The Jose Mourinho Appreciation Thread

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fez said:
This is pretty much what we need to do. Remove Woodward from anything football related, get a DoF in and find a manager who will play the kind of football we want to see. I have no idea how we haven't done this already. Woodward has monetised every facet of the club despite the football side of the club being awful so having a manager who plays good football but doesn't win trophies for a few years isn't going to affect the bottom line. Eventually United will lose their relevance and as a result their worth to sponsors. When that happens we will have a badly run club from top to bottom without the power to spend our way out of it.
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this heavily depends on how effective this "good" football is at getting results - as it could easily affect the bottom line. Pundits and media in general have been glowing about Arsenal's wonderful football for years despite the horrendous results...if that happened to Utd the bottom line definitely would be affected...esp considering how close the top 6 are (and bottom two only being in Europa)


fez said:
My question to you Frank is how do we get consistently outplayed by teams that have spent less than the Pogba money alone on their squads. Its not like we are playing well and missing a host of chances. Its not like we are outplaying 90% of the teams we play. I can't think of a single game this season where we have played better than the opposition. If young boys had a decent striker we would have lost our first CL game. They outworked, outplayed and outclassed us completely.

I agree that the quality of the PL has been steadily increasing over the past 5 years but somehow Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham, City and Arsenal all manage to beat the smaller teams and even when they don't they almost always play better than them.
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Because there are too many egos on the pitch....there is only one that deserves to be there (in goal) and he has every right to show it and he doesn't at all!! Pogba sometimes has games of his life, but its so rare that its no wonder we don't perform, same for Sanchez - something HAS to be in his contract to get such an extensive run of starts whenever he is available despite his average performances as a striker / forward.

11 not so talented but all players working together / co-ordinated will always surpass 11 individuals how ever separately talented those individuals may be (and some of our 1st team don't even count in the latter)

have to say I still think that first WHU goal was clearly offside and we should have got a pen for McTominay being barged down in the penalty area - Im not saying WHU didn't deserve the result, they clearly worked harder than us as a team but that result individually was definitely one for the officials

Generally however you are correct - we are coming across better teams who work harder together and are worthy of the results. This is what happens when you get investment by 3 totally different managers and a board and the resultant squad is no-use to anybody. fully expect to lose in the CL tonight (or get a boring draw which doesn't help us at all in such a tight group)
 
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FrankJH said:
this heavily depends on how effective this "good" football is at getting results - as it could easily affect the bottom line. Pundits and media in general have been glowing about Arsenal's wonderful football for years despite the horrendous results...if that happened to Utd the bottom line definitely would be affected...esp considering how close the top 6 are (and bottom two only being in Europa)
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I'm not sure how you are coming to that conclusion. Arsenal have been in the CL spots for years until very recently and it was frustrating their fans but they all knew that their spending was holding them back (as well as perhaps Wenger). They got to watch good football 80% of the time though. Do you genuinely think that our "success" since Ferguson left has improved our bottom line? Of course it hasn't. If we were winning the league every few years and getting to the tail end of the CL each season I might agree but we are not. Our **** football has not been effective at getting results.

FrankJH said:
Generally however you are correct - we are coming across better teams who work harder together and are worthy of the results. This is what happens when you get investment by 3 totally different managers and a board and the resultant squad is no-use to anybody. fully expect to lose in the CL tonight (or get a boring draw which doesn't help us at all in such a tight group)
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Thats not something that should be an issue. Chelsea change their manager every 2 or so years and yet they can go from awful to brilliant with a new manager at the helm. The issue is that we are consistently appointing bad managers. Teams who finish in the bottom half of the league can get a new manager and suddenly they play far better. We don't have a bad squad, we have a bad manager.

United has been run like a billionaire who thinks his kids will turn out well if he gets good nannys and buys them everything they want. We would be in a better position if the management at United put the effort in to restructuring the football side for continued success instead of just throwing money at the problems we have.
 
