₦airaland Forum

afrodoc2:
It is not about superstars. It is about playing people in roles they are suited to. We just need a player whose natural position and/or skill set is DM. Bissouma and Kalvin Phillips are not stars.

The only DM in the whole team is Matic who is ancient. Playing box to box midfielders as DM won’t pay us in the long run.

Depends on the formation and style. We don’t need a natural DM. A standard 4-3-3 won’t really need a DM. Also, if the objective is to dominate play then we need a ‘short’ passer as DM who will dictate and control the game. VDB can do this na.

Bombblacks:
So you have no problem with Mctominay and Fred starting regularly?

One of them can start, let’s have Pogba, Bruno, Ronaldo and Sancho on the pitch. Varane and Maguire at the back. What else do you want. You guys are just greedy. Shoot!

DM this DM that. Abeg, we are okay with the squad. We don’t need superstars in every position on the pitch. Teamwork and a few superstars is all that matters.

Oasis007:
Solskjaer: ’ll start with Donny. Of course, we started against Leeds with the team that we picked and the 5-1 win was, of course, a justification of the team selection. Of course, it always is. Then we moved to the next one, Scott couldn’t play and Nemanja has been our best player in the pre-season, I have to say, that’s why I chose Nemanja. He’s been terrific. So I went with them two. Donny has worked hard, he’s done really well, I can’t say anything else but he will get his chances when the season gets going.



"Last season we had the Carabao Cup games, a game every 3 or 4 days at the start, now we have a week or 8 days even in between. I can’t really say it in any other way, that we made a decision. Of course, when you start as well as you do, you don’t want to rotate too much. Scott couldn’t start, that was the decisions that Nemanja started instead of Donny. It was very close, very, very close. He has been very positive in the games.”

Shalaye-ing is not necessary. We have a good team, win trophies or fuvk off!

paafin:
Sancho, Varane and Ronaldo for under 125m pounds. What on earth!

Fletcher and Murtough are better negotiators!

Woodward is still there. He is leaving in December.

odizeey:
Them say those ones no leave when Mancity was threat. Rubbish

E dey pain them niiii.

elrony:
Cry babies everywhere smh.

So I guess Schmeichel, Cole, and Law are all snakes lmao

You no wan sign am but make another club no sign am, no be juju be that?

Don’t mind them. Because he wants to join city, he is no more a Utd legend. E choke!

afrodoc2:
If you mean play him as the most defensive midfielder there is no evidence in his career that he can do that. He has always had a more defensive partner with him. He is an 8 not a 6.

Do you think that VDB can be Utd’s Busquets. If we are going to be a possession based or direct play team, we may just need a player that can recycle possession or/and make short, safe and maybe incisive passes to our attacking/central midfielders.

Or better still, consider two DMs, VDB with one of Fred or McTom making the interceptions and tackles. Bruno, Pogba and Sancho as AMs/wingers in a 4-2-3-1 set up.

VDB is definitely very useful, our manager is just not ready to figure out how to use these players.

GloryIsaac:
Must every goal be someone’s fault?

Southampton fouled a player, Ref chose to let play go on, they scored. Why try to pin it on anybody?

I think what he is saying is that, if it was Pogba, you wouldn’t be saying this.

Botfuss:
Sancho has a lot of work to do. He’s used to bring the main man and the pretty football in Germany. Our pressing dropped drastically immediately he came on.

And it seems he is more comfortable on the left. Do we still need to get a rwf?

Seems it’ll be another season of vibes and Insha Allah with ole in charge. Lord help us.

TBH, the McTom sub in killed the game. We became toothless and utter rubbish after that substitution.

elrony:
Most of our players were dull and off today tbh, I no even know who to drag.

On to the next, at least no L today.

What about Ole? He was smart and on?

LMDyaya:
Omo,my input...


mancity are better than us ,yes


but we not far behind,yes


we still need like 5 more signings to be up there with mancity(squad depth wise) but that doesn't become an excuse for the fraud not to win something.we have seen teams with worse squad depth win trophies.(liverpool 19/20,leicester 15/16 etc comes to mind)

I talk am. We need 5 more world class signings before we can say we have a squad at City’s level. I saw it coming.

We just need to sell OT to get a ‘perfect’ squad.

