicky Butt]

Based on the disastrous defense last year after Rio was suspended, I would say do not sell any defenders. Defense may not win you a championship but it could easily lose one. Also, Howard needs help. We can not depend on him to make great saves day in and day out.

As for wingers, I have no idea. My guess it that SAF will try to get someone in January depending on how the season is progressing.

[Motterman]

We miss Keane not being in the team.

Going about replacing him with a player that can influence a game like he can is nigh impossible, but we need to try. Gerrard would have been the best choice, better than Vieira for me. The list is not long... Djemba is the heir apparent and I'm more than willing to see if he continues to improve his game - but if he doesn't start dominating matches - especially against minnows - I can see us splashing out the cash at some point...

However; we haven't seen much of Djemba's game with Rio anchoring the defence either. I think Rio takes a bit of pressure off our midfield, and maybe we'll see Djemba emerge when he doesn't have to get back all the time in order to help cover for Silvestre's mistakes...

I actually don't see a real problem with getting a capable winger in January. They'll be there for cover mostly, and a fully fit and rested Giggs and Ronaldo on the wings will be enough against the bigger teams.

Pederson was mentioned a couple of times here as being available and that we should have gone for him - I wasn't impressed at all with his play against us on his debut. However; he probably only trained with them 3 or 4 times (if that) so it's not really fair to judge him yet, but his individual play wasn't great.

[therealronaldo7]

I think the team is solid up front and when Rio, Heinze return, I think the defense will be solidified. I do not like the center of midfield though. I do think a healthy Roy Keane will help the team. Outside of him, I do not see Djemba-Djemba doing much at all. I like Fletcher and I hope he can step it up, but I am not so sure. With the big purchase of Rooney, I am really doubting there will be any purchases during January, but who knows. To me Djemba-Djemba does not do much out on the pitch. While he is strong, he is not that fast, he lacks creativity and his passing is not nearly as good as the team needs it to be. Djemba can dink ann dump passes to players next to him, but I have never seen him make a solid pass moving forward to a forward or striker in a scoring position. I think with a solid defense and a strong attack in Rooney, Ruud, Ronaldo, Smith, Saha, Scholes, etc the team will be able to make up for their lack in the midfield. Who knows, maybe someone will step up in a big way. That would be great.

[sitati_kituyi]

IMO Kleberson is showing why we bought him, and will be a great prospect this year. Also, DJ2's performances haven't been bad except for his loose passing. This combination will be our central midfield pairing of years to come, and for this season, with them as cover for our obvious no. 1 choice CMs Keane and Scholes, our central midfield is beyond decent.

The problem in midfield is limited to the wide positions IMO. Our CM and attack are good and great respectively.

[Robert25]

Yes the front 4 and backline are just getting stronger as the season goes on. Ruud and Rooney will be coming in soon, given Rooney's transfer is finished. The backline will have Rio and Heinze back too.

The midfield is I think the last area of improvement. I think SAF is going to let Fletcher and Miller really show what they can do. January would be a good time to bring in reinforcements. I have to hope someone like Van der Vaart, perfect to share time with Giggs. Though its not too possible or maybe liked, maybe Figo even.

As far as defensive midfield its DJ2 time. He has to begin improving at some point, and let it be now. Or we will have this position to shop for as well.

But overall i think we are a great team, that will just improve as players return from injury or international duty.

[Mac_Howard]

With just nine and a half hours to go to the closure of the transfer deadline then nothing's going to happen before January. By then we'll have a much better idea how the team has come together and just what we need.

But Gill is talking about 10 million of Rooney's fee coming out of NEXT season's transfer budget so I don't really see anything happening in January unless we sell.

I think we've seen everything for this season and now we need to see what the current squad can do.

[Achtung]

Yeah I think that our frontline (duh!) and backline are taken care of, but right now we just don't have a settled midfield, at least in the middle. It's almost like SAF is running a "midfield by committee" (apologies for the Red Sox reference), and he can't truly decide on the 4-5 guys he wants out there every game. Scholes is an obvious choice pretty much every time, but beyond that it gets more difficult. Dj2 is more on the physical side, Fletcher is somewhat physical, but more known for his passing, Kleberson makes more creative passes but seems to have some trouble tracking back, Keane is clearly aging, PNeville, well, he's ok but not going to anchor the midfield. Giggs and Ronaldo are pretty settled, but its obvious that Ronaldo is exhausted at this point, and may need to rest soon.

To me, that CM area is where is all happens, sort of the heart of the team. Right now we're not able to create as much because its a weak spot, and it shows in the scoreline. If you're asking what we need to spend on though, I will say wingers. If you're asking what we most need to get set on, its the central midfield.

[sitati_kituyi]

UNITED STARTING 11:

GK: Howard
Def: G Neville, Heinze (or maybe brown), Rio, Silvestre
Mid: Ronaldo, Scholes, Keane, Giggs
Att: Ruud, (I won't re-direct the direction of this thread by speculating who would be picked to partner Ruud)

Don't you think this Line-up (the players, not neccessarily the playing style) is AT LEAST as good as Chelsea and Arsenal's?

