The Official Manchester United Thread

[Fresh]

But we wont fall off for a quarter century Like Liverpool, or for half century like Spurs.

[Yoshie]

http://www.reddit.com/r/soccer/comments/2enupi/who_is_to_blame_for_manchester_uniteds_problems/ck1ef6t

 

Deep breath. If you want a far more accurate explanation, read on. Kambei's post, whilst articulate, got nowhere close to explaining "who is to blame for Man Utd's decline".

The arguments in that post i've heard said before a hundred times over. While i'm not at all saying the Glazers have been good for the club, it's simplistic, emotional and feckless to just blame this faceless and nameless entity "the board" for all of our troubles like little kids pointing fingers at the bad men in suits. The board have barely anything to do with the analysis of the playing staff; they deal with sponsorships and accounting, not 4-4-2 v 5-3-2, and by all accounts revenue growth has been huge. They've been doing their job over the years (if we leave last summer out of it). So who hasn't? Prepare for a criticism no United fan likes the unpalatable truth of.

You can say we "lacked planning" all you want, but it's a naive statement to make. When Fergie was last in charge we'd bought Jones, Smalling, Powell, Zaha, Rafel, Fabio and De Gea for the future, with others like Welbeck and Cleverley coming from the youth system. In addition, players such as Anderson and Nani were seen as ones for the future and they're both still relatively young now. All for significant fees.

We won the league 1 year and a few months ago with virtually the same squad minus those defenders (which many were starting to criticise as past it, despite the revisionism now), but all the attackers even look like they've lost their mojo. What's changed is Ferguson.

He got the most out of a group of players, that in his eyes were good enough to carry the club forward. Since he's left that's turned out to be a bad misjudgement. Does anyone seriously think in their right mind that a man that gave more than 2 decades of his life to building up a football club wanted to leave it a crumbling ruin as soon as he left? Of course he didn't. He left what he thought was a squad somebody else could take and build on. Signing the players he did, and not signing the players he did, were his decisions, based on his principles, not "the suits".

What's happening now is the inevitable result of a club run for 25 years according to one mans vision, who's final years saw a refusal to modernise, suddenly handed over to a brand new set of people that are now rushing to identify exactly where it's gone wrong. To blame "the board" ignores the reality.

For one reason or another, Fergie got it wrong with virtually all the players he thought would now be good enough to be settled in the first team; and without his guidance it's all fallen apart. His decision making towards the end of his career got noticeably worse. Look at his hand in the appointment of Moyes. Everton under Moyes were one of those teams you'd switch over match of the day for, dull and boring; he was so clearly not the man to lead Man Utd forward either on the pitch or off it.

Fergies absence combined with Moyes's shattering of the superiority complex he had built up over decades not only stopped those players from punching above their weight class, but now means they're actually punching below it. That's the reason behind the huge drop in playing standard.

So why did the recruitment go so horribly wrong? Everybody mentions 2008 as the last time we had a truly great squad. Coincidentally the year that Carlos Queiroz left the coaching staff, the man who was instrumental in bringing Ronaldo to the attention of Utd. His judgement on transfers hasn't since been replaced, and Uniteds transfer decisions and scouting of youngsters hasn't been the same ever since. But that's not the only reason, and probably not the most significant.

I don't believe for a second that the money wasn't there for Ferguson. He repeatedly said whenever he asked for money from the Glazers it was given to him, and we spent significant sums the whole time he was in charge. How could "the board", who aren't football experts but simply accountants and middle managers, possibly know that it would go this badly wrong as soon as Fergie left? They listened to him on football matters. So why did he refuse to spend big, like we now know was necessary?

The later years of his career coincided with the huge, rapid inflation of player prices fuelled by clubs like City and Chelsea, spunking massive sums all in one go, and at that stage of his life and career he either couldn't or refused to to adapt to the changing market conditions. It all happened so fast. But his sheer managerial genius and imposing legacy meant he carried the success of the club on regardless. His influence at the club was all encompassing, and to a large extent the board were subject to his decision making - and while he was successful on the pitch, they were never going to challenge it.

Of course the year Ferguson left, so did David Gill. So with the heart of our coaching staff and transfer team ripped out, we've been left with a broken squad full of imbalances, that Moyes made significantly worse with panicky decisions; spending £65m on players we didn't need whilst handing lucrative contracts to others.

