Greenlizard0 PL & Championship Football Thread ** spoilers ** [12th - 15th August 2022]

Soldato
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Brentford biggest win in the top league since 1938. First time United have lost 7 in a row away from home since 1936. Looking grim.

It was a mailing from all pundits last night. You get the feeling it's going to be a lot longer without a title than 30 years. Especially when all the other teams are building so well.
 
Soldato
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It wasn't really Maguire's play that I thought came for any criticism yesterday. I thought people were directing the criticism at the fact he's captain.

That there is no fight in the team and he couldn't motivate a wet flannel.
 
Soldato
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Just taking a stat at face value with no context is silly, especially one like 'progressive passing' as it's literally just a successful forward pass that travels more than 10 yards. Take ddg's pass to eriksen yesterday that resulted in the 2nd Brentford goal, it would tick all the boxes for a progressive pass yet totally ignores all other factors.
 
Don
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Maguire and Utd's backline as a whole were run ragged yesterday. I'm not sure if it was tactical (madness if so) but Maguire's positioning for the 4th goal! He was on the right wing and from being under pressure in their own box, Brentford were 2v2 against Shaw and Martinez thanks to one punt up field.

You can say he wasn't directly at fault for any of the 4 goals but Utd's inability to defend long balls and balls hit into the channels put them on the back foot, giving the initiative to Brentford and Maguire played his part in that.

And a penny for Varane's thoughts on the current situation. A couple of years back he was being talked up as the next best after VVD and now he's back up to Laurel and Hardy.
 
Caporegime
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Varane is a victim of being unable to stay fit. He'll get his chances but he needs to perform and more importantly stay available.

We were run ragged because we're not used to passing out from a back, any new system will come with hiccups like yesterday. Especially when you add big individual errors on top of it. It's ridiculous to judge any individual person a few games into the season. We need to give more time and see how people adapt to the new system really. But most importantly we need to get some ******* players in. We haven't even replaced the players we lost yet, it's a joke.
 
Don
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Passing out of the back was another issue but dealing with direct, physical teams is going to be a constant issue for Utd while they have Maguire and Martinez at the back.

Maguire's issues aren't new. Throughout his time at Utd, whenever he's been asked to defend large spaces he's been a disaster because he's simply not quick enough or agile enough. And as Frank admitted, teams are going to target Martinez and the sheer volume of duals he's going to find himself in, the law of averages dictate that he'll be found out a few times, even if he defends well.
 
Soldato
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Passing out of the back was another issue but dealing with direct, physical teams is going to be a constant issue for Utd while they have Maguire and Martinez at the back.

Maguire's issues aren't new. Throughout his time at Utd, whenever he's been asked to defend large spaces he's been a disaster because he's simply not quick enough or agile enough. And as Frank admitted, teams are going to target Martinez and the sheer volume of duals he's going to find himself in, the law of averages dictate that he'll be found out a few times, even if he defends well.
TBH Martinez did quite well to frustrate Toney at times with aerial duals. He just wrestled with constantly and they were obviously FKs to us, but perhaps because of his size the ref refused to give anything.

He really doesn't look like a CB built in the EPL mould so I wouldn't be surprised if he moved into DM.
 
Man of Honour
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ETH will want us to play a high line and dominate possession, and in that situation Martinez would be fine. Mobile, good on the ball, aggressive.

I think the best plan is to play him in defensive midfield (we need someone there anyway), and try and get a tune out of Bailly and Varane at CB - if they can stay fit, big if. I don't have much hope for Maguire.
 
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