United (H) | PL | Post Match Thread

.db. said:
Taylor genuinely is an Altrincham fan. He went school with my mate who said he was an Alty fan back then. Another mate of mine played for Alty and Taylor used to always speak to him about Alty when he saw him. And another mate of mine’s missus is mates with Taylor’s missus. Straight up, he’s an Altrincham fan.

I don’t get this weird fixation our fanbase has with Taylor being a United fan. We never used to have the same fixation with Lee Mason who claimed to be a Bolton fan but had been known to attend United games when he was younger. In fact, I can’t remember anyone in our fanbase ever mentioning it.

Even if Taylor was a Rag (his kids are), what does it matter? He’s taken charge of a few derbies now and refereed them all very fairly.
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Until recently I worked with a good mate of his and he confirmed that Taylor has an Alty season ticket (although not in his own name). All his family are united fans though and based on what Mike Riley said to a Points of Blue meeting in 2012, that should in theory disqualify him from our (and their) games.

Talking of Mason (and there's lots of things I could say about him), I'd heard from people who'd worked with him when he was reffing in the NW Counties League that he was a regular visitor to the swamp, and may even have had a season ticket. But in the Q&A with Riley, he said Mason's brothers were Bolton season ticket holders so Mason couldn't do Bolton games. So how does that square with Taylor doing derbies?
 
Dribble said:
Sadly, I agree. Ole father time has caught up with Bernardo, & I think the end of this season is a fitting time for him to return home to Benfica. I can see City reviving their interest in Morgan Gibbs White as his homegrown successor.
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He has gradually become less and less influential unfortunately. Let's hope he has a nice swansong for the remainder of the season.
 
Forgive me for posting the rag but first few minutes of this is really good analysis. How we’ve changed how we play and why that made Donnarumma a fundamental signing. And of Haaland.

 
Dogtanian said:
After two games going missing in the 2nd half we decided to participate in one and blew the cunts away, still think we are in 2nd gear and can't wait for the dutchman to start playing like he did against Wolves, Haaland excellent, Foden excellent, Khusanov could be our right back answer and that's the best I've seen from Doku so far
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I was going a bit mad second half because we were letting them dictate the game. Maybe that was part of the plan but we should have the ability to hold onto the ball and slow the game down when we're 2 or 3 up. We were just giving the ball back to them too easily. Even a pile of shite like them might get lucky with that much possession.
 
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FogBlueInSanFran said:
Great post OB. TBF I was one of those who was concerned our tactical stubbornness, newness of personnel and rust would get us a draw today and that’s what I predicted. But . . . I was super-encouraged by EH’s pre-match bluntness about needing to play better which fired me up too. The whole team took putting a quality performance in an important match (for the fans especially) seriously, and their lap around the ground afterwards also showed how much they appreciated the home support (which was excellent to my eyes and ears from 5,500 miles away) despite a lot of our pre-match worry and disappointment with the two losses.

I don’t expect a win vs Arsenal but I wouldn’t even were we 4-0-0 with a GD of +16 — it’s a brutal fixture (I know Napoli is first). But the confidence lift in the players and how galvaniz(s)ed they were today gives me as a fan a ton of encouragement that we’ll put in an intense, entertaining performance whatever the outcome.
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The crowd was great at times and it was good to be in the stadium with that sort of atmosphere.

It’s a tough week and could influence the rest of the season but City are unquestionably in transition and it will take time. More personnel changes are needed before we can say the transition is over and we are back in a tweaking what we have got phase in the summer(s).

Confidence is very important. It was shattered last season and it is harder to (re)build than lose. This squad still has a lot of talent but a a lot of it is now unproven.

We just have to go step by step.
 
Father Paul said:
I thought Bernardo stuggled at times tbh. Seems to have slowed down a bit and was ponderous in forward positions. As usual he gave his all but I fear we have seen the best of this chap and he is yet another we face the difficult task of replacing.
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Particularly in the first half, he was receiving the ball and it was taken off him far too easily. The Bernardo of old would have twisted, turned and got out of trouble but he doesn't even seem to be able to do that now. He was better in the second half, when he seemed to have a freer role though, popping up all over the place.

He needs to be a 70 minute sub these days, coming on when we're holding onto a lead and sitting beside Rodri covering the defensive side.
 
mixed bag on and off the pitch.

Both sides could not pass to save their lives.

Crowd was quite at times, and noisy at others.

end of the day we won, should have been 4 or 5 and we also need to stop being sloppy

Have to say Rodri 1st half was awful, thought Doku, Haaland, Foden, Khushanov, o'Reilly all had terrific games.
 
Prestwich_Blue said:
Particularly in the first half, he was receiving the ball and it was taken off him far too easily. The Bernardo of old would have twisted, turned and got out of trouble but he doesn't even seem to be able to do that now. He was better in the second half, when he seemed to have a freer role though, popping up all over the place.

He needs to be a 70 minute sub these days, coming on when we're holding onto a lead and sitting beside Rodri covering the defensive side.
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Play Bernie like we did in the 2nd half and he wil be much more of use for us.
 
Citi-leaks said:
Exactly, the fact that he let the game flow without any stop start nonsense, gave City the opportunity to build up a momentum and all 3 goals came from quick, free flowing, open play.
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The annoyance for me with the ref was that their keeper was allowed to take all the time they wanted, yet as soon as we we were ahead he was whistling to donarumma to take his kicks quickly and went over to have a word with him.
Same thing used to happen to Ederson all the time, opposition keeper is allowed to waste time for 75mins but once we are in front eddie would get a yellow card issued for time wasting. Other than that he seemed to let the game flow well and waved away most of the free kick claims, probably fell for a couple of theirs near the corner of our box but it wasn't a bad performance.
 
alexmcity said:
The last 18 months? That's since March 2024: we won the last 9 games in 23/24, April and May, to win 4 in a row and got beaten in November (at Bournemouth). In that period, the 4 in a row aside, we broke the record for most consecutive unbeaten games in Europe.

Also, the main reason why we didn't dominate possession yesterday was our passing and midfield problems. It wasn't tactics. The more this team develops, the more it will resemble previous Pep teams in terms of midfield dominance and possession-based style.
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Good for you that you've enjoyed how we've been playing last season.

I haven't.
 
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