So it's not a lack of planning or investment by the board, it's the planning from the footballing management that has gone horribly wrong. That's down in part to Ferguson, in part to the coaching staff (or lack of) in charge of identifying transfers, and partly down to the unavoidable uncertainty of chance; you can't know 100% of the time in football who's going to turn out great, and who's going to flop.

The situation now is a highly methodical manager with an entrenched vision has had to come in, assess the squad, realise it's fucked, and informed the board in no uncertain terms that huge money needs to be spent. It's not lightly that Van Gaal says he's been brought in for his "philosophy", because we need a whole new one to succeed Ferguson, something that he failed to adequately put in place.

Moyes didn't want to pull the earth up nearly as much, because it would have reflected terribly on him having been handed to reigns to Fergies champions. It would basically have been an admission that he hasn't got the same level of managerial ability as Ferguson, or a rebuke to his methods. He was never going to do that, being the character he is. Moyes, whilst the wrong man from the start anyway, took a bullet for the next manager coming in.

So now we find ourselves in a position where we're having to break the (hugely inflated as it is) British transfer record to sign world class talent, because we've only now discovered another "class of 92" isn't about to happen, and the players that were bought for the future have never fulfilled or will fulfil the promise they were showing under Fergie.

It's a combination of losing one of the biggest man managerial geniuses of all time, one of the longest serving managers of all time, in a period when market conditions changed so fast he couldn't keep up. This is a man that broke the transfer record for Keane at a sum of £3.75m. By the end of his career, clubs wanted £30m+ for players like Hazard and Lucas Moura, who whilst could have been the new Ronaldo, could easily have turned out the new Obertan. His reluctance to spend huge sums on young players untried in the premiership was his pragmatic decision. His much maligned line - "there is no value in the market" reflected his reluctance to accept the reality of the new top level; despite his previously partial attitude to a big transfer (Ferdinand, Veron) he simply stubbornly refused to compete.

What were the board/upper management supposed to do? Force players onto the most successful manager the club had ever had, that was winning titles up until he left? The money was always there, the planning was always there. It's just that the planning, directed by Ferguson, turned out to be not good enough, as even the best plans sometimes do. Now we're forced into playing catchup.

To blame "the board" like Kambei did and is apparently getting so much credit for, is ludicrous. Does anyone with a straight face genuinely think that a group of successful businessmen managing a billion dollar plus asset penny pinched and held the purse strings for seasons on end, and then this year suddenly went forest gump and said "oh, shit" and decided to start spunking money everywhere, spending near enough the Ronaldo money on one player? Of course not. That makes zero sense.

If at any point Ferguson had said "not spending x amount of money on x players is costing me the ability to compete" they would have recognised the inevitable devaluation of their asset, and spent the money exactly like they are doing now. Ferguson never did that, and he won right up until the end, his way. They had no reason to doubt his methodology.

He ruled with an iron fist, the clubs player recruitment were solely at the behest of his policy, grounded in decades gone by. The director of football and player recruitment structure in place at City and Chelsea has clearly shown to be superior in recent years, and the reason we've been left behind is a direct result of his authoritarianism, his methods becoming outdated.

Now post Ferguson's genius the decline of the squad has manifested, and they are attempting to rectify it by backing a world class manager with the money he needs, quite clearly. That's the reality. Throwing a paddy about the board and the glazers ignores it.

Edit: I'm pretty sure Mark Ogden has been browing r/soccer for ideas. The snake!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/manchester-united/11058490/Manchester-United-turmoil-is-partly-down-to-Sir-Alex-Ferguson-and-the-clubs-transfer-policy.html

 

Strong post.

We're definitely playing 'catch up' and there's a scent of desperation in our transfers.

[Yoshie]

@MailSport: Angel di Maria tells fans he'd rather have stayed at Real Madrid than move to Man United http://t.co/OODRfNXfyD

 

Idiot.

[Flojo]

http://www.reddit.com/r/soccer/comments/2enupi/who_is_to_blame_for_manchester_uniteds_problems/ck1ef6t

 

 

Deep breath. If you want a far more accurate explanation, read on. Kambei's post, whilst articulate, got nowhere close to explaining "who is to blame for Man Utd's decline".

