PBP: FAC - Norwich City FC vs Manchester United FC - Jun 27, 2020 [R]

Positives
- we are through
- no injuries
- Ighalo continues to score on every start
- we took a chance to rest some players
- meant we could assess the squad players
- Ole prepared to use every sub and every attacking player to win
- Pogs pass and captains finish for the win
Negatives
- most of the squad players are not good enough
- poor to let a player have such room for a shot but should have been saved
- on a bad day for him Bruno still easily our standout player for much of normal time given how poor everyone else was then
- just not enough creativity in Shaw, McT, Fred, Dalot etc. (William too added little when he came on)
- Lingard and Mata continue to be poor
Takeaways
- we still need a RWF
- we need more attacking options in our fullbacks (creativity & width when the middle is packed)
- we still need more quality to spot for Bruno @10 (he probably should have been rested, but resting Pogs and Bruno gives us zero creativity)
- we still need more quality to spot for Pogs @ 8 (ie creative CM)

 

Shout out to Shaw’s cross in the 83rd minute. That was something special.

 

Lingard was so shit today I expect him to be offered a contract extension by Monday

 

118th-minute winner. 😎 pic.twitter.com/EvMCpMRkrb

— B/R Football (@brfootball) June 27, 2020

 

I think the squad quality issue is overstated. We had a very poor combination of players. We aren't Chelsea under Mourinho the first time, we don't have a fully interchangeable 22 player squad.

Ole either was overconfident or is just really bad at rotating. We started Mata and Lingard on the wings. Those are options 4 and 5, along with McTominay and Fred in CM, options 3 and 4 or 2 and 3 but certainly the least likely to offer penetrative probing passes and we started Igahlo who is our most service-dependent forward.

We had 1 dribbler on the pitch in Dalot and we didn't use him as an outlet.

I maintain Ole has zero ideas about buildup play and he needs an assistant who does or to get a midfield general on the books.

From a penetration standpoint, the only player we had who was remotely useful at creating openings was Bruno and we played him high up the pitch. If we'd have played him in more of a traditional #8 role, we might have been more open (lots of giveaways from him) but also more likely to create chances.

We could have done something like this:

---------------------------------Ighalo
Dan James---------------------------------------Greenwood
---------------------------------Mata
------------Bruno----------------------------McTominay

or Fred in place of Bruno and Bruno in place of Mata. We could still have played Shaw at LB to give him minutes to continue to boost his fitness and we could have played anyone at RB, Dalot or Williams.

All of that to say, it was a putrid performance and Mata/Jesse et all should have done better, but we didn't put them in a position to thrive. That's on the manager, not the players.

 

Go slow. Make it 2. Rojo, Smalling, Jones, Mata

Then the others.