Yet that model worked so well for them during the Chelsky era. I suspect the post 2021 thing may be due to the quality of manager they nowadays can attract.
You can spend more but get less. Utd are showing that. It’s about making the correct decisions, Spurs haven’t done that since appointing Poch. Return to the norm? This is well below the norm.
In the last 10 years United have won 2 FA Cups, 2 League Cups, and the Europa League. They’re far from the dominant force they were under Fergie especially in the league, and have been a bit of a basket case, but that’s an excellent decade by most standards.
It's also quality of players. As last night amply demonstrated, they really aren't anything special anywhere on the pitch, and that was them at full-strength.
They will have to concoct the CDOs of "creative accounting" in order to get Chelsky era player transfer/wage money again.
I think there may be a feeling amongst the better players that England is not the place to be. It's far easier to win things in Spain, Germany and Italy because there are only three or four top clubs, rather than the 5 and three wannabes we have. So getting the very best players is harder.
Not when you notice that the four richest clubs win 80% plus of the Trophies in every league. Man Utd have remained in the top 3 richest over the decade so should have won 8 trophies. Arsenal and Liverpool have usually been 4th or 5th so 4 each would be about right for them.
Making the correct decisions is also heavily correlated to wealth though because better people who make better decisions cost more to hire. You don't know we are below norm until you see how we perform when not devastated by injuries.
I'm not sure. I was having a reminisce with friends about 'ballers from the 90s' and then comparing today's top players with them. Not even a sniff. Ronaldo and Messi are the dying embers of a bygone era in which footballers were unbelievably talented. Who is there today? I think the overall standard has dropped. Or levelled up. Different routes, same outcome.
They haven’t used that wealth well though, which is the point. Wealth doesn’t guarantee good decision making. Despite being a bit of a laughing stock, United have still managed to win as many trophies as Liverpool over the last decade. Granted Liverpool have won the league and the CL as part of their set, but that reflects them being much better ran than United. I think City and Chelsea have won more than those two over this arbitrary time period, but we’re talking about the elite here. We have seen Spurs become a much wealthier club in recent times but have won less and decision making as regards football seems to be haphazard.
And there's been more competition from vastly wealthy clubs. Utd, Liverpool and Arsenal had an advantage, then Chelsea and City jumped in. Imagine La Liga if someone surpassed the spending power of Real, Barca and Atletico. They've only had 18 clubs win anything ever as it is.
I’ve been saying this for about 18 months. The recent Balon d’Or was confirmation for me too. Nothing against Rodri and Vini Jr but there’s players who from just a few years ago would’ve stormed the award if they were still in their prime now. Vini won’t be half the player Neymar is/ was and Rodri wouldn’t get in the Spanish XI if he were playing in the era of Iniesta, Xavi, Xabi Alonso, Fabregas and Busquets.
Football has swung back to system over talent once more, as it does every 15-20 years The first warning sign this was coming was the ubermensch's treatment of Dele, due to his fundamentals being Championship level in some regards which was prioritised over his inexplicables often being Champions League level
Spurs haven’t been devastated by injuries for a little while now yet we’ve not seen any improvement in performance or results
The lack of Deki's running has not only affected our ability to penetrate defences, but serves to make our approach even more predictable as we run through the fundamentals we do in training dozens of times a day but, unless Maddison is in his uppers, there's nothing that can really flip the switch so we resemble a toy robot walking into a wall until its clockwork unspools
It is inconceivable that we can start a match with Maddison, Bergvall and Bentancur as our midfield and set up such that Solanke barely received a pass all game. The Winks-Sissoko pivot was more creative.
A timely observation, given the news today about KDB. There really aren't many players left who I'd put in the 'world class' bracket. Kane needs trophies to get it imo. Salah is probably the only one for his quality and sheer consistency. Most lists online have Haaland in the top 5 but tbh the guy doesn't hold a candle to the likes of R9 and Del Piero.
The issue there is Bergvall is the only one in his natural role, while Bentancur is cast as a 6 because Bissouma's unworkable (unusable?) at this point while Maddison is cast as an 8 That's why the whispers of Edin Terzic had a degree of promise as his midfield trio is a 6 and two 8s...who watch the ball sail over their heads for the majority of the game, albeit headed towards our front line not our penalty area
