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There has been a lot of chopping and changing of players and formations

I think it's good to have the personnel and flexibility but you would have thought 100 games in Ole would have a better idea of what works when.

I want to see him succeed so the next couple of months are essential, If the inconsistency continues he's a goner
 
dacads said:
There has been a lot of chopping and changing of players and formations

I think it's good to have the personnel and flexibility but you would have thought 100 games in Ole would have a better idea of what works when.

I want to see him succeed so the next couple of months are essential, If the inconsistency continues he's a goner
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He needs to be more risky and trust his players more. Chelsea and Arsenal are prime examples of how frightened he is of conceding. The PSG game he took that risk at half time and went back to a 433 and it worked wonders. He changed the formation at half time with Arsenal which worked but then went and did some really strange subs.
 
Formation isn't that important compared to tactics and coaching. Playing Arsenal you could see that their players knew where their teammates were. They were playing triangles, moving as a unit and hunting in packs. We were literally playing moment to moment. Get ball, look up to see whats on and then play a pass. It means that everything is slow. It means that it takes twice as long to do anything, it gives the defence ages to reposition and close gaps.

It means your attackers aren't making runs because by the time a pass comes they are either offside or the defence has tracked them or closed the gaps. It means going backwards A LOT when you hit their 25. How anyone can look at us and think we are coached well is beyond me. Ole isn't scared of losing these games, he just doesn't have a team that is coached to do anything but hit teams on the counter. The only time we get away with it against teams that sit in and are well drilled is when Martial is playing because he can unlock defences and win us penalties. When you only have to look at a striker for a penalty to be given, Martial wins us a lot.
 
It's a mess, top to bottom at the moment.

Played so many formations in the last few games that players have no idea what they are doing. I've said it before, when you start games with Fred, McTominay in centre mid, your never going to "win" a game, simply try not to lose it. You then bring on Matic for Fred (hardly a dynamic change), Cavani for Greenwood (looks MILES away from fitness or the Cavani of 4/5 years ago) and van de Beek who must be wondering why he signed for United.....

We've had diamond in midfield, 4/2/3/1, 3/5/2 etc etc - 100 games in and Ole still has no "width" in the team, everything is so narrow it's unreal.

It's a total and utter mess, not just the Arsenal game but so inconsistent. He need to find a formation and stick to it. Play players in their positions, leave others out. Simple.

Liverpool play the same formation week in, week out. You can pick 8/9 same players in their team every week if fit. United chop and change each game.

Huge Ole fan for what he did as a player but he's lacking in making the big calls - He's trying to keep everyone happy in the squad and sometimes you can't do that.
 
Shamikebab said:
We literally beat one of the best teams in the world with them starting a few weeks ago...

We also did it several times last year
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Beating a poor PSG side doesn't make it all ok.

Put it another way - Would McTominay or Fred get into any of the top teams in the premier leagues midfield....no chance.

I ain't blaming them, but effectively at the moment united have 12 midfields in the 1st team squad, competing for 4/5 places. Ole has no clue what is his "best" team, paid £35 million for Van der Beek and he's played about 25 minutes as a sub. They have no width in midfield at all.

I just don't understand where they are going at the moment - This stupid pursuit of Sancho all summer, then you end up with a half fit/past his best Cavani. Ighalo who is never, and should never, be near that 1st team squad.

Whole squad is just a mess. Phil Jones on £80k a week and not even in the 25 man squad....etc....

It's a mess from top to bottom.
 
I have said this a million times but your first and overriding job as a manager is to take a squad of quality X and make it play like a squad with quality X+.

If you have the 5th best squad in the league, anything above 5th is good going. If you have the best squad in the league you should be winning it.

When you are in 15th place (could be 13th if we win our game in hand) and you have one of the best squads in the league you are doing a **** job. You can whinge all you like about the players you do or don't have but thats something to do when you are 3rd and want to be 1st, not when you are in 15th position. We should really have 5 points as well considering how lucky we were with the Brighton game.

I genuinely boggles my mind that people are saying we need signings to fix our issues when we are in 15th place. 15th. Its just an excuse for having a manager who is well out of his depth and has fallen back to a style of football that is one dimensional and easy to "coach". Counter attack. He hasn't even coached us to be like someone like Atletico Madrid who also play on the counter but actually defend properly as a team.

Honestly, what teams in the league do you think would sack their manager and hire Ole if they could. I'm honestly not sure any of them would. Not a single one.
 
adam cool dude said:
You could say the same about Arteta and Lampard. No other team would have employed them apart from their respective clubs.
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Wasn't Lampard doing ok with Derby and Arteta was working under Pep at City and only left because it was Arsenal asking?

Don't get me wrong I'm not saying they are ripping up the league but surely Ole is showing the same kind of traits he did with Cardiff?

