₦airaland Forum

Sane should be doing better.

afrodoc2:
We don’t have to stick to that particular style that worked in the past. As long as it is attractive football and it wins trophies, I am all for it.

When I started watching Premier League in the early 90s Arsenal were boring boring Arsenal while West Ham were known for attractive football.

We should not be too arrogant to accept other means of success. As long we win meaningful trophies and the football is attractive I don’t care if it’s gegenpressing, possession, or combination, or fluid counterattack like you said. Just play enjoyable football and win titles.

Gbam...

Ellexy:
I want to ask, Chelsea under Roman Abramovic was highly successful. They didn't have that definitive pattern of play per say. He just backs whoever the manager is and when the manager fails to deliver, sacking straight up.

One can say the style of play then was simply to deliver on the pitch and win trophies anyhow, whether it's Mourinho's pragmatic style or Ancelotti's pro attacking style.

Madrid does same too, Bayern as well.

Madrid and Bayern before Tuchel had a pattern of play. They play a fast-transitioning game. You listen to everything ETH says and you'll see that he wants us to transition the ball from defence to attack much like Liverpool and Madrid play but he just doesn't have the quality of players to execute it and has refused to wake up to this reality.

And yes, Chelsea under Abramovich sure had a pattern of play. Mourinho favoured sitting deep and hitting teams on the counter with Robben, Darmian Duff, Joe Cole etc. Don't forget Chelsea had an owner with deep pockets and thus could afford to send their way out of trouble.

TrebleChamp:
Sign a full squad in on window? United should sack Ten Bald first, appoint an attacking minded manager and let him work closely with Dan Ashworth to identify his kind of players.

No bro, we are at the point where as a club, the management has to decide what pattern of play they want and go for a coach that best fits that pattern. That way, we won't be struggling to offload those players when we sign a new manager because he will meet the right crop of players. Man City identified a peculiar style and went for a manager who fit in Pep. If Pep leaves today, they'd go after a manager with a similar style making it easy for him to do his thing.

Our mistake has always been in hiring maners and giving them what they want instead of setting out a definitive pattern of play that makes for easy hiring of managers and recruitment of players with certain profiles.

afrodoc2:
Ashworth is coming. They are just negotiating compensation with Newcastle.

There is a report that Ashworth wants Graham Potter who he worked with at Brighton. Another report says Rangnick has advised Sir Jim to go for Julian Nagelsmann. Yet another rumor is that Omar Berrarda prefers De Zerbi.

This might be part of the reason why ETH is still in place. I don't think he will survive Ashworth resuming office officially.

De Zerbi is crazy about football so much so that he tries out stupid tactics and weird team selections. Ferguson should be his undisputed starter but his craze for ball retention ala total football has seen Brighton struggle to take the next step. Much like LVG's United team, his Brighton team are obsessed with keeping the ball so much so that they forget that the primary purpose of football is putting the ball into the opponent's net. He is not ready for the big step up even though I am a fan.

Potter seems cool-headed but his teams focus too much on keeping possession and do not attack the opposition's goal. This is where Nagelsmann comes top for me, his teams play purposeful attacking football similar to Klopp's style...I am quite sure Nagelsmann will be tempted to move to Old Trafford to prove a point seeing how Bayern did him dirty.

afrodoc2:
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That is where the recruitment comes in. You might be able to retain possession even if you play at breakneck speed, as long as your fundamentals and technique are on point. On the other hand, a player like McTominay can never be a possession footballer even if he plays at snail speed because he lacks the fundamentals and technique.

Talking about recruitment, have you picked up any news on the Ashworth deal? or the other names linked to the management positions at the club?

afrodoc2:
Yeah. I agree with you about Shaw. It is time to move on purely from an injury point of view. From a technical and physical point of view though he is the type of fullback that we need.

Bruno is Bruno. He is not comfortable enough on the ball in tight spaces to cope well with the pace and pressing of the EPL. There are passes you will give to Bruno in a tight area that he will spill to the opponent or rush a through pass that is not on, but if you give the same pass to Bernardo Silva or Odegaard they will wriggle out of the tight space and keep the ball circulating.

If we want to continue to play transitional counterattack football, Bruno is the guy. If we want to play front-foot possession football like the other top teams he is not the one.

I will go for front-foot possession football. I watch Silva, Odegaard and even other AMs who are not as technically gifted on the ball as the aforementioned like Maddison and Paqueta and begin to question why Bruno can't keep a calm head sometimes. I have seen that fella rush a through pass that isn't there when he is not under any pressure. We need a coach who knows how to communicate his ideas to the players and get them to execute it perfectly...

