I agree with both your posts after the game. The summer signings are more for the future, but cant see Bellion being a good buy but you never know. Ronaldo needs more experience and time. We need a few players, I mean real quality players, in defence, creative midfield and another striker. A few years ago we had loads of flair and cover for flair players but with no real cover for defensive midfield, now its gone the other way. My view is that SAF picked a weakened (starting lineup) against a top six team. Its was as though we are playing Fulham, not Fulham in the top six and playing well. A high degree of SAF arogance. Hopefully we will buying at least a couple of top quality players in January. But dont hold youre breath. Can SAF admit he may have made a mistake in the summer by not signing another quality forward?
This was an engineered loss I think that Alex Fergusson's ego is the cause of this loss... I believe that he wished ManU to lose or do poorly in his absence from the bench to demonstrate his importance to the team. Ok, so maybe he did not want us to lose, but he certainly did not expect a good performance. After all. Scholes and Keane were missing from a team that was already playing very poorly. You may say that this was just Fullham, but you take away the middle of the field from any top shelf team and they would have a hard time beating any team. Without Keano, the defence lacked some of the support and tackling, the offence missed his vision and knowledge of our players and of the situation, and that affected our possesion. Worse yet, you take Scholes away at the same time, and our attack looses potency without his through balls and well timed runs. As if that was not enough, O'Shea has been playing like crap recently and we should have started Fortune who has been playing like a man possesed recently. Was Phil Neville, recent hero at Ibrox injured? why did he miss this game, especially to fill in for Keane. I hate to question the mans loyalty, but I would rather question that and his ego than his coaching ability. There are no pushovers in the EPL. Even if they were pushovers dont lose 2-1 to your bench they are supposed to get thrashed 4-0 by your starters.
Arsenal drew at Charlton today. So, they drop 2 points and are only 2 points ahead of United. At this point, the important thing is to keep within striking range until the new year, when United usually go on a run, when key players will be back from injury, and when, hopefully, United can pick up a couple of players during the winter transfer window.
Re: This was an engineered loss SAF always wants to win. Sometimes, I suppose like any coach he picks the wrong team. What are United without Scholes at the moment!? Lets hope no injury to Scholes. Giggs needs to step more now Becks has gone. Giggs is generally playing well though, but hopefully more and better is to come I agree long way to go, but no matter what team you dont want to and should drop points at home (all three in this case). Its one game, but there does seem to be some trends appearing. Defensive lapses (for a few years now, but we are improving), lack of creativity, especially if Scholes is not playing and reliance on Ruud, When Ruud is not scoring, sometimes you wonder were the goal is coming from, especially without Giggs and Scholes.
Do I really have to drag back up my "Panic!" thread? Typical league result after a big midweek Euro match for us. Add a risky squad selection and you get a 3-1 defeat to a motivated visitor. I'd be worried if we got this result with a full squad, later in the season, with a full week's rest. By the way, of COURSE Ronaldo is not ready to be a week-to-week starter for us. We're having to play him more than we'd like because of the injury to Solskjaer, and we're also wanting to bring along young Fletcher with care as well. I'd also like to say that there is a limited supply of players in the world who ARE good enough to play for us, and while I'm sure that there are plenty of people who could be good cover, it takes somebody very special to hold down a place in our squad. As long as we're a win over Arsenal and Chelsea away from the top, there is no reason to be too concerned, especially as it IS still October. I'm hoping we spend some in the winter transfer market, but the board may be shy about it with a takeover looming out there. No worries though, we're OK, for now...
Re: This was an engineered loss I don't know where to begin on this one. Seriously, read this post again in a few days and reconsider if you want me to delete this for you or not.
You expect every team that comes to OT to be motivated. The supporters and management of those teams would be disappointed if they were not. Problem is some other bug*er seems to want all the best players as well. There are lot of good players who could play for us, unfortunately a lot of clubs will not sell them to us, well not for a huge amount of money. We have lost two games so far in the league, but we are two points behind Arsenal, which is ok. Arsenal havent lost a game yet. Still as I keep saying long way to go, besides we usually play better after xams. We do need to improve our squad though. More firepower up front for starters.