I read this morning Sanchez is on £505,000 a week, which says it all. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if Fellaini and Lukaku are getting paid more than the likes of Mohamed Salah and Eden Hazard. The United wage bill is just ridiculous most of the players who go there probably think they've hit the jackpot and don't need to try very hard because there's nowhere better to be.
 
fez said:
I'm not sure how you are coming to that conclusion. Arsenal have been in the CL spots for years until very recently and it was frustrating their fans but they all knew that their spending was holding them back (as well as perhaps Wenger). They got to watch good football 80% of the time though. Do you genuinely think that our "success" since Ferguson left has improved our bottom line? Of course it hasn't. If we were winning the league every few years and getting to the tail end of the CL each season I might agree but we are not. Our **** football has not been effective at getting results..
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Because sponsors have clauses in contracts to pay Utd less if we fall out of the CL places - which is now more likely (because of how competitive the top 5 or 6 are)

Now whether its after two consecutive years, or whether its just after more than 2 (separate ) seasons outside the CL within the same contract is still to be seen.


fez said:
Thats not something that should be an issue. Chelsea change their manager every 2 or so years and yet they can go from awful to brilliant with a new manager at the helm. The issue is that we are consistently appointing bad managers. Teams who finish in the bottom half of the league can get a new manager and suddenly they play far better. We don't have a bad squad, we have a bad manager.

United has been run like a billionaire who thinks his kids will turn out well if he gets good nannys and buys them everything they want. We would be in a better position if the management at United put the effort in to restructuring the football side for continued success instead of just throwing money at the problems we have.
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Sorry that's just bs, we do have a terrible squad. Valencia, Young, Smalling, Jones, Fellaini, Mata, Rojo & darmain are all aversely affecting the squad and could be sold tomorrow (if the FA would allow it) without affecting the quality one bit.
Then add the fact that Sanchez, Pogba (consistently at least), Matic (post injury admittedly) and lukaku aren't pulling their weight this season - Im only adding Lukaku here because of the large number of missed chances he has already had .

33% of the squad really isn't good enough for where Man Utd want to (and really should) be. Im not expecting every transfer to work out, but a lot of those haven't been good enough for years and add in those that have arrived and not worked out it just makes the situation worse.
 
FrankJH said:
Sorry that's just bs, we do have a terrible squad. Valencia, Young, Smalling, Jones, Fellaini, Mata, Rojo & darmain are all aversely affecting the squad and could be sold tomorrow (if the FA would allow it) without affecting the quality one bit.
Then add the fact that Sanchez, Pogba (consistently at least), Matic (post injury admittedly) and lukaku aren't pulling their weight this season - Im only adding Lukaku here because of the large number of missed chances he has already had .

33% of the squad really isn't good enough for where Man Utd want to (and really should) be. Im not expecting every transfer to work out, but a lot of those haven't been good enough for years and add in those that have arrived and not worked out it just makes the situation worse.
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Thats making the assumption that those players are currently performing even at "par" for their abilities. Most of the players your have named above are squad players at best.

A good manager would get the most out of our players.

DDG
Dalot
Shaw
Bailly
Smalling
Matic
Pogba
Periera
Fred
Martial
Rashford
Lukaku
Sanchez

All of the above are good players under the right manager. I agree that we should have a better squad for the money spent but we have a bunch of players easily good enough to be top 4. We have a squad that is easily good enough to be beating almost every team in the league bar the odd blip. The fact that we are playing like we have/are is not because we have a rubbish squad its because we have a toxic manager.

How many top players do Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham and Arsenal have outside their first XI. We have a load of players who aren't United standard but the best managers get the best out of their players. The system they create means that if a lesser player has to come in for a while the whole team shouldn't suffer. Mourinho rotates players out for god knows what reason, plays someone else who hasn't played in weeks or months then drops them when they are not amazing. Hes just a bad manager and can only succeed with a team that already has a strong identity and just requires short term motivation.
 
Steedie said:
I agree to a certain extent, the board offered him a new deal then refuse to back him in the transfer market. Whether they agree with the signings or not, you can't back someone to an extent that you're rewarding them with a new bigger money deal, then go and stop him making signings, and let's face it, the defenders were signings we absolutely needed.

I'll stop short of saying the next manager needs to be given time to build, as that's effectively what every manager since Ferguson has said they are setting out to do. But we definitely need to make a clear statement with a manager that has a track record of building squads as opposed to short term starting 11's.

