PBP: EPL - Manchester United FC vs Newcastle United FC - Sep 11, 2021 [R]

I dont understand why cant he play instead of Fred. Solskjaer is weird.

 

He tried to leave. Had a move to Everton lined up and Ole called him and said they weren't letting him go and to report to training.

 

Van de Beek is class. Lingard played well. Martial's intelligence sublime.

Pogba two assists today.

 

Bright spot in midfield.

10 - Paul Pogba is the only player to have recorded as many as 10 assists in the Premier League in 2021, while his seven assists in Man Utd's opening four games is the most any player has registered in the first four matches of a Premier League season. Creator. pic.twitter.com/J1L9ZK1nrM

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) September 11, 2021

Paul Pogba’s game by numbers vs. Newcastle United:

124 total touches
92% pass accuracy
23 passes into the final third
12 attempted long passes
9 successful long passes
9 passes into the box
7 ball recoveries
5 attempted tackles
3 successful tackles
2 assists

Unreal. 🅰️🅰️ pic.twitter.com/NoJn2HlARg

— Statman Dave (@StatmanDave) September 11, 2021

Must be kept at the club (almost) no matter what. Get him a viable partner and our set, for all intents and purposes, is set for the next 2-3yrs.

 

Martial intelligence is an issue tbh, its his link up that is sublime.

 

They say he only scores penalties so I figured that was one of them

 

I know a lot of us thought the Ronaldo move might be a bad one, but honestly this is exactly what we need him to do. He's a better version of what Cavani provides. We have enough creators, we need someone automatic inside the 18 and I don't think there's many better than him at that...even at his age.

 

Intelligence? I don't think I agree. Martials decision making and positioning has always been really good. I think his issues is that he's mentally weak and relies too much on confidence. Players with up and down confidence tend to be inconsistent.

 

Top of the table at the moment and at worst we'll be tied up there with the likes of Chelsea and Pool (Everton also) depending on how things go in their respective games.

What an image: please stay Paul!

 

Intelligence as not in game intelligence.

 

Ronaldo is happy to be 'home'.

Cristiano Ronaldo with a beautiful message after scoring twice today ❤️ pic.twitter.com/Al85KgWOty

— utdreport (@utdreport) September 11, 2021

We've finally got a legit contender once more for the Golden Boot btw. Should be a very fun battle to watch unfold between him, Kane, Salah and Lukaku. Will probably be between those 4 unless someone pops up out of nowhere.

SIUUUUUUUUUU

 

Why do you keep saying this? You don’t need a midfield in games like this. And games like this are the ones you need to win the league. You need a midfield for the top games and Europe. You’re right about our attack carrying us to contention, though. Win at home and break the bunkers, I don’t see why we couldn’t challenge, midfield or not.

 

He somehow made a mistake and typed Martial instead of Rashford

 

Cristiano is very clinical player in the box, but Cavani and Martial show better movement for me because they make dummy runs and try to open space. Cristiano is more selfish, wants to just score himself.

I thought Sancho and Greenwood looked off today. Cristiano started very nervous. United struggled to convert chances for that reason early on. Lol at Bruno trying to upstage Cristiano's debut. Trying to score from the half-line and all that jazz. Pogba looked good in his more natural midfield role. Newcastle didn't really threaten much and United played comfortably a lot of the time. Bruce won't last in that job. Probably wishing he was somehow involved again at MU lol.

 

Having a good chuckle at the anti-Matic sentiment. First half he was superb. Second half not so much, but still not nearly as bad as people here are saying lol!

A lot of defensive problems were down to utterly stupid gambling on the press - Maguire, in particular, ********ed it for their goal, leading to a domino effect of players being pulled out of position.We should be far smarter in terms of delaying the attacker than we were. Not a new problem, but especially dumb with a Pogba Matic midfield, against Almiron & St Maximin. If you’re going to rush in, take ball or man. Stop the attack, don’t hold the door open for it.

Disjointed attack, which is one of the problems with not really having a structure to base your attack on - players need to get on the same wavelength and that takes longer if you can’t fall back on patterns of movement.

We all know it but AWB needs to kick on with his attacking. He could get 5, 7, 10 assists if he plays that square pass from Pogba’s ball, or more back post crosses for Ronaldo.

And goal 4 was awesome from everyone involved. In particular, Donny doing exactly what you want from a 10 when you have that much technical ability close by. Bruno’s goal was great and all, but it was the 30 yard skied shots and the pointless halfway line attempts that were so frustrating - just keep possession, turn the screw.

So yeah. Donny’s run was exactly what we were missing when we looked disjointed - pulling 2 defenders left so Pogba could go right. A lot of the time we had that classic Utd issue of a lack of movement from the front line, which leaves the player on the ball with much harder decisions to make.

 

They both have their pros and cons. But for us, and until we manage to seriously increase our chance creation numbers (which we should in time once Sancho gets to up speed and the attack in general is on song), Ronaldo is the ideal guy for us up top.
Yes, he did miss some decent chances but we've still seen the clinical side of his finishing and it stands to reason it will only get better with time. Cavani will have his moments, no doubt but the truth of the matter remains that he's not a finisher on Ronaldo's level. Not even close really with him at times being pretty wasteful.
I would like to see the both of them together though at times: really feel they could compliment each other pretty well. But it should fun watching our attack once it clicks.

 

CR was brilliant today. He'll score, but he is does very little else on the pitch. I think he's better there as a CF unless Haaland signs next summer, but maybe United play two up front at times and get some mileage out of Cavani and Martial too. I think Martial will benefit the most from that.

 

One thing that is undeniable is that Ole has options galore upfront and it will be very interesting to see if and how he chooses to mix things up. The clinical aspect of Ronaldo's finishing is something that should benefit us a great deal.
I really hope that our wing play on both sides (not just one as it's been the case for us mostly in recent years) will be up to par, as it will make up for whatever else is lacking at this juncture in Ronaldo's overall play. Mase and Martial could play a part in this, but I'm definitely looking at what Rashford will provide there (with Sancho on the other side). .

 

He's typically a slow starter but he's also getting used to the league AND his teammates and how we play. He's very much a batman in build up and a robin in the box. He's happy to create chances for others but he needs to understand their movement. We've started 3 seperate 9s. He's going to develop chemistry, but it will take some time.

We also need to play him on the right for balance purposes. If teams are going to sit back, we should be playing Tony/CR7/JS ahead of Bruno. Let Mase be first off the bench and play rotation games. Sancho had 2 or 3 defenders every time he got the ball. They can try that shit if they want to, but if we are able to switch to Tony at LW and there's only 1 defender to beat, teams will have problems.

This is disgusting. You disgust me. This is his boyhood club and he's never done anything but give his best for this club. You should be ashamed.

 

Because it's true. We didn't play too well today but our offense carried us. But in games like this where we're going to commit a lot forward, we need a 6 that can provide cover and can dictate play from deep (although Pogba handled this today). When Newcastle broke forward today, Matic did nothing. A better counter attacking team would have punished us more.

Against better teams, I would prefer this same lineup but with a proper 6. But since we don't have that, I expect Ole to put on McFred which takes either Greenwood or Sancho off the field to allow Pogba to play LW. Which means we have energy in midfield but they've shown that they can lose us games. I expect that to happen several times this year. I hate that setup. It makes us a worse team but I get Ole defaulting to that because their are no better options.

 

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Don't think there ever was any doubts about this once it was revealed this game would not be broadcast in the UK...

 

I'm surprised it was that small a number.