26 Aug 2025 22:31:49
Real and Atletico keeping tabs on Mainoo over a potential loan deal. Personally hoping its just media clickbait!

1.) 27 Aug 2025
27 Aug 2025 05:56:42
A Real midfield containing Tchouaméni, Camavinga, Guler, Bellingham and Valverde and a Athetico team who have just spent €30m on Cardoso from Betis to partner Pablo Barrios and Rodrigo De Paul.

If he wants minutes on the pitch then these are probably not the best two teams to be linked with, that is why it’s either idle paper talk because United generate clicks, or an agent stirring.

{Ed077's Note - should I point out that De Paul has joined Inter Miami earlier this window ?

2.) 27 Aug 2025
27 Aug 2025 08:05:21
Interesting discussion on Muppetiers about what’s really going on with Mainoo.

Fuelled by agent who wants new contract / more game time

Mainoo being gradually prepared to take over Bruno when he leaves for Saudi next summer and will hopefully partner Baleba.

3.) 27 Aug 2025
27 Aug 2025 08:31:33
I am not worried about Mainoo going. We have not managed to complete a sale in 2 months of negotiating.

Cant see us suddenly completing one in under 5 days.

4.) 27 Aug 2025
27 Aug 2025 06:20:59
Sorry Ed, early in the morning, thought he was still there.

{Ed077's Note - NW

5.) 27 Aug 2025
27 Aug 2025 12:45:02
Listen to mitten. Muppeteers is an aggregator.

6.) 28 Aug 2025
28 Aug 2025 10:37:18
Lets be honest about Mainoo, he's a talented young player with potential. He isn't a top level player right now. Maybe his first season and his run the Euros final with England has made him think he's further along in his career than he actually is.

Right now he's a talent young player who had a purple patch for the first 8 months in the first team while he benefitted from having the surprise element over his opposition. He then had an injury hit season where he struggled to match his first season performances.

Yes he has a lot of potential, and if he works hard and develops his game then I'm sure he can be a regular first choice player for us.

But right now he isn't that player no matter how much us fans want him to be the Messiah.

He struggles in a midfield two and to be completely frank while he looked good individually when he played in a midfield three with Casemiro and Bruno, it didn't improve our performances as a team. Games still reassembled a basketball match with teams running right through the heart of midfield where we left far too many large gaps.

The reality is that the midfield issue cannot be solved by any of our current midfielders. In fact it's not even entirely a midfield issue.

Yes we need a more athletic and positionally intelligent defensive player in there than we currently have in the squad.

However, half the problem is still that the team overall loses it's compactness as the game wears on. Our defence later in games stops pressing as high and drops deeper which increases the amount of space the tiring legs in midfield need to cover. Which is why Amorim has subbed a couple of CB's in the games this season, to try and get the defence to push higher up and close those gaps.

While the new No.10's are yet to fully adapt to the role they need to play. They need to both offer attacking creativity, but they also need to drop deeper when we don't have the ball to help form a 4 man box midfield. The issue we have had so far is Cunha has had to play as the false 9 in games due to Zirkzee being injured and Sesko still settling in. Which means he hasn't managed to get to grips with the role fully yet. Then Mbeumo joined later and is still clearly trying to get back to full fitness to the level needed, as well as having very little time to be coached the role.

The two man midfield is not the real problem, lots of teams line up with a double pivot. The real problem is that we haven't got the right blend of skill sets and quality amongst the midfield options, along with the rest of the team struggling to implement the tactics successfully for the entire 90 minutes.

If the defence can push high for the whole game and the No.10's can drop deep when we don't have the ball then we actually have 5 players in the middle of the pitch (CCB who steps up, both midfielders, and both No.10's) when the opposition have the ball.

This issue is more about how the team play together as a team and move together as a unit. Once they get that the performances and results will start to improve.

We saw it against Arsenal where we did it so well that Arsenal retreated into their shell and hung on. We started doing it against Fulham, but the confidence of the players wobbled and the defence started to drop deep along with Bruno pushing further forward trying to force the goal which totally opened us up in the middle of the park allowing Fulham to take control of the game.

The strength of a clear structured system is it can allow a team to play greater than the sum of its parts. The weakness of it is that it only takes one player to not do their job properly and it starts to break down,

7.) 28 Aug 2025
28 Aug 2025 14:02:58
I'd say probably a year ago Mainoo was one of our better players, and more England too. His best position is difficult to pin down. I thought he wasn't quite right for those no.10 roles but still managed to contribute a lot in an attacking sense.
Past 6 months I have no idea what's happened. All seems to have changed since he cut his hair!
As a Utd follower for about 4 decades I've been treated to and always associated Utd with some of the best centre forwards in the world and always a great pulse or cog in the middle the whole team evolved around. Sadly we've had neither since Fergie left.

8.) 28 Aug 2025
28 Aug 2025 16:34:29
A lot of players burst onto the scene then get found out. Their habits, the preferences, even their tells get noticed and leant and the more the play the more game film there is the more that everyone understands how they play and how to play them. Its up then for the player to add more strings to his bow find ways to hurt you thst cpunter your counter to what he is good at.

With Mainoo you don't press because his great at recieving and turning into space and taking one or two players out of the game whilst he isn't strong he has a low centre of gravity and uses his body well here.

Mainoo for example bevomes a totally different player if people start dropping off allowing him turn and he starts hitting 40 or 50 yard passes. Suddenly you have a massive headache in how to deal with him.
Hjulmand certainly did a bit of this at Sporting. The big thing with Hjulmand though is defensively his reading was exceptional which covered for his lack pace. Mainoo isn't at that point yet by a long way.

Mainoo needs to develop his game like all players. I think that's at least in part why he has seemi gly regressed. He hasn't so much as others have adjusted how they deal with him.

A lot of players have difficult years 2 and 3 whilst they work out what got them through a decade of youth and reserve football isn't going to carry them through EPL.