The arguments in that post i've heard said before a hundred times over. While i'm not at all saying the Glazers have been good for the club, it's simplistic, emotional and feckless to just blame this faceless and nameless entity "the board" for all of our troubles like little kids pointing fingers at the bad men in suits. The board have barely anything to do with the analysis of the playing staff; they deal with sponsorships and accounting, not 4-4-2 v 5-3-2, and by all accounts revenue growth has been huge. They've been doing their job over the years (if we leave last summer out of it). So who hasn't? Prepare for a criticism no United fan likes the unpalatable truth of.

You can say we "lacked planning" all you want, but it's a naive statement to make. When Fergie was last in charge we'd bought Jones, Smalling, Powell, Zaha, Rafel, Fabio and De Gea for the future, with others like Welbeck and Cleverley coming from the youth system. In addition, players such as Anderson and Nani were seen as ones for the future and they're both still relatively young now. All for significant fees.

We won the league 1 year and a few months ago with virtually the same squad minus those defenders (which many were starting to criticise as past it, despite the revisionism now), but all the attackers even look like they've lost their mojo. What's changed is Ferguson.

He got the most out of a group of players, that in his eyes were good enough to carry the club forward. Since he's left that's turned out to be a bad misjudgement. Does anyone seriously think in their right mind that a man that gave more than 2 decades of his life to building up a football club wanted to leave it a crumbling ruin as soon as he left? Of course he didn't. He left what he thought was a squad somebody else could take and build on. Signing the players he did, and not signing the players he did, were his decisions, based on his principles, not "the suits".

What's happening now is the inevitable result of a club run for 25 years according to one mans vision, who's final years saw a refusal to modernise, suddenly handed over to a brand new set of people that are now rushing to identify exactly where it's gone wrong. To blame "the board" ignores the reality.

For one reason or another, Fergie got it wrong with virtually all the players he thought would now be good enough to be settled in the first team; and without his guidance it's all fallen apart. His decision making towards the end of his career got noticeably worse. Look at his hand in the appointment of Moyes. Everton under Moyes were one of those teams you'd switch over match of the day for, dull and boring; he was so clearly not the man to lead Man Utd forward either on the pitch or off it.

Fergies absence combined with Moyes's shattering of the superiority complex he had built up over decades not only stopped those players from punching above their weight class, but now means they're actually punching below it. That's the reason behind the huge drop in playing standard.

So why did the recruitment go so horribly wrong? Everybody mentions 2008 as the last time we had a truly great squad. Coincidentally the year that Carlos Queiroz left the coaching staff, the man who was instrumental in bringing Ronaldo to the attention of Utd. His judgement on transfers hasn't since been replaced, and Uniteds transfer decisions and scouting of youngsters hasn't been the same ever since. But that's not the only reason, and probably not the most significant.

I don't believe for a second that the money wasn't there for Ferguson. He repeatedly said whenever he asked for money from the Glazers it was given to him, and we spent significant sums the whole time he was in charge. How could "the board", who aren't football experts but simply accountants and middle managers, possibly know that it would go this badly wrong as soon as Fergie left? They listened to him on football matters. So why did he refuse to spend big, like we now know was necessary?

The later years of his career coincided with the huge, rapid inflation of player prices fuelled by clubs like City and Chelsea, spunking massive sums all in one go, and at that stage of his life and career he either couldn't or refused to to adapt to the changing market conditions. It all happened so fast. But his sheer managerial genius and imposing legacy meant he carried the success of the club on regardless. His influence at the club was all encompassing, and to a large extent the board were subject to his decision making - and while he was successful on the pitch, they were never going to challenge it.

Of course the year Ferguson left, so did David Gill. So with the heart of our coaching staff and transfer team ripped out, we've been left with a broken squad full of imbalances, that Moyes made significantly worse with panicky decisions; spending £65m on players we didn't need whilst handing lucrative contracts to others.

So it's not a lack of planning or investment by the board, it's the planning from the footballing management that has gone horribly wrong. That's down in part to Ferguson, in part to the coaching staff (or lack of) in charge of identifying transfers, and partly down to the unavoidable uncertainty of chance; you can't know 100% of the time in football who's going to turn out great, and who's going to flop.

The situation now is a highly methodical manager with an entrenched vision has had to come in, assess the squad, realise it's f*cked, and informed the board in no uncertain terms that huge money needs to be spent. It's not lightly that Van Gaal says he's been brought in for his "philosophy", because we need a whole new one to succeed Ferguson, something that he failed to adequately put in place.

