United Thread 2015/16

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Martial was pretty good, end product wasn't there but whose was? I can see why people rate him although he isn't the second coming. My united mate told me Darmian was world class yesterday so I was a bit surprised that the odds and jobs man, Valencia was at right back. But I guess he was being delusional.
 
Based on the games I've seen of them, and today, they are going to draw a lot of blanks this season and it's going to prevent them being serious challengers. We clearly attacked poorly and missed passes, but they genuinely offer very little threat at all and it wasn't even clear how they intended to score until they brought on the big lump and started playing for knock downs. I can't remember a team threaten us so little this season
Drop Rooney and they'll be more of a threat. Will the club have the balls though?
 
Martial was pretty good, end product wasn't there but whose was? I can see why people rate him although he isn't the second coming. My united mate told me Darmian was world class yesterday so I was a bit surprised that the odds and jobs man, Valencia was at right back. But I guess he was being delusional.

Darmian has gone from being the best right back in the league to being the 2nd best right back at a club with only one right back.
 
Drop Rooney and they'll be more of a threat. Will the club have the balls though?
It's not just that Rooney is shit though, it's that they don't seem to have any plan of attack or play with any real intensity. I know we are often guilty of passing it around midfield too slowly, but they do it constantly and never actually step up the tempo. I don't remember Mata or Herrera actually doing anything, it wasn't as if they were trying things and failing, they literally weren't doing anything except keeping the ball, same for pretty much their entire team except Martial. Tactical Turtle has clearly told them to not take any chances with the ball and as a result they never seem to even attempt to create chances
 
It's not just that Rooney is shit though, it's that they don't seem to have any plan of attack or play with any real intensity. I know we are often guilty of passing it around midfield too slowly, but they do it constantly and never actually step up the tempo. I don't remember Mata or Herrera actually doing anything, it wasn't as if they were trying things and failing, they literally weren't doing anything except keeping the ball, same for pretty much their entire team except Martial. Tactical Turtle has clearly told them to not take any chances with the ball and as a result they never seem to even attempt to create chances

You're bang on there I reckon. United huffed and puffed but it was more stifling play than creative.
 
Tight game but I thought we had the edge despite virtually playing with 10 men (Rooney). It felt like the first leg of a CL knockout tie. Don't understand Pellegrini moaning afterwards that it's easy to play a tactical game and it's not what we he likes. He decided to start with Fernando and Fernandinho then hooked a visibly unhappy Yaya, who has been a thorn in our sides in this fixture, for Martin Demichelis.
 
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Tight game but I thought we had the edge despite virtually playing with 10 men (Rooney). It felt like the first leg of a CL knockout tie. Don't understand Pellegrini moaning afterwards that it's easy to play a tactical game and it's not what we he likes. He decided to start with Fernando and Fernandinho then hooked a visibly unhappy Yaya, who has been a thorn in our sides in this fixture, for Martin Demichelis.

You had the edge only in the sense that your 1 shot on target was a harder save for our GK, tho it was only a pea roller. 1st half we had the better of things and 2nd you did. You didn't even have a shot - a shot, not talking about a shot on target, just a shot - until Herrera in the 2nd half.

And I think we had the best chance of the game when Yaya fluffed his lines in the 1st half. Most of the time he sinks that in the bottom corner

Pellegrini says it's easy to play defensively with top players and just nick games on the break. You reduce risk and let the quality of the players grab a goal. There's logic there, that's why Mourinho does it.
You brought on the longball specialist, he did the right thing in putting someone on to man mark him when the ball is in the air.

Both teams played defensivle today. Utd did it by trying to keep the ball whilst showing no ambition and we did it without the ball. I'm glad because without Silva and/or Nasri we aren't really setup for 60-70% ball possession against higher position teams away
 
It's not just that Rooney is shit though, it's that they don't seem to have any plan of attack or play with any real intensity. I know we are often guilty of passing it around midfield too slowly, but they do it constantly and never actually step up the tempo. I don't remember Mata or Herrera actually doing anything, it wasn't as if they were trying things and failing, they literally weren't doing anything except keeping the ball, same for pretty much their entire team except Martial. Tactical Turtle has clearly told them to not take any chances with the ball and as a result they never seem to even attempt to create chances

Well that's it. They try to bore you to death then score in the last few minutes when the goalkeeper has lost concentration.
 
Not one fucking song from them all game, half and half scarves everywhere, just a fucked up club that has become a tourists dayout,they are on a par with Alton Towers or Blackpool pleasure beach, fuckin laughable.
 
Rojo played well - did a good job on De Bruyne. Also thought Martial was dangerous and there only threat in the final third.

Rooney and Schweinsteiger were awful. Rooney in particular seems to be attracting a lot of criticism for his performances and LVG is reportedly fed up with the media asking questions about him.

