01 Feb 2018 07:01:23
The game last night proved a couple of things beyond any doubt:

1. We are inept when it comes to playing against sides who are energetic and press high. If teams go at us, several of our players seem to lose all ability and just go backwards. City, Liverpool and Spurs are the 3 teams who play this way every week and funnily enough we have struggled to play much good football against them over the past couple of years. Against teams like this, the most important thing is keeping the ball once you win it back. We don't do this and the best sides do not start making daft mistakes as soon as they are pressurised which does happen with a few of our players.

2. Chris Smalling might be the only player in the Premier League who is genuinely terrified of having a football at his feet. Unless he is grabbing shirts or committing unnecessary fouls he is extremely uncomfortable. Needs to go asap.

3. Paul Pogba cannot play as one of only 2 Cm's against anyone half decent. On his day Pogba is our best player and we should be working to make sure he is given the chance to be at his best more often. I've posted about this before but he is expected to do too much in this team which last night led to him doing nothing. He is poor defensively and until we play 3 in the centre of midfield, when Pogba plays against good teams we willl struggle badly. It's great that Martial and Lingard have been in good form, however, Mourinho seemed to completely abandon his general tactics against Spurs which is to ensure Eriksen has no room. Dropping one of Lingard or Martial may not have been a popular move but to add another midfielder, Carrick would have been my pick, it would have been the right move. Hindsight is 20/ 20 but this seemed fairly obvious before the game. Carrick would have provided protection for the back 4 as well as some much needed composure on the ball. Ideally Lindelof could have started at the back as well as he has a bit of ability on the ball.

4. Shaw is our best left back

5. We need to get support to Lukaku quicker. Mourinho tactics tend to see us retreat into our half before applying pressure. However, this leaves Lukaku isolated. His hold up play has actually been quite good over the last couple of months but there is only so good you can be when up against 2 good centre backs and a defensive midfielder at one time.

Much of the above is already fairly clear in my opinion but the yesterday was one of the poorest performances I've seen from United in a long time. I still think we will finish top 3, however, if we have aspirations of winning the top prizes again, we need more composure throughout our team, need to play 433 and while I don't see us adopting a high press tactic similar to Liverpool or City, Mourinho needs to be a little bit braver to pressure an extra 10/ 15 yards up the pitch.

1.) 01 Feb 2018
01 Feb 2018 08:12:27
I agree with most of what you say but in my opinion Carrick would not have been the right choice either. I agree we needed to play three in midfield but what we lacked was a player who is quick of the mark and able to keep up with spurs’ movement. Carrick at 36 would not of suited that game either. We seem to be lacking in that area so out of the options we have I would probably have opted for Herrera alongside matic and pogba.

2.) 01 Feb 2018
01 Feb 2018 08:52:46
I agree we've struggled against the top teams. Hit and miss at home against them but mourinho record away to them has been poor since he joined united. Been outplayed in the majority of those games.
Our form against the lesser sides has been very good however which is why we are where we are in the league table.
It's worth noting we had a very good record home and away against the big sides under van gaal who liked posessopn but his tactics meant we struggled to break down the lesser sides.

3.) 01 Feb 2018
01 Feb 2018 15:15:29
Can one game prove all that?