Manchester United Banter Archive September 24 2018

24 Sep 2018 12:25:31
Wow, nice to see pogba letting everyone know 'attack' should have been the primary thought on joses' mind when playing at home! -seems he really does want to be jumping on a plane in january for pastures new! -and yes, you can say he's just answering a question honestly and expressing his feelings, but surely as club captain (if it meant anything to him) he'd have toed the club line with diplomacy?, i bet his agents' phone is blowing up right now, mission disloyalty continues-yet another dressing room battle for jose, does he reprimand him or put his hand round his shoulder, either way its catch 22.

24 Sep 2018 13:41:59
Classof82,

He isn't club captain. Also, everything he says is blown up so much it is ridiculous, did he say anything the rest of us aren't thinking? He thinks we should attack and take the game to teams at OT, hardly controversial.

24 Sep 2018 15:24:38
GDS2-Fair point, but surely even in his deluded world he must realise his comments aren't exactly helping matters, whether you like jose or not, you have to admit he has indulged pogba far more than most managers would, bearing in mind there seems to be the sense of the team starting to tick means any comments should be of a positive nature for the good of the team, but maybe i'm wrong so hands up, my bad.

24 Sep 2018 18:03:31
The comments bug me tbh honest everything seemed to be settling down the with one quote here we go again.

24 Sep 2018 20:16:59
After Pogba's pathetic lack of commitment on Saturday he would be wiser to keep his mouth shut. We as fans can SEE him not bothering to put a shift in.

One sublime but of skill is not enough.

24 Sep 2018 21:20:22
I think when pressed on why United did not adopt a more positive, his comments where worse .

"I can't tell you because I'm a player, " said Pogba. "It's not me.

"I am not the manager, I cannot, like, say that, but obviously we should show more options of playing.

"But I cannot say that, because I'm a player. That's my way of thinking - we should move better. We should move more, yeah. "


Then again if the manager is happy to critise a player to the media is it a shock if a player mentions the manager to the media?

24 Sep 2018 21:36:08
Engineering himself a January move by any chance?

24 Sep 2018 21:50:52
The unfortunate thing is that pogba is a very good player. Just not good enough often enough for us.
The more unfortunate thing is that he seems a mutinous little person as well.
He really needs to shut his mouth until he starts doing the very least that he is paid to do. I. e. give 100% every minute of every game for the fans that pay their hard earned money to watch him kick around a pigskin.

25 Sep 2018 07:00:07
Sounds to me like Pogba wants things done his way, how he sees them or it is part of his agitating to get out. There is a huge difference between the manager commenting and a player. Pogba is a player and needs to do what he is told by the manager, end of. Frankly, he needs to keep his mouth shut and start performing to the standard he is paid for. Pogba is a player who was softly dispossessed leading to the Wolves goal so is in no position to mouth off about anything, actually he should be apologising.

He needs to be fined and put back in his place but selected to play until he earns the respect and shows that he is the player he, in his head, thinks he is. He seems to have been selective when he puts the effort in and that needs to change. You play football with your head and feet not your mouth.

25 Sep 2018 07:18:32
In fairness, you do play with your mouth. Vocal communication is an essential skill for a top class player.

25 Sep 2018 12:13:05
There is a time and place to mouth off and that is certainly not infront of the media.

25 Sep 2018 18:38:37
An advice the manager would do well to remember Singh.

25 Sep 2018 21:11:54
Good point Jred. The players shouldn't criticise or even hint at it against the manager, but he continually has a go at the players publicly so how can he complain. Stems from the manager IMO.

25 Sep 2018 22:30:44
Willgreen

If you think it is ok for team members to talk out against a manager it just shows a lack of understanding at how the dynamics of management works.

{Ed025's Note - it has to work both ways though red man, jose trashing his players in public is also wrong, "something is rotten in the state of denmark" mate..as the bard would say..

25 Sep 2018 22:47:34
Ed0025
There is a big problem at the club but it has been there for years, the same stench pervaded Old Trafford in the early seventies. Change is needed from top down, it needs shaking up and the manager is trying to do that. Mourinho hasn’t been perfect but there is no way you put a player above a manager. If the club chose a player over a manager it undermines the managers position, they undermined the manager in summer and if they do it again over Pogba the manager will or should quite rightly walk away. Am off to bed as up for work early but the principle has to stand or a lot more will break down.

{Ed025's Note - i get that red man but the manager has to set a president mate, as you say the club is rotten to the core and it needs more than just a new manager..

25 Sep 2018 23:20:51
Manager sets the example.

26 Sep 2018 06:29:50
Jred
It has to come from the owners through Woodward downwards and it doesn’t
In Mourinho’s position as Manager he is absolutely right on Pogba. The problem is far bigger than the manager it is from owners down.

24 Sep 2018 09:28:07
First off the fallout from a draw against a very good Wolves team is as always over the top. I'm not a Mourinho fan, but all teams drop points. We had an off day against a good side who were up for it.