But where I disagree is saying he's a consequence of the boards lack of direction. I think with Mourinho, it's more to do with him being an out of date, toxic manager that will try and blame anyone but himself, which makes the dressing room feel like crap
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I wasn't defending Mourinho. What I meant by him being a consequence of a lack of direction was his appointment. I've said it 100 times, I don't believe for one moment that Utd wanted to appoint him - they had their chance to appoint him when Fergie retired but they chose Moyes instead. You don't appoint David Moyes over Mourinho unless you're dead set against Mourinho. Mourinho was a last resort appointment after Moyes and LVG failed and having failed to get Pep, Klopp and I suspect Poch too. Having missed out on the CL in 2 of the 3 years post Fergie, Utd panicked and basically said "**** it, we know all the issues that come with him but we desperately need to be back in the CL on a regular basis and he's our safest bet". Rather than set-out and stick to a clear plan to move forward, Utd rolled the dice on a quick-fix.

Regarding your point about backing him in the transfer market. This is what I mean in my point below to fez re people working together. I have no doubts that before he joined and when discussing his new deal that the club would have made it clear to him their views on transfers. In the 10+ years of the Glazers' ownership prior to Mourinho, Utd had only spent any significant amount on 1 player 28 years old or over. Mourinho would have known that Utd don't want to keep spending big money on aging players yet his two main targets were a 29 year old winger and a 29 year old CB. The way Mourinho deals is completely at odds with how Utd as a club & business run and was never sustainable.
fez said:
This is pretty much what we need to do. Remove Woodward from anything football related, get a DoF in and find a manager who will play the kind of football we want to see. I have no idea how we haven't done this already. Woodward has monetised every facet of the club despite the football side of the club being awful so having a manager who plays good football but doesn't win trophies for a few years isn't going to affect the bottom line. Eventually United will lose their relevance and as a result their worth to sponsors. When that happens we will have a badly run club from top to bottom without the power to spend our way out of it.

The thing that baffles me most is that we are spending huge sums in completely the wrong way. It's not like we are penny pinching on our journey to mediocrity. Literally every successful club in Europe has a different model to us yet we don't seem to make the required changes.
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You make it sound so easy. First of all, who appoints the DoF? You then need to make sure you've got a manager that's willing and able to work in that set-up.

As I've said before, there's no single right way to do things, whether you go with a DoF set-up, an old school Manager + CEO or some sort of compromise between the two, the key is having the right people and them being willing and able to work together. But before they even decide on this they need to decide on what the club is going to be. Do Utd want to be a side signing Galatico's, in which case you want a manager/coach/DoF that can manage egos and getting them to play together or are Utd going to be a side that signs the best youngsters in the world, in which case you want a coach/manager/DoF that are most suited at identifying and developing young players.
 
Bring on Zidane. He'll most likely be another massively expensive disaster. He's got no history of being anything other than a head coach at a club he already knew inside and out.

Man U need root and branch reform. They need a modern day Houllier or Wenger. Not another Billy big *******. They need someone to come in and clear the decks.

Unfortunately for Man U fans. The Glazers will have no appetite for this at all. It's a total anathema to their type of ownership.
 
BaZ87 said:
You make it sound so easy. First of all, who appoints the DoF? You then need to make sure you've got a manager that's willing and able to work in that set-up.
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The upper management. Who appoints senior management in any company? You don't have to be an expert in a particular field to appoint someone to do a job in that area. At the moment we have a money man in charge of transfers which has been largely disastrous. Any manager you bring in will know you have a DoF in future and will either work under that understanding or not take the job.

BaZ87 said:
As I've said before, there's no single right way to do things, whether you go with a DoF set-up, an old school Manager + CEO or some sort of compromise between the two, the key is having the right people and them being willing and able to work together. But before they even decide on this they need to decide on what the club is going to be. Do Utd want to be a side signing Galatico's, in which case you want a manager/coach/DoF that can manage egos and getting them to play together or are Utd going to be a side that signs the best youngsters in the world, in which case you want a coach/manager/DoF that are most suited at identifying and developing young players.
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A premier league side in Manchester is never going to be a side signing Galacticos. It worked for Madrid because they have been at the pinnacle of European football for a long time, have a very "supportive" set of investors/government and are based in a country that has a fantastic climate and is part of a 2 horse race league. Much like Bayern, Madrid seem to be able to pluck a lot of their players from rivals and smaller clubs for much less than market value. We don't need to be at extremes of ideology. What is Man Citys or Liverpools? Its pretty simple. Build a side of complementary players and develop a strong footballing identity on which to base your transfers.