We go dey alright las las

lekkie073:
Barcelona from 1974 to 1990 did not win a single LA Liga, despite making second position more than five times. They went on to win four straight seasons after that. Real Madrid has its own fair share of periods of hiatus. Ac Milan is also going though its own period. This is normal in football, and it is more difficult now that competition is improving as a result of fund availability. Gone are the days players will troop to one club simply because of club profile and popularity.

Interesting. I guess they spent up to 400m in today’s money in the same period, without winning a major trophy.

lekkie073:
is united the first club that will spend 400m in three seasons and not win the league?

Every big club goes through a hiatus, a period when they will find it difficult to get it right. It might be a result of increased competition, money, fatigue or any other factor. The fact remains, a big club cannot remain competitive for ever except when there is no competition from its rivals. Fergie kept Liverpool in hiatus for decades. That coincided with the emergence of new football powerhouses like Chelsea and Mancity.
Now manutd has been in a hiatus since Fergie left (this is normal) and you expect one manager to come and fill his vacuum perfectly.
Fergie, as a personality won United at least 10 points per season. That's why some rival fans ascribe him the position of epl influencer. That is gone with him, more clubs are grooming themselves to be more competitive. In the midst of these, some manutd fans still fantasize about overnight success. Hmmmmm

Would be good to provide examples of clubs that spent 400m in three years without a major trophy to show for it.

Real Madrid, Chelsea, City, Barca, PSG? I don’t know, please help.

CapitalCee:
They want Bruno 2X, so that when One Bruno gets injured or tired another Bruno comes in, they also want clones for all players same world class quality. 22 world class players.

chidexxy007:
Like Pogba haven't played that role before Abi?

Pogba played AM. Ole should just free both of them, let them swap/play different positions (wide, attacking, forward, whatever), and watch us decimate our opponents. Pep does this every time with his AMs.

chidexxy007:

If it was about that, Joe Hart would have been first choice(afterall, he was first choice for pre Pep city nd they won trophies too) while Bravo would have deputised for him.

So why do you think that Ederson is better than DDG and Henderson? I don’t understand. Clean sheet?

We should just sell Old Trafford and use the proceeds to buy another 5-6 world class players at 100m each. We borrow grounds every match day to play our games.

Maybe that’s when the fans will be satisfied. We need to ship in better forwards and midfielders.

The same thing happened at Chelsea when Lampard was there. They said there was no depth and quality. The same team won the UCL (beating City in the final).

Let us continue!

chidexxy007:
Square peg, round holes.
Na you go still come here come rant.

Not like it's something they haven't tried before though.

Bruno has a free role at Utd, forget the AM story. Pogba can also do very well if given the same role. No square peg in any round hole.

ChristineC:
true

Honestly, I am not doing Ole out or anything. I just want a trophy this season. No excuse. He has the tools, he’s built his team over the last three years. It’s now or never for him because the board will sack him if we don’t win a trophy.

patrickmuf:
At LWF, is Grealish, Sterling, Torres and Foden better than Rashford, Martial, Sancho and James? No way...

At RWF is Mahrez, Sterling, Silva and Foden better than Sancho, Greenwood, Rashford and James? No way...

At CF, is Jesus, Sterling and Torres better than Cavani, Greenwood or Martial? Hell no...

How then are City better in attack?

Exactly. City attackers are just there, they are not in any way better than our players. A good tactic/system ensures that their output makes sense vs Utd’s. Does not necessarily mean that they are better.

chidexxy007:
Lol

AWB to Dalot compared to Walker to Cancelo?

Shaw to Telles is worse that Zichenko to Mendy

We don't have Goalkeeper right now.

Mahrez to Silva is not much drop in quality compared to Rashford/Martial to James.
Maguire to Bailly = Dias to Ake

Whilst Greenwood is better, he is still young and quite inexperienced. Why is Pep hesitating to play Liam Delap more often?

What do you mean we don’t have a keeper? Geez! De Gea and Henderson nko? Who is Emerson? Because he’s won trophies under a manager that is very good?

Nawa o!

ChristineC:
it's always a two way street when you make blanket conclusions like this.
like someone already pointed out, every debate here ends up on an Ole baseline which becomes boring.
conclusion can also be made from the other angle, which is you are trying to overrate the squad quality, should in case they win something then you can say the quality was responsible and OGS didn't do anything

Because Ole is the weak link, and I will def praise Ole, if we win trophies. Let’s win first, this season is our chance, the team looks really good. The Glazers have done the needful (re: player acquisitions and ‘structure’). It’s Ole’s turn to do the needful.