The main thing that stands out to me (I'm a Liverpool fan so really want Man U to carry on as they are) is that players like Pogba have a real attitude problem, it absolutely stinks and watching amble around the pitch drives me crazy so I can't imagine what it does for fans of Man U, the very least required to play for Man U (I can remember the pre-Fergie days as well) is effort and he puts in so little I cannot fathom why (unless it's a financial obligation) he continually gets picked above players who actually try.
 
Maundie said:
Wasn't Lampard doing ok with Derby and Arteta was working under Pep at City and only left because it was Arsenal asking?

Don't get me wrong I'm not saying they are ripping up the league but surely Ole is showing the same kind of traits he did with Cardiff?

The main thing that stands out to me (I'm a Liverpool fan so really want Man U to carry on as they are) is that players like Pogba have a real attitude problem, it absolutely stinks and watching amble around the pitch drives me crazy so I can't imagine what it does for fans of Man U, the very least required to play for Man U (I can remember the pre-Fergie days as well) is effort and he puts in so little I cannot fathom why (unless it's a financial obligation) he continually gets picked above players who actually try.
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Ole was reserve team coach under Fergie. He also took Molde to their first Norwegian league title in history which he won twice including the Norwegian cup. Managing a relegation team is entirely different to managing a top team and Cardiff was a poisoned chalice anyway. Sam Allardyce is the master of keeping teams up. Look what happened when West Ham gave him money and asked him to play football. He failed miserably.

Arteta had basically no managerial experience before Arsenal and Fat Frank did work experience at Derby with a load of Chelsea loans yet still didn't manage to get promoted. Frank is undoubtedly even worse than Ole. He has had 200 million to spend this season. 70 million Pulisic plus a whole wrath of loan's that he brought back last season. Yet because he is English he gets a free pass. Arteta does have a little bit more about him but is still very early days for him. He is playing very defensive football and last season when he took over Arsenal were 2 points behind Manchester United yet ended the season 10 points behind. Too many draws really.

Rashford, Martial, Greenwood, Fred, Shaw, Mctominay have all improved immeasurably under him as well plus we were the third best team defensively last season. Who has improved under Frank Lampard since he took over? If anything his defence has gone backwards.

In my opinion at least the issue isn't Ole and his tactics but he needs to get tough with players. One of the CB's needs dropping for Tuanzebe and the midfield can consist of either Fernandes or Pogba but not both. The season is still in its early days so is difficult to judge. Manchester United had a really late finish to their season with the Europa league and it showed in the first month of the league. Martial is back from his three game ban so it should be a lot better going forward.
 
Maundie said:
That's ok, as long as Ole's doing better than Frank and Arteta it's good enough for you.
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The league is so up and down at the moment I really think it is hard to judge till at least after Christmas. We have Everton, West Brom, Southamptom and West Ham in the league. I was bricking Everton two weeks ago but they have fallen off a cliff since then.
 
adam cool dude said:
The league is so up and down at the moment I really think it is hard to judge till at least after Christmas. We have Everton, West Brom, Southamptom and West Ham in the league. I was bricking Everton two weeks ago but they have fallen off a cliff since then.
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The problem is who we are facing doesn’t mean anything to us as a team anymore. We’re so inconsistent you just never know what will turn up on match day.

Ole headline on BBC stating that Pogba has ‘shown lots of positives’... COVID maybe, but little else in my opinion.
 
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booyaka said:
Whole squad is just a mess. Phil Jones on £80k a week and not even in the 25 man squad....etc....
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Not a rant if Jones' not mentioned :D

On topic of Arteta and co at least they have made the right signings, Partey, Gabriel etc. it's clear they have a direction, including from their performances and Arteta is obviously influenced/inspired by Guardiola. Not sure if this is a comparison really as Arteta has only managed 40 games.. but still a better win rate than Ole etc.
 
dacads said:
Not a rant if Jones' not mentioned :D

On topic of Arteta and co at least they have made the right signings, Partey, Gabriel etc. it's clear they have a direction, including from their performances and Arteta is obviously influenced/inspired by Guardiola. Not sure if this is a comparison really as Arteta has only managed 40 games.. but still a better win rate than Ole etc.
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Ole had a better win rate himself after 40 games. Ole has made good signings as well. Fernandes, Maguire and AWB all improve the team. As much stick as Maguire gets he played every minute last season.
 
Robbo said:
Was nice to see Poch on MNF last night.

Get him in ASAP please.
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Yes great character and charisma about him..

Anyway I was supposed to come here to say saw some photos on the MU Facebook page of the players smiling and posing in the plane etc. to Turkey, what's all this about? Keano would be fuming!

I'd be smiling when we put a good string of results together again like we did last season before the lockdown
 
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