You watch Liverpool and their style of play and you'd think Liverpool midfielders would be careless with the ball since they play high-octane football but no, they surprisingly keep the ball so well even when they sometimes play at neckbrake speed.

Eriokanmi:
Sadly, these people you talk about don't have any business with the social media talk more of reading whatever people say here. They don't even have android phones.

So your comment doesn't hold water. Nigeria is in the worst crisis ever. We've not seen anything yet. I hope the government would forsatall the impending lawless act, which the police and military would find difficult to curb. Each time I take a walk in the street, people who always ask me to buy food for them.dont have a phone. Those are the people you see looting warehouses

You'll be shocked to see that some of those folks looting warehouses are not struggling at all...Most people are very greedy...

The post you quoted is deep, very deep...You just have to have been around long enough to understand every word therein.

allen113:
For those of you supporting this rubbish, I hope you don't complain when the hen comes home to roost. They have started with Govt. Warehouses and have move to stealing people's goods in truck, goods either bought on credit or someone's hard earn money and you're laughing about it and making a joke of it saying it is hunger. I hope when they start breaking into your shops and homes you will still understand it's hunger? We were in South South when Militancy started and they were kidnapping the white expatriate people laughed it off and said it's just the white, they don't kidnap black people because they are our sons, the white began to go back to their country and when there where no more whites to kidnap they started kidnapping their so called black brothers who worked in oil companies, people still laughed it off that they only kidnap oil workers, when oil companies began to leave they started kidnapping rich men, people started saying they only kidnap rich people, today everyone is a target weather rich or poor nobody is spared. Same thing happened in the North with Boko haram, same thing in the east with UGM, here we are again cheering this looters. I hope when they start breaking into the homes of your age fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, cousins, uncles and aunties. I hope by that time we will also understand it is hunger?

💯

afrodoc2:
Are you still expecting anything remotely reasonable from that guy? If he tries youth players and Amad in all those positions you mentioned, they will still struggle because the team structure is bad and the pattern of play (if there is any) is not effective at all.
that is bad.

So we won't learn anything if he tries those moves. He might even mislead us into thinking they are thrash players when it is his system that is bad.

Well, you make a lot of sense.

afrodoc2:
We are going to struggle for the foreseeable future. Full stop.

Maybe 3 years from now we can start competing. Several years of inconsistent squad acquisitions have left us with players who are not fit for purpose.

Dalot, Varane, Martinez, Shaw, Mainoo, Garnacho, Hojlund, and MAYBE Amad are the only ones that are manageable. Every other person is not fit for the type of football the fans are asking for (and that the manager has said he wants to play).

Well said. Shaw has to go not for lack of quality but with his age and injury history, it will get worse from here.

Interestingly, you didn't list Bruno among those that are manageable, you think he is beyond redemption? I'd keep him as an option on the bench because with Portugal he plays differently.

Ibime:
Na this thread oga dey use check temperature because ol gees dey here

But seriously this thread na resource portal on its own. Kudos to all the posters here for keeping it going except for the odd days when things go south.

afrodoc2:
10 players in one summer?

Doc na wetin need to happen else with one injury we are back to watching Maguire or McTom or Lindelof or Antony...

In simple terms, we are going to struggle for the foreseeable future unless we get it spot on with the management team (including the next coach)...

If ETH is serious, he should try Amad out at AM or that RWF position and also try out other promising youngsters so we see what we can get from the youth set-up else we will need to spend so much money if we must become competitive in a short space of time.

Anything else will mean that for the next 3-4 years we will still be playing catch up.

Come summer, we need to sign a LB, 2 CBs, a DM, 2 CM (At least one of them must be able to play as the DM), an AM (Depending on Mount's fitness), a RWF, LWF and a CF as back up to Hojlund else we will still struggle.

We can afford to sign just one CB because that will leave us an injury away from parading a fraud, the same with the midfield and forward positions.

All these need to happen after ETH has been shown the door.

I just had to go and watch our highlight vs this same Sheffield Utd. They balled us that day but Christo said it's because we had a couple of players out injured...

ETH no try at all...

Mrviktor:
Walker would have caught him for the first chance..

But the second one is criminal

A good touch and there's no way Walker would catch him. All he needed to do was put himself between Walker and the ball and any foul is a red card. In that scenario, whilst speed can be a factor, intelligence to know how to protect the ball while moving is key.

Stats are the reason why people thought Bruno had a great game.

The stats will say Rashford did well...