I honestly don't care if we aren't winning trophies if we are making progress and playing good football most of the time. City have played good football for years. So have Liverpool, Tottenham and Arsenal. We have huge spending power so I am completely baffled how we can't do what these teams have done with the added benefit of being able to spend huge sums of money when needed.
 
fez said:
The upper management. Who appoints senior management in any company? You don't have to be an expert in a particular field to appoint someone to do a job in that area. At the moment we have a money man in charge of transfers which has been largely disastrous. Any manager you bring in will know you have a DoF in future and will either work under that understanding or not take the job.
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So Woodward, the man you said be kept away from anything football related will be setting the overall direction of the club and appointing the people to implement it. The man that was ultimately responsible for LvG and Mourinho.

fez said:
A premier league side in Manchester is never going to be a side signing Galacticos. It worked for Madrid because they have been at the pinnacle of European football for a long time, have a very "supportive" set of investors/government and are based in a country that has a fantastic climate and is part of a 2 horse race league. Much like Bayern, Madrid seem to be able to pluck a lot of their players from rivals and smaller clubs for much less than market value. We don't need to be at extremes of ideology. What is Man Citys or Liverpools? Its pretty simple. Build a side of complementary players and develop a strong footballing identity on which to base your transfers.

I honestly don't care if we aren't winning trophies if we are making progress and playing good football most of the time. City have played good football for years. So have Liverpool, Tottenham and Arsenal. We have huge spending power so I am completely baffled how we can't do what these teams have done with the added benefit of being able to spend huge sums of money when needed.
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You've misunderstood my point. I wasn't suggesting Utd should or would take either route, I was simply using those as examples of approaches and stating that Utd need to decide on what they're going to do before deciding on what structure to put in place and which people to put within that structure. The problem at Utd is there is no clear approach and while at every club there will be exceptions to the rule, Utd's whole transfer strategy has been a compromise. Look at Liverpool and City's transfers over the last few years, there is a clear pattern of signing players in their early to mid 20's - players that are approaching or just reached their peak years. It's not just a case of not signing older players but they're also not committing huge fees on 17-18 year olds either. I'm certain that Liverpool want Pulisic for example and we know from the Fekir deal that Liverpool were willing to pay £50m+ on an another forward this summer but they aren't willing to gamble on Pulisic - we'd rather wait another year or so for him to establish himself a bit more, even if it ultimately costs us more, rather than risk the money now.

Again, I'm not saying Utd should take this or that approach but they need to decide on the approach they're taking and then decide on the structure and people best suited to implementing this approach.
 
BaZ87 said:
So Woodward, the man you said be kept away from anything football related will be setting the overall direction of the club and appointing the people to implement it. The man that was ultimately responsible for LvG and Mourinho.
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Picking a DoF should be a little easier than picking a top manager who needs to turn around the fortunes of one of the largest clubs in the world. Even if it isn't a huge success it has to be better than our current transfer and recruitment policy. The best managers don't become available very often and even less likely is that one is available when you are looking for a new one.


BaZ87 said:
Again, I'm not saying Utd should take this or that approach but they need to decide on the approach they're taking and then decide on the structure and people best suited to implementing this approach.
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Lets hope we do this soon because I really don't like watching Liverpool do better than us. You lot are unbearable when you are having a good time of things ;)
 
fez said:
Thats making the assumption that those players are currently performing even at "par" for their abilities. Most of the players your have named above are squad players at best.

A good manager would get the most out of our players.

