Transfer Rumours Let's ignore the big ****ing elephant and blame the latest manager, again. Are we nearly there yet?

Tbh Sancho is a sideshow. The problem really is that there are too many sideshows within the club and have been for the best part of a decade.

There's something rotten at the heart of the club.

It's not the manager, but from the owners down to the recruitment to previous incumbents like Woodward. And inevitably down to the players. And Ten Hag has to overcome all of that.

Where's the belief or ambition in our players? I don't see it on the pitch. They play to win games not trophies, which is why there's no sense of accountability when they lose. And it's mirrored by some of the players' private lives.

There are two things which just aren't happening:-

1) Players understand the stature and standards and expectations of playing for Manchester United. (I'm beginning to wonder whether they even exist anymore, which is a disgrace in itself)

2) An absolute fear of God put into every player that they do not step out of line or do ANYTHING that would go against the standards of the club - in training, on the pitch and in their private lives - or they're out.

When Fergie came in he had to overcome a drinking culture and general piss-poor attitude towards training. The thing was, that was within a wider general culture in football at the time. Many were culled, including immensely talented players like McGrath.

Professional football has changed (Fergie was an architect of that) and yet Ten Hag has similar AND different problems to deal with, including a wider ethos where our focus appears to be on Revenue over Success. That means he not only has to deal with the players but the powers above.

He HAS to do it his way, or die trying. No compromise.

 

Just coming back to your second line here highlighted, as actually no, he didn't chose to do that..

What could and should have happened is Sancho stopped being late for training and started to work harder, especially after being given the time off to 'clear his head' last year.
He should have also been open to the idea of playing on the right sde of the attack (or absolutely anywhere on the pitch to be perfectly honest).

Ten Hag didn't choose to kick this off, Sancho has. Ten Hag did his part, he's been let down by a player, again.

 

Wan Bissaka confirmed out 'for a few weeks' having picked up an injury in last weekend's match

 

It sounds like Sancho has been a pain for a long time. That being the case, why wasn’t he sold in the summer? Only for ETH to complain in public few days after the window had closed. Either way, it was ETH’s decision to make decisively but he didn’t. This is why it is effectively a loss for the club because we simply never move fast enough on anything from a position of strength. Also, complaining about a player that was not on the pitch after losing a game in the manner that we did wasn’t the best of timing to make those comments. Add on top of that, Antony’s investigation was already in the mainstream.

We have made matters worse for ourselves with horrible timing. Now I’m hoping that Mount comes back quickly. Never thought I would say that lol

 

Oh goodness! Just never ends! What are they feeding these players?

 

Well basically because he was given that time off last season,ended it seemingly refreshed,and was expected to be ready go this season.

That didn't prove to be the case.

If it was apparent before the window closed then maybe they should have been touting him to Saudi, but by that time the Antony thing had upped its game so Sancho was needed.

And he still didn't step up!

All on Sancho this, not Ten Hag. It's not as simple as to just sell him. Someone has to want him first.

 

You do know we were entertaining offers for Sancho in the summer? It was widely reported.

 

Here you go...

https://www.tntsports.co.uk/footbal...mains-open-paper-round_sto9673953/story.shtml

There were plenty reporting this.

 

Bingo! How do we manage to have a team that no one else sees the value in most of our players. This is again part of that systemic problem at the club whereby talents are not adequately managed to fit in but still carry crazy salary.

In that article posted by Treble - 13 players for sale yet most of them are still kicking around today. Why?

Also, if we can’t sell them because of fkin stupid salaries, why is it so hard for us to get loan deals that will at least meet us in the middle instead of having a squad full of unhappy players and an unhappy manager? At least get some of the salaries paid by someone else given that’s what’s putting everyone off and eat the rest of the cost. But noooo! We play a stupid win-win game without being in a position of power to do so.

This to me points back to bad management across the club.

 

On behalf of the Glazers, Woodward destroyed the heart, heritage, history and soul of the club, he sold it to the Japanese whisky sellers, the Swiss watch makers, the Spanish wine producers, the official airline partners, the bog paper suppliers - he sold the beating heart of this once proud club to the highest bidder. That is where the problem lies. He transformed the club from an historic institution into a commercial venture, his sole aim was to buy success, and that is the legacy that we have to deal with today. Don't blame ETH, he has done/is doing a great job in driving up standards at the club and if that comes at the cost of on-field performances in the short term, I'm fine with that.

 

Yeh very much what I posted above.

For a while I believed that if we get the right manager in and the right players we can change the mentality.

Instead what I've realised is that the rot is so widespread and so high up that what actually happens is the reverse - the good players we bring in end up either being chewed up or losing their hunger as well as the standards they first had.