I can't see Utd challenging for the title. I can see them dropping a lot of points at home as its relatively easy to defend against them. Stop Martial and you stop Utd, they have nothing else. We didn't see Depay, but LVG seems to have lost faith in him.

I thought they'd beat us. They were at full strength. They should have been confident after a good win at Everton and they were at home. It was a set piece game for them where a win would have seen them go top, and they struggled to break us down.

It was a bore draw in the end, in part due to City's approach, but only in part. If Utd are genuine title contenders they should have been able to break us down. They did so very very rarely. If Utd had adopted similar tactics at City, I'm confident Silva, Nasri, KDB, Sterling, Aguero etc would have produced more over 90 minutes.

Their defence was good. Their defensive midfield was good. Their attack and creativity was almost wholly absent and relied entirely on Martial. If they really are going to be safety first and rely on the flair of one player to win games, then they might as well play him centrally down the middle although I think he is better for the moment coming off the wing.
 
Rug Rag reckons Smalling is one of the top 3 centre halves in the world.

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Rojo played well - did a good job on De Bruyne. Also thought Martial was dangerous and there only threat in the final third.

Rooney and Schweinsteiger were awful. Rooney in particular seems to be attracting a lot of criticism for his performances and LVG is reportedly fed up with the media asking questions about him.

I can't see Utd challenging for the title. I can see them dropping a lot of points at home as its relatively easy to defend against them. Stop Martial and you stop Utd, they have nothing else. We didn't see Depay, but LVG seems to have lost faith in him.

I thought they'd beat us. They were at full strength. They should have been confident after a good win at Everton and they were at home. It was a set piece game for them where a win would have seen them go top, and they struggled to break us down.

It was a bore draw in the end, in part due to City's approach, but only in part. If Utd are genuine title contenders they should have been able to break us down. They did so very very rarely. If Utd had adopted similar tactics at City, I'm confident Silva, Nasri, KDB, Sterling, Aguero etc would have produced more over 90 minutes.

Their defence was good. Their defensive midfield was good. Their attack and creativity was almost wholly absent and relied entirely on Martial. If they really are going to be safety first and rely on the flair of one player to win games, then they might as well play him centrally down the middle although I think he is better for the moment coming off the wing.

Plenty of talk on Red Cafe about Rooney and what it will take to drop him. To be honest, I think the huge contract he has coupled with having the captaincy AND being England captain makes him pretty much undroppable and I actually think van Gaal's hands are tied on this issue. It's astonishing how much he (Rooney) has regressed though - even though he's not been doing it for England for ages his form for United has tended to be very good down the years. He nearly always turned up in derbies even if the rest of them didn't but yesterday I saw for myself just how poor he is these days. I think this has gone on too long for it to be simply a case of him being out of form and this is the full throes of a natural decline in his game.

I was surprised to see how much weight Schweinsteiger was carrying yesterday - he looked like a fatter Luke Shaw! Martial as you say is their one real bright spark in attack and perhaps you could add Lingard to that. Can't deny that they're well organised though and they're difficult to break down. As such, I can't see them losing too many games but I feel their lack of attacking options coupled with a safety-first approach will see them draw too many games and as we know, too many draws can scupper a title challenge.
 
It's funny because I think old Whiskey Nose knew that Rooney was finished and deliberately tried to get rid of him so Moyes could build a new team. But they Wee Davey, who has always had a hard on for Rooney, wanted him to stay.

Definitely seemed that way. I think he'd finally had enough of him and wanted him out. He was usually a pretty good judge of when to get rid of someone too, Beckham for example.
 
Definitely seemed that way. I think he'd finally had enough of him and wanted him out. He was usually a pretty good judge of when to get rid of someone too, Beckham for example.

The thing with Rooney is I can't decide whether he is the worst good player ever or the best bad player.

You look at his stats which are phenomenal for both club and country but there is a huge question mark over his ability to handle the pressure and be the main man.

England have depended on him for years and have never been better than shite. Where as at United he has scored the goals but for long parts of his career been in the shadow of players like Van Nistelrooy, Ronaldo and even Van Persie.

The elite players like Messi, Ronaldo, Suarez, Ibrahimovic and Kun can handle the pressure and lead their team. I've never seen that from Rooney.
 
Rooney has possibly been undroppable due to merchandise sales/sponsors a la Brazil and Ronaldo at the World Cup.

He is the face of united to most of the world outside UK.

So that's good for the bank balance, but crap for their footie.
 
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I think your last sentence has nailed it there. Burnt out. He's club captain isn't he? In my opinion I think rooney burnt his bridges with you lot after the transfer request malarkey. It's hard to get fans back onside when that happens. I dont think van gaal is the type that will listen to fans. You're stuck with him.

van gaal will ditch rooney in the next few games he doesn't care who he upsets and imho, unfortunately, the rags will be better without him
 
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