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

Probably City bound though, Rodri's replacement I would imagine.

 

That sucks! We need a new playmaker.

 

Is it just me or has Mainoo gone backwards since his breakout season, for me he is MIA in many matches I've watched so far this season, he definitely isn't having the same impact on games. Interesting to read today that he and Garnacho are both struggling to agree new contracts, perhaps under the new man's system their future lies elsewhere and both would bring in shed loads of cash for replacements..

 

The current squad;

Onana - keep
Bayindir - get rid
Dalot - bin
Malacia - bin
Shaw - bin
Lindelof - bin
Mazaroui- keep
Yoro - keep
Maguire - keep
De Ligt - keep
Martinez - get rid
Mount- bin
Eriksen - get rid
Casemiro - get rid
Mainoo - keep
Ugarte - keep
Fernandes - keep (just)
Rashford- bin
Zirkzee- bin
Garnacho- keep
Amad - keep
Antony - keep (just)
Hojlund - keep

Out of the 23 man senior squad, 11 need chucking in the bin and two just about stay in.

 

Who hasn’t gone backward in that team?

 

“Manchester Unitedwill try to sign Sweden striker Viktor Gyokeres, 26, from Sporting this month in a bid to save their season, but a deal is expected to cost £80m.”

I really hope this is not true. It would be an absolute misappropriation of funds.

 

It was utter fkn madness hiring Amorim mid-way through the season, particularly as he plays such a different system from that which the players have been used to under ETH and previous managers. Far better to have kept faith with ETH (let's face it - it couldn't be any worse), then bring in Amorim at the end of the season giving him a summer window and a full pre-season to coach the players in his methods. To imagine that the team could seamlessly change their style of play in mid season was either ineptitude or naivety as all he has achieved so far is to confuse everyone, particularly the likes of Garnacho, one of the few shining lights of the season so far.

 

I have to agree with that. Especially if Amorim had indicated that his minded system is the only way without knowing if it can be implemented with the players in the squad. Then that would be a sign of ineptitude at the higher up management layer.

 

It's quite funny that with the benefit of hindsight people now saying we should keep Ten Hag until the seasons end (well, duh!) when you all wanted him sacked.

What did you expect to happen? Do you honestly think there's a manager out there with an actual magic wand who can make half these players decent? Really?

Well guess what, there isn't.

Completely agree they should have waited till the end of the season, said it all along, but they didn't and they have at least gone for a man with an actual plan, even if it is six months too soon.

Ruud not looking so great either, eh! Nor would Southgate.

 

I don’t agree with the part of keeping ETH. I think what they got wrong is not factoring in “how” the new manager would setup the team and ask if there’s dynamism to the intended system to accommodate the players. And if you remember, I was originally concerned with the 3-4-3 system in the premier league.

I saw Newcastle play a different system today to contain Spurs as an example. Dynamism is the only way to survive in this league and Amorim has yet to display that.

There really wasn’t a bad time to get rid of ETH. He was not coaching the players and has wasted so much funds and talents.

 

It'll be a long process to erase the previous recruitment and management choices.

Although Ineos are not covering themselves in glory, they can't be held accountable completely for the Glazer/Woodward era, they need to be erasing that.

Which is what they are doing.

Ashworth wanted to stick with a dull 4 2 3 1 formation that has (not) held us in such good stead for ages since Fergie, and wanted Southgate to implement that.

The board decided otherwise and got rid of him, and then went for Amorim instead.
Personally, I can see why, and am prepared to wait until this all fits into place. It'll take a while!

Completely agree that last summer was wasted in a recruitment perspective as the players were bought for ten Hag, but at least Yoro and Mazaroui look good enough to be able to play in any formation. I'd say Ugarte probably too.

Amorim is not The Great Suprendo, he can't fix this in a matter of weeks and we're going to be up and down for the remainder of the season while he tries to make other manager's players work.
That some can't see that is truly staggering.

We'll finish top eight at best, so we need to consolidate and try to win a cup competition.

 

It’s interesting that after the Liverpool match, the focus has shifted again to why the team has not performed consistently at that level. Same team that beat City at Etihad - off course that’s no longer a novel achievement, but at the time, it was unexpected.