We won't be a serious force again until that changes.

 

Can't wait for us to play Bayern on Wednesday btw. I'm sure Kane will bag a few and the media morons will claim we should've bought him, like that's the problem. Which in case anyone hasn't worked it out, it isn't.

 

Kane is one player i really hoped we would never buy. The man is a clinical finisher but seems to drag the team down when building fast attacks and tends to run in 20mtr elipses in the first 3rd of the opposition half until someone gives him the ball.
Spurs are a lot more free flowing and attacking now without him and Bayern seem to have slowed down (i hope ).
Great individual player, not too sure how good he is for a team.

 

the change in Spurs is far more to do with the change of manager than the change of CF imo

 

I disagree on the assertion that ETH cannot be held responsible for where we are. The number one job of a manager of a large club is for such manager to be an agent of change. ETH actually acknowledges this by referencing the state of the culture before he joined. Granted, it will take far more than one season to get it right and injuries have been horrible. But we must still ask the question why so many of our players are out injured.

I’m going to keep this to only the things that I believe the manager has influence over. No point talking about the owners given that’s not going to change anytime soon.

Here some reasons why I think ETH needs to bare some responsibilities:
1/ The squad needed to be much smaller.
We have had three windows with ETH and the squad is now bigger. Shedding the fat is a now necessity. It is equally as important as buying players. But ETH has been given way too much latitude to bring in players without full plan on how to get the absolute best out of them.

Reducing the size of the squad should have been his number one priority when he came in.

2/ Questioning some of the signings
Antony is the one that I’ve questioned the most. We overpaid for him, period! I don’t mind him as a player but he is wasting the space on the right side because he doesn’t attack the gaps in the flank. This takes away at least 20% of production in creating goals from the right.

I also don’t think that Mount will add anything meaningful to the squad in terms of production. He didn’t manage a single assist throughout preseason and few games that he played before getting injured.

Malacia should not have been bought as we have young players that I think are equally as good.

3/ Overall attitude of the squad
This season has been poor in terms of attitude of players on the pitch. This is down the manager. And it’s been that way since preseason as well. Something is definitely off there. But when you think of the ancillary issues with unhappy players which can be linked to the squad, it makes sense that the players on the pitch are acting half depressed.

ETH will know that he needs to take responsibility for the on field events especially given how much he has spent. I believe in him given his record. But we need to get it together very soon as we know what can happen when bad things get worse with managers coming to this club.

 

I think Bruno is far to temperamental and hot-headed to be captain - I can see him reacting in the heat of the moment rather than letting things cool down, an attitude like that can quickly alienate players and their friends in the dressing room.

As for trimming the fat, of those players that we would have liked to have sold, we couldn't because of their ludicrous wage demands, a legacy of OGS and Woodward, so we are stuck with a bloated squad until those contracts run down - Maguire/West Ham a case in point and history tells us that a dressing room full of malcontents is a breeding ground for problems.

Had we been able to ship out the deadwood ETH may have had a better window, certainly Rice would have been attainable instead of Mount and as is becoming clear, had we been in a position to set aside funds for his wages next season, Kane would have joined us in 2024.

Hopefully our missing/walking wounded will return and we can hit some run of form. .

 

@glazerfodder I agree with you on many of those points. Bruno especially! The shoulder dropping scenes hunt me!

On Rice; there’s no way he’s worth £105m. So I’m glad we didn’t go for him. We need to be done with idiotic signings like that. If you sign a player for ridiculous amount that you can’t recoup because no one else will bid higher even in the future, it’s a vanity purchase. Similar to Grealish.

I’m actually not too concerned that we didn’t get Kane because I don’t see evidence that we have a system that will produce enough creativity to push the club higher. We need to first focus on fixing that midfield and use a younger striker in the process as it may take time. Consequently, I think Hojlund is a good fit. He doesn’t need to be an instant hit but with age on his side, he can get transformed with the team.

On the size of squad which is not helping; loan deals is what the club should be looking at. We got one for Greenwood so fast because the club really wanted to. It makes it more puzzling why we can agree loan deals to trim excess. Maguire not in the squad to play is a huge salary that someone else could have been paying half of, as an example.

Ultimately, it may take six more windows to unwind the mess but also in that time we also can’t have excuses for not competing given the players that we’ve brought in.

 

What an amazing and refreshing interview by Ole - https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/66865014

Essentially touched on all the points.

 

Fck I'm reading all those essays you two have posted ( n that includes Ole's bollox)

 

Why are you even on a forum if you can’t take 1 minute to read? Don’t you worry, we’ll stick to 140 characters next time.