Moyes didn't want to pull the earth up nearly as much, because it would have reflected terribly on him having been handed to reigns to Fergies champions. It would basically have been an admission that he hasn't got the same level of managerial ability as Ferguson, or a rebuke to his methods. He was never going to do that, being the character he is. Moyes, whilst the wrong man from the start anyway, took a bullet for the next manager coming in.

So now we find ourselves in a position where we're having to break the (hugely inflated as it is) British transfer record to sign world class talent, because we've only now discovered another "class of 92" isn't about to happen, and the players that were bought for the future have never fulfilled or will fulfil the promise they were showing under Fergie.

It's a combination of losing one of the biggest man managerial geniuses of all time, one of the longest serving managers of all time, in a period when market conditions changed so fast he couldn't keep up. This is a man that broke the transfer record for Keane at a sum of £3.75m. By the end of his career, clubs wanted £30m+ for players like Hazard and Lucas Moura, who whilst could have been the new Ronaldo, could easily have turned out the new Obertan. His reluctance to spend huge sums on young players untried in the premiership was his pragmatic decision. His much maligned line - "there is no value in the market" reflected his reluctance to accept the reality of the new top level; despite his previously partial attitude to a big transfer (Ferdinand, Veron) he simply stubbornly refused to compete.

What were the board/upper management supposed to do? Force players onto the most successful manager the club had ever had, that was winning titles up until he left? The money was always there, the planning was always there. It's just that the planning, directed by Ferguson, turned out to be not good enough, as even the best plans sometimes do. Now we're forced into playing catchup.

To blame "the board" like Kambei did and is apparently getting so much credit for, is ludicrous. Does anyone with a straight face genuinely think that a group of successful businessmen managing a billion dollar plus asset penny pinched and held the purse strings for seasons on end, and then this year suddenly went forest gump and said "oh, sh*t" and decided to start spunking money everywhere, spending near enough the Ronaldo money on one player? Of course not. That makes zero sense.

If at any point Ferguson had said "not spending x amount of money on x players is costing me the ability to compete" they would have recognised the inevitable devaluation of their asset, and spent the money exactly like they are doing now. Ferguson never did that, and he won right up until the end, his way. They had no reason to doubt his methodology.

He ruled with an iron fist, the clubs player recruitment were solely at the behest of his policy, grounded in decades gone by. The director of football and player recruitment structure in place at City and Chelsea has clearly shown to be superior in recent years, and the reason we've been left behind is a direct result of his authoritarianism, his methods becoming outdated.

Now post Ferguson's genius the decline of the squad has manifested, and they are attempting to rectify it by backing a world class manager with the money he needs, quite clearly. That's the reality. Throwing a paddy about the board and the glazers ignores it.

Edit: I'm pretty sure Mark Ogden has been browing r/soccer for ideas. The snake!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/manchester-united/11058490/Manchester-United-turmoil-is-partly-down-to-Sir-Alex-Ferguson-and-the-clubs-transfer-policy.html

 

Strong post.

We're definitely playing 'catch up' and there's a scent of desperation in our transfers.

 

There are plenty of holes in his thinking to be honest.

 

Ferguson was reluctant to spend huge sums on young players? Rooney cost £30 million at 18 years old.

He tries to make it out like Ferguson was against spending money, I bet he's broken more transfer records than everyone. 

[Rsonist]

But we wont fall off for a quarter century Like Liverpool, or for half century like Spurs.

 

You know you've fallen off when you're mentioning Tottenham.

[Thizz]

clubs wanted £30m+ for players like Hazard and Lucas Moura, who whilst could have been the new Ronaldo, could easily have turned out the new Obertan

 

 

 

[Seydou]

Some Fergie apologist

You man were screaming for him to leave cuz of his formation and dinosaur thinking.

[SLEAZE BALL]

Tbf it is fergies fault

[Kompressor]

If you really believe Di Maria would rather go to Man Utd in their current climate, rather then say Man City or PSG then you are deluded.

There's been a lot of delusion going round for the past year or so.

[Guest Gooner_Man]

What's Di Maria's salary?

[Gambino]

Think it was something like 180k a week.

[Fresh]

Brilliant post & article from the caf, both well worth the read.

 

If learning a system means getting tonked 4-0 by a team two divisions below you, then something is wrong. You can build a great team without that happening.

I'd bet Van Gaal is bothered. Why? Because he's (usually) a winner. He would not have achieved what he has if losing didn't bother him.

