Ratings.

My ratings:

Forster 3
Clyne 7
Fonte 5
Yoshida 6
Bertrand 7
Davis 7
Wanyama 7
Mane 4
Tadic 6
Long 5
Pelle 7

 

My ratings:
Forster 4
Clyne 7
Fonte 6
Yoshida 7
Bertrand 7
Davis 7
Wanyama 8 (MOTM)
Mane 4
Tadic 6
Long 6
Pelle 7

 

It wasn't a comment, it was a question. Thanks for the feedback anyway.

 

Will you upgrade your ratings if we beat Burnley 0 - 3?

It's my observation that there's some extremely fickle fans in this board, who are unable to see the bigger picture and instead simply react from game to game.

 

Surely the point of being a fan is that you react game to game, there would certinaly be no point to this forum if we didn't. What do you mean by being unable to see the bigger picture?

 

What an absolute joke.



Bertrand is a brilliant player who had his performance last night hindered by Mané, the winger often occupied the space that the WB looks to exploit and didn't release Bertrand anywhere near frequently enough on the few occasions he drifted inside and let Ryan overlap.

Mané had an awful game, lost the ball consistently and misplaced even the simplest of passes. I'd love to see his pass completion percentage from last night.

I do actually rate Mané but it's a sign of how badly we are struggling with injuries atm that a player performing as poorly as he did, plays the whole 90 minutes.

 

100% agree. Mane was shocking last night and has been well below par for the last few games.

 

I think our results have almost put the players beyond criticism...we play so well as a team, but Mane hasn't stepped up recently. I'm not saying he isn't trying, but he is far too wayward. He looked exciting with his speed and ability to unsettle the opposition in his first few games, but he hasn't improved. I can see him being bench fodder soon.

 

Mané, Long and Pellè had the three worst pass completion percentages of the team last night with 69.2%, 61.5% and 59.1% respectively.

Tadic on the other hand was our most successful passer with 92.9% passes completed.

United were giving us the time and space to pick a pass and three of our attacking four didn't do it successfully enough.

We were the masters of our own downfall last night, that game was there for the taking and we didn't capitalise on our opportunities.

Manchester United were clinical but that's what spending £100m+ on your attacking line-up gets you.

 

It wasn't directed just at you, more of a general observation. Anyway, Forster has had more good games than bad, and Mane has also played well. I think Long has impressed about as much as we all expected, not sure anyone thought his price tag was reasonable. But 30 million for three players isnt a lot when you consider we were only beaten and displaced in the League by an incredibly expensive team. My point is react from game to game, but remember it's only a momentary blip. Forster will impress again like he did against Arsenal, Long like he did against Leicester and Mane like he's also done.

 

Mane has plenty of potential, should he start to get the final ball decision right more often he could be lethal, I don't like his habit of diving and that stupid tackle late on is something else that has to be removed from his game, reds have been dished out for less.

 

Well eventually he will become better, I always believe players can improve at Southampton

 

Agree, Forster is more likely to improve than Boruc.

Much rather have Fraser.

 

Mane pressed all game hard and was a threat. All 3 players behind Pelle did great to press like they did and were the main reason we were on top for 90 minutes. But they were wasteful. I think it's a bit harsh rating them low seeing as they caused a lot of the pressure themselves. The midfield played well as a unit. Marking any of them under 6 is a joke.

Bertrand got given tons of space to run into and kept passing it to Mane who had a man tightly marking him. Despite all the space Bertrand was given he did next to nothing. I hope you realise Mane playing there would have been the game plan. What you are doing is disagreeing with the manager, not the player, when you refer to positioning like that. Then again perhaps Bertrand was instructed by the manager to force it to Mane early. That's why player ratings can be complicated.

Passing accuracy stats for the attackers last night is irrelevant. United parked the bus and we had no room to play. A lot of the passes they played were bound to be incomplete but worth the risk of playing. I suppose it boils down to certain people hate the players giving the ball away at any time. I don't mind the players looking for the kill passes constantly when we are on top.

 

Wanyama definitely MOTM for me, best game I've seen him play; he was very aware of the trigger of Rooney drooping deep and his ability on the ball has improved tremendously. Davis also very impressive, and I thought Tadic's movement in the 1st half to create room for himself against Carrick was clever, although he struggled more when Carrick dropped to CB as Carrick read his play.

Personal gripe for me is Mané, I'm not a fan of players drawing the opponent in to cause a foul, I feel it slows play down too much, however that might just be me and others might see it as clever play? As a direct runner he's a nightmare for defenders and I feel on the shoulder of the full back is where he best operates.

 

Mane was brilliant in his first four games or so, not sure what's happened. He played better than he did against Arsenal, though. Who was it who said he was better than Neymar?!

 

He fell over. It wasn't a tackle.

 

I agree. If anyone was watching my stream, the commentator and LeSaux were raving about the impact of Mane's pressing and direct running first half. They felt he set the whole tone of the match. In the second half I thought he needed to come off as he looked knackered and everything went wrong for him. He didn't get everything right, but he sure as he'll worked for the team.

 

If anyone wants to sit through 90 minutes and watch it again [ ], so they can have a reappraisal, they can do so here:

http://www.footballorgin.com/2014/12/southampton-v-manchester-united-premier.html

 

I couldn't really tell to be honest and have not seen any replays yet, best give him and the referee the benefit of the doubt then? Mane seems to slip and tumble rather a lot, the problem could be his choice of footwear?