I have to believe Amorim’s system is more suited to big teams that need to play to win. The setup flourishes when the midfield is not crowded. But so far, it has struggled against teams that are setup to be defensive and depend on counter breaks. This is where dynamism is required in the way Amorim sets up the team to accommodate both defensive and attack oriented teams. More importantly, the results against City and Liverpool demonstrate there is enough talent in the squad to win 3 in five games.

 

It could be that, but then I'd say that neither Newcastle or Bournemouth are especially defensive, we were just very poor all round against them.

Yesterday appeared to me that players were understanding and responding to how Amorim wants to play.

Significantly, the midfield three from yesterday didn't start against Newcastle, who Amorim had clearly underestimated by playing both Casemiro and Eriksen, neither of whom can be described as dynamic.

Mainoo and Ugarte resolved that yesterday, and Bruno also had a very good game.

As he works with them more, then his ideas will come to fruition even more. Or at least should.

Based on yesterday, we can beat Arsenal in the Cup. Arsenal aren't as good as Liverpool.

It's then a run of more manageable league and EL games to build some momentum. He needs to stick with this team though, not throw older less able players in.

 

Can’t argue with that observation. Eriksen should never start games for us. And possibly nor should Casemiro over the younger and more agile players. So yes, Mainoo and Ugarte should be the preferred option and less tinkering. Bruno, Mainoo and Ugarte in the midfield. Where I see gap is on that left hand side which Dalot won’t solve yet he did very well yesterday down that flank which exposed Trent.

 

In fairness Bruno and Ugarte were both suspended for the game against us and that was always likely to have a massive bearing on it. Our midfield trio are bang in form at the moment but it would have been a good contest with first team XI's.

(I'd agree we aren't particularly defensive, we seems to vary tactics quite a bit. Not sure if you saw the Arsenal game but we played three very different systems in the space of the game and all were done well).

Anyway I came over because I saw the media comments about Mainoo. Hope he stays with you guys, whatever PSR was meant to be about the current trend of selling homegrown players to free up money to buy others is the exact opposite of what I want to see in football (for any team). Pains me to see Elliot Anderson (who was born in the village I'm from) be sold off to Forest in the Summer just at the point he was ready to start playing regularly for us - nice that he's doing well now though ofc. Once teams like Man Utd are apparently selling homegrown players to meet PSR it seems to me the system isn't producing the outcomes people wanted. Hopefully it's just media nonsense.

Final point, view on Eddie Howe? If I were Man Utd that's who I would have gone for but I'm biased of course. When he got the job with us the talk afterwards was that he was the only candidate who didn't talk about who he would bring in to turn the club around and instead came in with a dossier on each squad member outlining the training methods and tactics he could use to get more out of the people who were already there. 5 or 6 of the players who we beat Arsenal with the other night were at the club when he joined. I think Amorim will do well given time, I'm just surprised Howe wasn't even in the conversation (interesting you mentioned Bournemouth as Iraola is the other one I'd have thought would work well).

 

No! At the end of November, he was just as bad as ETH but he flew under the radar. At United, the pressure would have been immense and there would have been no where to hide. There are a lot of great managers around. But how they respond to pressure is why most of them don’t bother to go for the top jobs.

 

I would take those media comments about Mainoo with pinch of salt and contempt they deserve, it's all just click bait and a continued onward rolling effort by British media to undermine anything we do.

Mainoo is going nowhere, and nor is Amorim. Amad has also just signed.

As for Howe, weren't your own fan base dissatisfied with him not long back?

Certainly one or two of your cretin posters on here were saying he's not up to speed.

That's what happens when you support your manager though, things start to fall into place as none of them are magicians capable of turning things round in weeks, they all need time to put together a plan/assess players.

I wouldn't have seen him as a candidate really, he had a job.
But I'd have had him over Southgate any day, that was a scary period and I'm glad we binned Ashworth as a result.

 

Let’s get real! I doubt that starting the season with Southgate would have resulted in winning only 6 out of 20 games.

 

Really? Same players, so why do you doubt that?

Anyway, I don't really care, the bloke is an utter loser and a complete myth. We dodged a bullet, his idea of football is dogshit.

If you can't see that, then I don't know what you're watching, sorry.

 

I just don’t see how we can somehow suggest we dodged a bullet in our predicament. We are effectively in the middle of a nuclear war.

I also don’t think it’s the players. Hell! We’ve bought so many in the last few years alone. It’s always been the setup and lack of coherence as a team. The players also got worse because they were not trained, not held accountable, and rarely setup to win.