What new skill are they practising? It's a different formation, not a different skill. Far worse teams than the United side have switched formations without going through a preseason and several matches, but they don't get tonked to a side two leagues below.

Louis van Gaal is not looking for a short term team, he is looking for a long term team. He therefore in this stage is more concerned with the performance and building the foundations even if it means the results are not so good because later they will be so good. In fact, if you watched his interviews you would realise he said before the season started that for three months the players will struggle.

This was no different to the past where he would be disappointed even if he won the game when the performance was poor because his instructions were not carried out but also he could be happy losing when his instructions were carried out. This is because in his view once the players are proficient in doing accurately what is asked of them then winning will be inevitable.

Your last paragraph is shocking because you seem to think this is about the formation failing to understand that is not as important as the philosophy. Errors would be made even with 4-2-1-3, I cannot believe you think this is a formation change. That has nothing to do with it, most on here might think it does but instead of taking their word for it you should assess this yourself. The struggle is not due to adapting to a new formation but a new philosophy, one that in the past has proved to be of a very high level.

Louis van Gaal loves defenders passing from the back, this is risky for any team and so the defenders most adapt and develop expertise in this area. With accurate, quick passing you can take advantage of an opponent's positional mistake, you do not want to give them time so you must take minimal touches and also if you have a two vs one situation where your player is a one, once you beat those players then somewhere on the pitch it is possible that you have a spare man and so you find him.

In order for the team to learn this system they must change the way they play. It is a brand new way of playing for them therefore if players like Janko, James, Vermijl, Evans and Keane do not usually do this then it is logical to expect mistakes during the build up, Louis van Gaal will not be surprised by this because making mistakes in the build up has been no different for players learning his system in the past.

Three things wrong with your post:

• Learning a system involves making errors and correcting these errors, that is all that happened. Watch the interview below and listen to the explanation of why we lost 4-0.
• Louis van Gaal does not build for short term gain but always the long term. In this moment he is more concerned with the performance not the result.
• You fail to understand a formation and philosophy are different.

  http://www.ncsoccer.org/docs/education/coaches/u19_objective_creates_exercise.pdf

[The King]

All the hacks reporting we're back in for Carvalho @ £24 mill

Concerns still over Vidal's knee

Hernandez, Kagawa, Welbeck, Cleverley, Anderson all available for transfer.

[Mame Biram Diouf]

Would pick up Carvalho myself right now at that price

Strootman in Jan hopefully then

[Gambino]

Strootman is a must. Unbelievable that we didn't move for him before Roma did.

[Gambino]

I'd still prefer young Mancunians coming through the ranks as a principle... Refuse to believe the quality isn't out there on the streets. Attitudes however, that's another thing.

[Mame Biram Diouf]

Imagine lvg with eikrem,mats daeli, Pogba, ravel, and larnell

[The Infamous]

I actually fully rate this BMF behaviour despite all the nay sayers

 

real madrid have been throwing money at problems for years and they have 10 european cups

 

strootman vidal herrrera rooney rvp di maria gets you 4th place imo.. even with f*ck boys like jones and evans patrolling the 18 yard line

 

life dictates money solves problem -football follows this rule

jokes

[Kompressor]

I'd still prefer young Mancunians coming through the ranks as a principle... Refuse to believe the quality isn't out there on the streets. Attitudes however, that's another thing.

Agreed, but as the fledglings showed, young homegrown talent has to be supplemented with proven ready made stars. Neville could've sunk without Bruce and Pallister. Scholes and Butt were helped by Keane, Beckham had to dislodge Kanchelskis.

Iron sharpens iron.

Spending big in a backwards sort of way makes it easier to blood youth.

[Fresh]

@BBCSport
Follow
.@ManUtd have received bids from @valenciacf and @juventusfc for Javier Hernandez- more soon

[The King]

YES

[Gambino]

What's going on with Rojo. Why has he still not got his permit?

[Kompressor]

Just a little bit more bad organisation.

Was hearing last week that ordinarily a permit would be applied for just prior to signing the player, we do things differently I guess.

It should be a formality given his international team status.

I thought it would've been sorted by this weekend tbh.

[darkman]

So Zaha has gone on loan for the WHOLE season and not a word from any of you guys? Too upset to talk about it ? I know it may be a shock and not make sense but this is the real reason why he was kicked out apparently...

 

 

Van Gaal's daughter