DDG
Dalot
Shaw ** given what he went through (and what he was like before JM) its impossible to know - he is starting to come good now though
Bailly
Smalling - already playing above his ability by a long way
Matic - Not convinced he is anything other than a (very) short term solution
Pogba
Periera - Its debatable JM has done much wrong with him, was players choice to go to Valencia last season
Fred
Martial
Rashford
Lukaku
Sanchez - given how many chances and in different roles he has been given, its debatable this would have been different

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All of the above are good players under the right manager. I agree that we should have a better squad for the money spent but we have a bunch of players easily good enough to be top 4. We have a squad that is easily good enough to be beating almost every team in the league bar the odd blip. The fact that we are playing like we have/are is not because we have a rubbish squad its because we have a toxic manager. .[/QUOTE]

That's highly debatable, with one decent centre half (Bailly) who doesn't have the best injury record since joining us - the defence is always going to be weak. Dalot is very inexperienced (although looks promising, but will be lucky to get 40% of the games available just because of his inexperience. Shaw is looking promising again although he does need ot improve defensively - hopefully this will come in time. With one main central striker (who did decently in most games last season) suddenly not able to take his chances - results are always going to take a turn for the worse.

fez said:
How many top players do Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham and Arsenal have outside their first XI. We have a load of players who aren't United standard but the best managers get the best out of their players. The system they create means that if a lesser player has to come in for a while the whole team shouldn't suffer. Mourinho rotates players out for god knows what reason, plays someone else who hasn't played in weeks or months then drops them when they are not amazing. Hes just a bad manager and can only succeed with a team that already has a strong identity and just requires short term motivation.
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Why are you so focused on outside their 1st XI - Utd don't have a decent XI to start with (no right winger to speak of, no consistant central defence and one goal scorer for the most part) - and those patching up the holes are either up and coming players , massively out of form (if they were ever IN form for Utd to start with) or squad players at best who shouldn't be at Utd to start with, let alone for this length of time.

If the players aren't capable of playing at this level it doesn't matter which manager is on the sidelines. Fellaini as a DM / centre half is a disaster waiting to happen (as proven by at least 2 goals in separate games already coming from central dm /centre half area of the pitch) - doesn't matter who is on the side lines this is a short term solution because no one was got in the summer (just one instance , same could be said of Mata as a right winger)



From Forbes -

United have made £651m in operating profits over the last decade, but have spent £523m on financing the loans used by the Glazers to buy the club. The dividends paid to the Glazers in the most recent accounts come to £22m of £44m profit


Yes, we have had some (very) debatable transfers over the last few years no doubt, but that is in a nutshell where the issues all start from. Its not all about money, but it doesn't help when the owners are taking out such significant sums year after year.
 
yet they spent how much on players for the last three managers? so 22m a year is nothing compared to the waste of the last 3 managers
 
zophiel said:
yet they spent how much on players for the last three managers? so 22m a year is nothing compared to the waste of the last 3 managers
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and yet Man City have spent over £500m more on transfers in the last 10 years and before last summer (where they spent approx. £200m just in one window) Liverpool had spent the about the same as Man utd.

Not saying Utd haven't been wasteful, they have been, but it doesn't help when you have had three totally different styles of manager with different ideas on how to move the club forward - its not one central idea from a football minded director so the whole squad is a mess
 
My initial reaction when Jose was moaning about not landing CB targets was pass me a violin given the spend on Bailly, Lindelof etc but on reflection I do think it is an area of weakness (when you have an Arsenal fan commenting on your defence you know you've got problems!). In years gone by it was Pallister and Bruce, Stam and Johnsen, Ferdinand and Vidic etc. Now it's well, to be honest I couldn't confidently pick a best pairing, personally I like Phil Jones and I guess Bailly alongside him, but open to debate.

To compound matters, I think MU have fullbacks who could flourish as wingbacks but that implicitly means needing to have three CBs and I can't justify finding spaces for so many average players.

Looking further up the pitch if I was Mourinho I'd probably just put the big names out for an extended runs of games and if they fail to deliver then so be it. So I'm talking like a boring team with no youth prospects and ignoring supposed poor form from the forwards:

.....................DDG
Valencia...Jones...Bailly....Shaw
...............Matic....Pogba
...Sanchez.....Mata.....Martial
...................Lukaku

Romero
Smalling
Young
Herrera
Fred
Lingard
Rashford
 
Forget the board for a minute, Mourinho has failed at things only he is responsible for. Squad management, tactics, transfers (his chosen signings haven't been good), and things off the pitch have just been embarrassing.

His general attitude has been awful from the start.
 
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