And our bench has seemed pretty weak so far this season. With everyone fit, supposing Heinze is picked ahead of Brown and Saha in attack, we'll have a bench (CL 7-sub bench) of:

Carroll
Brown
Miller
Kleberson
Djemba-Djemba
Smith
Rooney

Now tell me that isn't deadly cover!!! We're off, ladies and gentlemen! The title-winning run begins here.

[Achtung]

UNITED STARTING 11:

GK: Howard
Def: G Neville, Heinze (or maybe brown), Rio, Silvestre
Mid: Ronaldo, Scholes, Keane, Giggs
Att: Ruud, (I won't re-direct the direction of this thread by speculating who would be picked to partner Ruud)

Don't you think this Line-up (the players, not neccessarily the playing style) is AT LEAST as good as Chelsea and Arsenal's?

And our bench has seemed pretty weak so far this season. With everyone fit, supposing Heinze is picked ahead of Brown and Saha in attack, we'll have a bench (CL 7-sub bench) of:

Carroll
Brown
Miller
Kleberson
Djemba-Djemba
Smith
Rooney

Now tell me that isn't deadly cover!!! We're off, ladies and gentlemen! The title-winning run begins here.


Yes that would be a great squad if we could actually get everyone healthy for more than a week at a time. If that squad could play together over the course of several months, there would be no talk about the "demise" of Man United. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, we are having trouble bringing everyone together. Call it the curse of international success if you will, but right now its making a potentially great squad seem fairly average.

[sitati_kituyi]

Yes that would be a great squad if we could actually get everyone healthy for more than a week at a time. If that squad could play together over the course of several months, there would be no talk about the "demise" of Man United. Unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, we are having trouble bringing everyone together. Call it the curse of international success if you will, but right now its making a potentially great squad seem fairly average.
True, unfortunately. But the bright side is that our squad's average age has become very low! Without everyone realizing it, we've moved on from the class of '92. Keane, Giggs, Scholes and G Nev are the last of the passing generation. With some of our best players being so young (Rooney, Ronaldo, Fletcher, Miller, Howard-GK's have different age) and the rest still having VERY many years to come (Smith, Saha, Rio, Brown, Kleberson, Djemba, even Ruud), this could be the dawn of another long period of great success like the 90's (though maybe not as monopolized due to Arsenal and Chelsea's improved teams).

[Acronym]

Johno you still moaning about us getting Rooney :? lol Fergies "Mad about the boyyyy"

[GringoTex]

Did you guys really just spend $35 million dollars for a striker who scored just 9 goals in 35 appearances last year?

[Acronym]

Good players only come along very rarely, Fergie saw this as an excellent opportunity to sign the next 'Pelle'. Well maybe bit ott but you get the message, I mean during the Euros I realised this kid was special and thought it would be only natural to go in for him. He carried England on the weight of his young shoulders and looked not at all fased. Comes from humble beginnings in a rough area. Perfect for Fergie who likes players with fight and natural leadership; which Rooney has in abundance.

[DutchFootballRulez]

Did you guys really just spend $35 million dollars for a striker who scored just 9 goals in 35 appearances last year?
No!
.
.



they spent $45 Million dollars.

[Acronym]

Did you guys really just spend $35 million dollars for a striker who scored just 9 goals in 35 appearances last year?
He hardly started for Everton. If you use Smith as an analogy a great player in a crap team can only do so much, and Smith got what 9 last season and has like 5 now? Hottest teenager in Europe annihilated the youths scoring records playing with kids 5 years older than him, is almost as fast as an olympic sprinter, has the strength of men much older and scores great goals. Aside from his ability; huge marketing potential.

[Achtung]

Did you guys really just spend $35 million dollars for a striker who scored just 9 goals in 35 appearances last year?

So I take it you didn't pony up the cash for any of England's Euro 2004 matches then?

[Acronym]

Shirts are flying out of OT. Ronaldo and Rooney is such a dangerous pairing in any team. I mean if we're losing a match then stick on Saha, Rooney or Smith and Rooney, have Scholes on the bench to come on at half-time, options are enormous

[therealronaldo7]

Did you guys really just spend $35 million dollars for a striker who scored just 9 goals in 35 appearances last year?
After watching Wayne Rooney on the national team, it has become clear to me that he performs much better when there are other people around him. Tell me one person he had at Everton that struck fear into other teams. That is nothing against Everton, but they lacked players that scare other teams. Defenses were able to double team Rooney and he did not get the chances to score and perform to the best of his abilities. I think the move will help Wayne and I think once he gets healthy, all Manchester United fans will be happy with the move.

[blackjack]

Watching the game yesterday, I was very impressed with this Spector. I think he should be in your lineup as often as possible, he's far better on the outside back than Neville.