Maybe motivated wasn't the right word, maybe they didn't come into Old Trafford intimidated. In the past 10 years or so, most of the smaller clubs coming to Old Trafford tended to play us a little more timidly. Most were often trying to slow the pace of the game down and keep us from attacking them all day. This changed a bit two years ago when our defence was pretty daft, and we lost 6 games at home. The word was out that we were vulnerable at the back so we saw some more players being thrown at us and we paid for our shoddy defending. Last season, our defence was sorted out and we won the league. This year, the word is out that our defence is good, but they are now not as worried about our counter-attacks. We used to have the option of having Giggs racing with the ball down the wing or a big Beckham ball releasing Ruud or Giggs up top. Now if Scholes isn't there to do Beck's job of switching the attack or getting the ball up field quickly, we suffer. (or it's left to having Giggs trying to race up the wing OR Ronaldo racing up the wing) Once Wes comes back, I'd like to see him and Rio (if he's not still suspended) in the middle, with G. Nev on the right and Silvestre (or Fortune) on the left to help with this. Of course, once O'Shea is back on form, he can play anywhere on the back line too. Fletcher is supposed to be a more natural central midfielder as well, so I'd play him some there in the League Cup to see how he takes to it. He seems to be able to distribute it like a Scholes (or some say even Becks) and it would be good to see him get some time... I think our main priorities should be: A) a strike partner for Ruud, who can also play as the lone target man in the 4-5-1 if needed B) a proven creative player as cover for Scholes Unless we fill at least one of these roles, we're not going to win the Champions League this year.
might be hard to find a player of the requisite quality who isn{t cup tied. what the hell has happened to my computer-_ i{ve somehow turned on an alternate keyboard ' i didn{t even know it was there ' anyone know how to make this s$#t revert to normal;
Two things: Control Panel has a Keyboard setting in it. Keyboards are commonly 101 or 102 - Extended or Enhanced Or, if you are on a laptop, sometimes they double use keys, so make sure that any Numlock or Alt keys are not On. As for finding a non cup-tied player, yes it will be a challenge, but not impossible.
One thing I wanted to make a connection on too, was that, in a perfect world, Fletcher could fill that creative midfield role and Nardiello/Solskjaer/Cooper could fill the Ruud's partner role. Maybe it's a pipe dream, but I didn't foresee Howard being our solid No. 1 just yet either...
>in a perfect world, Fletcher could fill that creative midfield role and Nardiello/Solskjaer/Cooper could fill the Ruud's partner role. You're an inveterate optimist, Motterman In the REAL world Utd are just one injury away from a very serious position. Should Ruud so much as turn an ankle, pull a muscle or even stub his toe in a weekend's match then Utd will go into the crucial match with Rangers without a single striker, either on the pitch or the bench, who can be relied on to score. We could be going into that match seeing how Phil Neville plays as a lone striker. I joke of course ............ perhaps we'll try Barthez It isn't necessary! It is appalling complacency by Alex and the board. While other clubs with similar ambitions to Utd are carefully rotating their squad to keep players fresh and simultaneously keeping them happy with sufficient first team football, Utd have a bench without a single player that could legitimately claim a first team place. Competition for places? Forget it! Rest players? The quality of play takes a nose dive. Injuries? Pray it happens in defensive midfield. You can dream about youngsters coming through and solving the problem but I'll continue to push for Utd to use the January window and some of that money they realised in the off-season to bring in experienced players to fill out an inadequate squad. Hopefully by then we'll still be in with a shout for the Premiership and still lined up for the later stages of the CL but not if we continue to perform as we did on Saturday (not to speak of mediocre performances against Leeds and Rangers).
