Rival watch

All they wanted to talk about at the beginning of the season was the two Manchester clubs and their illustrious managers. I am enjoying their failure.

Many many football fans queried how someone who only managed Barca and Bayern could be hailed as the greatest manager in the world. He can't even do it at the richest club in England, perhaps he needs a spell at Leeds to find out what management is really all about. He reminds me of AVB the man with a plan, shame about the players.

 

You guys looked great at WBA. I had it down as a banana skin all over it with TP and his teams packing the defence. Obviously i wasn't expecting Jonas Olson probably the worse defender in the world to start but you guys are really moving the ball so well and this 3-4-3 tactic works even better for you guys than us i think!.

Anyway, it just goes to show that you can't just look at a team in a short period as i've always rated Poch. I know he got quite a lot of stick from quite a few fans earlier in the season but i think it just goes to show that when you have a special coach you need to give them time and see them through the bad patches.

 

I was fishing in them waters last week

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From BBC: Premier League title race: How top six is shaping up ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/38632129 )

Verdict: Flew under the radar for a while but now right at the heart of the title race.

 

Cheers Bobby. I suppose Conte deserves some credit for bringing back a 'lost' formation to these green pastures. In a way, it suits the blood n thunder style of the PL quite nicely.

Our game against you hinged on one thing: Our back 5 are better in this system than your own. There is no way a converted winger and averaged paced full back can out-do Walker and Rose as wing-backs, whilst the only CB out of our 3 who probably wouldn't get into yours is probably Dier; although give him a few more years playing at this level and that will probably change too.

 

Definitely... your wing backs are far better than ours in a physical game and technically whereas the one thing i would give our wingbacks over yours is that maybe they concentrate better although i dont think we have seen any gaffs from walker or rose for a while.

I actually think in our derby game the difference between our defenders and yours is that i don't think any team can press your back 7. Kante and Matic, Alonso and Cahill are okay footballers but under a good press will just give it away. Your back 7 on the other hand are so well drilled and all great defensively that it's hard to score against you guys and that its almost impossible to get the ball off you in the press.

It just meant whenever we got the ball defensively, we just lost the ball to you guys straight away.

 

You currently have the edge over us in the last third, as evidenced by your successes even playing the 'false 9' without Costa on a few occasions. Besides that, your only other noticeable advantage is that your players and manager are vastly more experienced than our own...and it counts across 38 games when the pressure is on. Your response to our win demonstrates this. Other, less experienced teams would've followed that up with a limp draw lacking in confidence. Your body language against Leicester didn't show the slightest sign of self-doubt. You'd put the defeat behind you and moved firmly on.

I've noticed a number of people (not on this board - I mean pundits) defending Guardiola, bemoaning the fact that he has a certain system that he wants to play, but lacks the players to do it. The fact that Conte has taken you to where you are via converting a bit-part winger/wide attacker into a wing back, a full back into a CB and a LB into a LWB, and apparently has no need for a focal point up front in order to do so, just goes to show that a really good manager has the nous to make the most of the tools at his disposal. Bad workmen blame the tools, good workmen build palaces.

 

Did you grit your teeth all the way through writing that?

 

It's BBC Salford spinning ****, when the facts are this..

Man Utd league position since 6 November 2016

5th
6th <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
7th

"Mourinho is definitely moving United forward" - Yeah right!!

 

For me, the edge that C K speaks of is the possession of 2 players in Hazard and Pedro who can get them a goal, or create one out of a seemingly impossible situation.

We don't have a player like that, we rely on our teamwork to create our chances.

 

It's not just them. Sky and BT and the written media are just as bad. The assault by Pogba on Henderson is just ignored. He grabbed the guy by the neck and threw him to the ground it didn't warrant a mention in this weekend's controversial referees' decisions on Sky. It's ridiculous. I thought that the Officials would enjoy having Fergie off their backs and being able to officiate impartially? I was wrong...and the media have no interest in commenting upon it impartially either.

 

He could have broke his neck tbf.

That's what happens when you get your own emoji.

 

What was all the fuss about United And Liverpool playing each other,they were two midtable teams

 

It was the Pundit Derby.

 

In a way. As I've mentioned, I've always admired Conte as a coach and tactician. So much more class than The Special Once with all his moaning and tin foil hat theories. Still have a special place in my soul for 'chelsea loathing', but it has become a little bit harder this season - especially with Terry barely playing and Fabricarse spending most of his time with said arse warming the bench. Costa, Hazard and Willian are the only dolls I still stick needles in nowadays.

 

Yep. I don't understand why, "He can only play one way", is supposed to be some sort of defence.
Doesn't that mean that he's extremely limited as a manager?

Getting a bunch of extremely good players to play well in a system that's pretty close to what they're used to isn't that hard, is it?
Doing well under difficult circumstances should gain more plaudits than that, in my opinion.
If he'd gone to Stoke after Pulis and made them play like Barca without signing anyone, then I'd be impressed.

 

It's no surprise the media are using "He can only play one way" as a defence, but here's the kernel of the argument: it's not a defence for Guardiola, it's a defence for them - after all, a certain other Manchester-based manager who the media worship to an unhealthy degree is just as guilty of imposing an inflexible set of tactics on teams which also requires heavy investment as he cannot adapt those tactics to the players they have at their disposal when they arrive.

What's ultimately stupid about this is that, at the same time, the media lambast Wenger for being just as inflexible with his set of tactics, while AVB is a punchline for not only being inflexible with his tactics but not even having the nous to recruit the right players for those tactics.

 

The hallmark of a superb coach is the ability to train players to adapt to different positions and different set ups. The fact that Poch has done so on a squad level, seamlessly identifying and transitioning from 4231 to 3421, as well as an individual level - with players such as Dier and Wimmer showing noteworthy versatility whenever called upon, is testament to his ability.

It boggles the mind to think what the likes of Poch and Koeman could do with the war chests regularly bestowed upon the likes of Mourinho and Guardiola.

 

Utd are unbeaten in 12 PL games since October - with only Chelsea taking more points from those games. Utd have conceded only 8 goals in that period - better than any team bar Chelsea. That period is almost a third of a season. Sounds like progress to me for a manager who's only been at the club for half a season. It doesn't mean Utd are going to win the league or even get top four, but it does show that Mourinho is getting results and with 17 games still left, I wouldn't be so sure a 5 point lead is safe when your team is capable of throwing a 3-1 lead at Bournemouth in the space of a few minutes. I'd be more interested in analysing a comment such as "Klopp has definitely not yet improved Liverpool's shaky defence."

 

They are 1 loss away from being joint points with 5th place and a loss and draw away from joint points with 6th