CapitalCee:
That doesn't render the fact that UTD squad is star studded untrue. Why do you keep hammering on a single position as if games are solely won on who has the better DM, you guys make it sound as if Fred and Mctoms are Sunday league standards. It is very ridiculous that you will quickly rush to downplay the quality of the team so as to shield the manager from upping his game. No team in the EPL has the quality of players utd have in defence. Utd attack is better than everyone else, Bruno is literally the best AM in the league with no question and a generational talent Sancho has just been added. What's with all these back and forth?

Absolutely ridiculous. Just watch them come out later to say that they don’t care if Ole is the manager or not, acting like saints and neutrals, when infact (deep within themselves) they have no faith in the manager to the needful.

Just doesn’t make sense.

GloryIsaac:
Lmaooooo... mentioned earlier that this was the real root of all these claim about United and City being on par.

Didn’t take long to spout it.

If Afrodoc didn’t halt the claim of McTom being on par with Rodri, you guys would have ridden on that too. Continue twisting stuff to fit.

Of course, we will definitely talk bout the manager. Everything is on him, if we win trophies this season, I will def praise the manager first before the players.

We can’t take away the manager’s input in all of this, which means even if the squad looks good, the manager must get the best out of the players to win trophies.

benji93:
Interesting! Are you ever out of these kinds of ideas?

That’s the fact. Jesus, Gundogan, Rodri, Silva, etc are not world class players. You guys should just stop abeg.

Some City players are average players, pep’s system makes those players look world class. We have bought more ready-made players in the last few years, yet, our fans/supporters are saying that City’s quality is higher. Also, we’ve signed lots of players in the last few years with most of them still around. Squad depth and quality are there, you guys are just trying to find an excuse for OGS, in case he doesn’t win anything.

It’s not fair on the owners and scouts spending and working respectively round the clock to bring in the players.

patrickmuf:
Una dey praise Ole for beating Pep, Klopp, Mourinho and other tip coaches but una no want give the players props...If you think Ole is a top coach for beating the aforementioned world class managers, why then do you think his players are inferior to those of the other teams?

Lol. Ole is a tactical genius. The players are sh1t!

afrodoc2:
Rodri's career average which includes his time at lowly Villareal and bus parking Atletico is 64 passes per game and 91% pass accuracy.

Career average 91% pass accuracy.

He is not a good passer because he plays at City, he plays at City because he is a good passer.

And i never said we won't be fine. You like answering questions that were not asked.

Are you saying Fred is a better DM than Rodri or are you saying McTom is a better DM than Rodri?

I said I was not sure if Rodri is really far from McTom or Fred.

nitrogen:
Reason I suggested Rodri vs Fred is that both are almost the same. There are other stats that can be considered (for the sake of the argument) which shows that Fred is also not a bad player.

Tbh, City’s style makes Rodri a better passer of the ball, if we dominate play every darn time, even McTom will have high number of passes and high accuracy.

We can have Varane at the back plus Fred or McTom as DM. We will be fine.

Other metrics to be considered include key passes per game, progressive passes, interceptions, etc.

afrodoc2:
What about them?

Rodri 2.1 tackles per game
Fred 2.7 tackles per game

Rodri 81 passes per game with 91% pass accuracy
Fred 60 passes per game with 87.7% pass accuracy

And we all know that Fred struggles with receiving the ball from the defense and under pressure from a press.

Of all the points you guys can make about our squad vs City's squad Rodri is not better than McTominay (or even Fred) as a DM should not be one of them.

Rodri posted very good stats as DM at Villareal, Atletico, City which led to his meteoric rise in such a short time but somehow McTom and Fred who are always sharing duties (unsatisfactorily) are better than him?

Reason I suggested Rodri vs Fred is that both are almost the same. There are other stats that can be considered (for the sake of the argument) which shows that Fred is also not a bad player.

Tbh, City’s style makes Rodri a better passer of the ball, if we dominate play every darn time, even McTom will have high number of passes and high accuracy.

We can have Varane at the back plus Fred or McTom as DM. We will be fine.