Yeah Motts you were right of course but you have to vent somehow, and hitting the computer is not an option. I just could not believe he would chose to rest them both at the same time. But yes on to your quote... Rivaldo fits A and B, and He is also cover for Giggs. Next thing, speaking of someone not cuptied, who is decent but also cheap there is a Brazilian in the mold of Gaucho who plays in Japan, for S-Pulse I believe, I think his name is Alessandro Santos, or something like that. He is cover for Scholes, Giggs, and can play at right half as well, and he is more mature than Ronaldo.
there is a huge difference between the japanese league and the EPL/CL. I no that we could give him time to get used to the league, but at the moment, we need more of a quick fix.
A few things. - Santos, or Alex as he is known commonly, is Japanese, not Brazilian. Otherwise, he couldn't play for Japan. - He is a winger/withdrawn forward but I have never seen him play on the right. Maybe he could, but as far as I know, left is his preferred side. - Alex hasn't played all that well for Shimizu and it's a mystery to a lot of observers as to why he keeps getting capped for Japan. - And Zico has played him at left back for the past 6 months with positive results on the attacking end but dreadful on defense. - He was all but siged, sealed and delivered to Charlton last summer but he did not have the requisite 75% of caps over 2 years. Now he is at around 80% and is now linked with Leeds.
1. Who cares if they're cup-tied? This isn't Man Utd's year to win the CL. They had a shot last year. They'll have another good chance in 2 years. That was conceded after Utd failed to land Ronaldinho, and instead bought youth. 2. Man Utd's attack is nearly impotent w/o Scholes. Utd haven't been prolific against any team with a decent defense this year. And they look positively anemic without Scholes. That's what happen when all your other central midfielders play defense better than offense... and your wingers are good, but crossing doesn't work so well when RVN is outnumbered in the box. 3. Utd need A. a real partner for Ruud and B. a good back-up (or partner, if you want to play single-striker) for Scholes in the attacking third. Everybody knows this. In fact, most of us suspected it before the season started. Why hasn't a purchase been made? No real answers. It could be excessive faith in RVN, a prayer that no injuries will occur, a recognition that the team probably was never going to win the league anyway, an unavailability of players, or an unwillingness to compete with Chelsea in spending big money initially. Who the hell knows? But you can't win the league if you can't score goals - and Utd can't right now.
Like many people have said here, better to lose those games in October than April. Just ask us Gooners. Seems like Ruud is out of sorts, and when your top striker is off, everything seems to fall apart. Plus Fergies team selection was questionable Saturday. You'll be there, don't worry. At least you guys are talking about winning the CL..I'd be floored if we made the next round!
Excellent post Machoward, could have written it better myself. We are now well stocked with defensive midfield players. Of for the days of (in top form and mainly because we had choice of players up front) of Ole, Teddy, Cole and Yorke. Not that I am after Yorke and Cole back. But we had quality experienced cover. What happened? With an injured Ole what happens if Ruud is injured, even for a couple of weeks, which is possible. Someone needs to kick butt and get the squad sorted out, by that I mean experienced quality players. SAF needs a tactically aware number 2. Striker and creative midfield player must be top priorities. Need a striker most of all though.
Yes we need cover for Ruud (it wouldn't hurt if that striker could partner Ruud as well as fill in), and we should make this a top priority. The only team with quality depth up front is Chelsea - and that's cause they spent millions and millions. United won't do that. Every other top team in the EPL is reliant on their number 1 striker: Liverpool - Owen Arsenal - Henry Newcastle - Shearer United - RVN Take any of these players out of their current team for an extended period of time and they each will suffer. Our main problem at the moment is that Solksjaer is hurt. While Liverpool are without Baros and Newcastle is without Bellamy. Arsenal still have Bergkamp however, and that's an advantage. Chelsea have JFH, Mutu, Crespo, Gudjohnson and can recall Forssell if needed as well as even play Duff up front. Bloody hell... Now I'm pissed off!