Away from stats, Rashford was trash and the goal won't blind me to what I saw. Put Garnacho on that LW and Walker will have more defensive duties. At least with Garnacho, you know he will try and fail but will never stop until he gets it right. Rashford downed tools after scoring that goal, a great goal it was but that is not enough. I have seen a bump like Sterling trouble Walker and make him forget to attack but Rashford thought he had done enough after scoring and played like he didn't care.

Bruno is another fraud. Even if Rashford had scored from the chances he created, we were still going to struggle to preserve the lead no thanks to Bruno and his lack of positional discipline. You watch City and you'd understand what positional discipline entails as a team. KDB pops all over the pitch but because they are a well-coached team, he doesn't leave spaces behind because a teammate slots into the space he leaves. Watch how Bernardo Silva will be in the DM position in one sequence and next, he is on the RW but it is not a problem because as Rodri moves, he slots into the DM position and when he moves, someone else slots into his position. At United, we don't understand that concept and that's why seeing Bruno all over the place can be frustrating. He should stick to his position else we will continue to struggle.

The problem above can be solved with good coaching that prioritizes movements and positional discipline...Positional discipline doesn't mean a player has to stay in one position but as a team, the players have to know when to step into a vacant position to cover for a teammate. ETH has consistently shown that he can't coach the players to do these things. He has to go...

McTom was lost on the pitch, apart from being a terrible footballer, he seemed confused about what his role was. Like Bruno, he is another poor choice as a midfielder when squaring up against City. They both do little to help the team retain position and are positionally suspect.

On the positive side, Casemiro had a good game but then, City played the game at a walking pace for the most part meaning he had enough time to recover so, I am not going to read too much into his performance.

Dalot, Varane and Onana were very good.

afrodoc2:


Water-filled calabash.

I shock...I come dey reason whether I no sabi my state again.

DissTroy:
I thought of a long rebuttal but then I thought what's the point of it when you lack basic understanding of geolocation to know the difference between South East and the South South where Akwa Ibom is located, or you are being mischievous.

You lots just like to force yourself on others even when you have been resoundingly told they have no ties to you. This argument was had just last December on this thread with Okpa and all doubts cleared. When you do this then appropriate other people's cultures.

We aren't interested and have no tribal ties to you. Why can't you get this and be on your way? Why force kinship with those who don't want it?

Remember clearly you started this so when and if it goes south, we know those who would gaslight and play the victim card on this thread.

Thank you bro.

BlueRayDick:
Are u saying their are indigenous Igbo people in Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Benue, Edo and Kogi? Or what exactly are u saying in the bold part of ur statement?

I will not talk about others but there's no truth about it as far as Cross River is concerned.

Spy360:
The Ekpe secret society originated from the Efik speaking people but extended to the Igbo people. Ekpe society developed the nisipidi writings. That is why people say it is Igbo. In reality the Efik people are Igbos.

Where did you get this from?

Oasis007:
Expert17.....hope you are good?!

The guy just disappeared.

MRTA7:
I doubt greenwood will ever play for United again.

Sir Jim has mentioned that they'll review the whole issue again, let us see how it goes. The poor performance of Antony and the fact that ETH doesn't trust Amad coupled with the cost of signing another RWF might all work in Greenwood's favor.

Oasis007:
La Liga president Tebas: "Greenwood was not condemned, so I don’t care".

"He’s a great player and he's doing really well at Getafe as a player, so I hope he continues to be successful and he continues to stay in Spanish football because that’s always good for us".

Na this Greenwood matter I go use know if Sir Jim na better businessman. Spend 60-80m on Olise or bring back Greenwood. That money should be used to fix other problem positions in the team.

yarimo:
that is there target in the name of protest

Don't be stupid.

izzou:
[color=royalblue]Which kind wahala be this?

You went to complain, dem nack you fine.[/color]

https://www.nairaland.com/8016371/plateau-appeal-court-dismisses-review

I just see am begin to laugh. N8m each...

The way those guys dey vex, I no go surprise if them no gree pay.

I hear something like we dey play Liverpool next for Old Trafford.

McTom is trash as a midfielder, he is only useful upfront. I wouldn't mind if Rashford is benched for Ghost to play CF because Raahford is just useless...

IZUKWU:
This tittle race is about to go down to the wire. First to blink .
Man city has shown they have what it takes in scenarios like this to win the league but they still have to play both Arsenal and Liverpool. They just need to win all their matches and they are champions once again or will arsenal show that they have matured and learnt their lessons from last two seasons and dig in and win the league .
Time will tell, my head is with Man city and my heart is with Arsenal. I think Liverpool has many injuries and will not last the distance.

On paper, Liverpool have the easiest fixtures but it depends if they'll have their core players available for the run-in.

Where una dey na?