I think the overall quality of the league has massively improved in the last 10 years. The TV money I the EPL means teams like Stoke, West Brom and Leicester have been able to outspend teams such as AC Milan. To put that into context teams in our league who will be fighting relegation can spend more money on players and wages than the team that has won the European cup the second most times.

There are no such things as easy games in the EPL anymore. We have a league where all the teams are capable of bringing in top managers, and top players.

So we need to stop with this entitled idea that we should be brushing aside any team outside the top six 4 or 5 nil. This is further seen that 10 years ago we had maybe three teams really challenging for a title at most, now that is up to six. The gap between the top and the bottom has been closed up.

This is the new reality, we need to stop judging today's world by yesterday's standard.

24 Sep 2018 10:10:19
There's a few more competitive teams this season by the looks of things, but even last season the teams from 7-20 were all 'should win' games for the top 6 home and away. Apart from Burnley, whom any top team should've beat last year, every team went through a period where relegation was plausible, not because the league was strong but because there was 13 very bad teams.

24 Sep 2018 11:12:53
Shappy - I can only speak for myself, but I am judging based on the current standards. You also have to factor in our history and pedigree to a degree otherwise what's the point in supporting a team?

Chelsea, Liverpool and Man City seem to be coping pretty well with the so-called improvement in lesser teams. Fundamentally there will always be whipping boys and whilst Wolves at home is trickier than it would have been last time they were in the league it still should be a no messing 3 points. As should a game against Brighton.

We were very lucky to beat Leicester at home as well first game of the season. They outplayed us if you recall. Even Young Boys looked the better team until Pogba scored midweek - we look completely clueless when we have the ball.

There are easy games in the league. Liverpool battered Southampton, Man City battered Cardiff the same day we struggled against Wolves. Did you not see any of this? Almost every week we say massive hammerings.

We should be playing with style, dominating games against mid-table teams and creating chances galore. Instead it's slow, disjointed, uninspiring and wasteful. We add hundreds of million in talent every year and look no further along than we did during his first year in charge.

If we don't improve soon we will genuinely be struggling to qualify for CL next season and maybe even the Europa League. The players don't seem right, the manager doesn't seem right, the attitude of too many of our fans is not right - how long does it take to make changes? Of the 10 games I watched during the weekend ours was the least fun and that is a frequent occurrence.

I'd advise you to stop making up excuses for the poor performances (and clearly poor training/ preparation/ Tactical decisions) . We need to hold these things to the fire, not mislead or delude ourselves that there is a not a huge problem with almost everything at our club currently.

24 Sep 2018 11:15:14
Shappy you forgot to mention that all the things you wrote applied only to Manchester United. All top teams don't drop points now. I can say a couple of teams have already won the match before they even step onto the pitch against lower teams (which used to be case with United during Fergie years) .
If other top teams do somehow drop points, they still dominate the match and are just unlucky. You are absolutely right that the overall quality of lower teams has improved a lot but the same can be said about top teams. And these top teams don't find it difficult to put in 3-4 goals and dominate matches.
This is the new reality and we need to up our game if we want to have any chance of qualifying for CL next season.

24 Sep 2018 12:17:57
This has to be the lamest excuse you could possibly make for the current position you find yourself in.

These improving clubs have spent 10’s of millions to improve their teams, you have spent 100’s of millions and have never been so bad.

Like us, these so called weaker teams, look at playing us as an opportunity to get at the minimum a point. No one is afraid of us anymore. They park their buses against City and Liverpool and go for it against us.

De Gea is your one saving grace as without him you’d be screwed in your current guise. Mourinho is truly a busted flush who should be nowhere near your club. If he was the Mourinho of old he’d have worked his magic long before now.

Some of you have been and are sounding like Arsenal fans during the last years of Wengers reign.

24 Sep 2018 13:36:05
The correct context is the fact that our peer group is performing better team for team than us. The issue is simply that while we now have improved wingbacks and a very good midfield that our striker is clumsy and inept and that the two wide players are unproductive. Striker shoukd be replaced by Martial. Left forward should be Rashford despite his limitations. Put Andreas on the right. Quicker, slicker and more penetrative.

24 Sep 2018 18:45:41
Beast, you've got it spot on. I'm tearing my hair out with all the rubbish that comes out from our manager and players. I'm also baffled beyond belief of the lame excuses our optimistic, positive fans are prepared to chirp out every week.
City or Liverpool will hammer wolves at their grounds. Simple as that.
As you rightly say, every match we've played, we've conceded the ball deep in our half, played lazy football and put in 50% effort.
Worryingly, our tactics have been shocking too, we play well for 45mins against Watford, then we try to shut shop and nearly give two points away. We come out against Brighton, with a park the bus attitude amd concede ground and we're well beaten. The win against Young Boys was fortunate, as they had two golden chances to score before Pogba's opener.
I am worried this team could not even make top 10.

24 Sep 2018 19:39:23
I would say Wolves are pretty good team. They won't surrender to anyone. They went toe to toe with City.
P. c. Liverpool fan.