This is symptomatic of the corner that the manager has painted himself into.
1. Making Bruno captain means that he is basically undroppable if he's fit
2. Signing Mount for £55m places pressure on him to play
3. Falling out with one superstar player gives him a challenge to keep the dressing room harmonious and that makes it harder to drop big names even if they aren't performing eg Rashford
All of this is part of normal "management" and its easy when you are winning but not so when you are losing and stinking the place out with the same old stodgy United performances that we have seen for 10 years. Young players also need protecting and in a sense it's not fair to expect too much from them when the experienced and highly paid squad members are letting the club down with consistent mediocrity. So, its a no win situation at the moment. I suspect EtH is hoping for a run of games where he can field a stable team, ideally with a genuine left back, Amrabat and Casemiro in CM. Even if he is able to do that there is still the gordian knot of a problem that is the front three. You have to say that we look better with Garnacho on the left but he wont drop Rashford, Antony is just a bad signing, Pellistri is a bit short physically and experience wise, Sancho is sulking and playing Mount at outside right seems odd.
What he probably needs is an early exit from the CL, lose to Newcastle in the Carabao and draw City in the 3rd round of the FA Cup. That way he can focus on developing a style of football that is worthy of the club and the players buy into. It's very hard to play your way out of a funk at a club like United and if we as fans are honest, we know there is an inherent weakness that until resolved will result in patchy form, the odd hammering from a top 6 club and the odd flattering win. It's what we are and until the Glazers **** off ten Hag just has to manage better.
Nicely summarised some of the key points for me (injuries aside) and with a little less of my emotions on Rashford who i'm losing all sorts of perspective with. He's not good enough, he never will be, we've contracted ourselves into a corner and with his image value to the club too. I think ETH is personally just waiting for the opportunity to be able to phase him out, but is juggling a number of battles which started with Ronaldo, Maguire and now Sancho.
That said i'll add... If we had a fit 11 i'd think ETH should be aiming for some thing like:
Onana
AWB / Varane / Martinez / Reguilon
Casemiro / Arambat
Antony / Bruno / Mount
Hojlund
Subs - Heaton/ Dalot / Lindelof / Shaw / Eriksen / Hannibal / Rashford / Garnacho / Pellestri or Martial
On paper you'd think technically, solid squad, but it's got a serious lack of substance, impact, grit, steel, etc. It's lightweight and with little top tier experience - I count 3 players and I don't include Bruno in that.
Bruno's a real problem in my eyes for the squad, i don't think he's the right captain as i think he's representative of Unitedd's problems - erratic mood/performances and loses it when it ain't going well. Surprised Casemiro or Martinez weren't choosen but I think ETH is banking on a couple of things like longevity, Bruno getting control of his emotions and growing with the captaincy and it has the added benefit of showing it's not all about bringing in ETH players. Which it could be seen as if he appointed Martinez or Casemiro.
The short is, there's so many 'little to larger' problems even beyond the injuries that ETH is trying to juggle. This club has been so poorly run it's like this big ball of spaghetti of knots and crap. ETH is having to slowly unpick them all and working out if they still are useful or useless. All the while trying to perform to an expectant fan base/media and keep the finances going. A season not in the CL will unfortunately hurt ETH's ability to rebuild both financially (as has been proven the last window by how close we run to FFP) and to bring in players with a show of consistency and progress.
It's a horrid/huge job for any manager - i think he's personally doing superbly to stay sane, coherent and consistent.
