30 May 2021 07:59:52
Manchester United are fixated on stability rather than quality of manager. Chelsea are fixated on winning trophies and glory.

Why is there such a diversity?

Yes the Glazers but the answer also lies with Woodward and who he has appointed, the ex mates of the manager in the press.

Chelsea just showed what single minded winning approaches can do, the other big clubs do the same, yet Woodward and co are stuck in the 60's and 80's looking for another Manager who will give stability.

That lack of winning mentality is why we only have 1 European cup more than Chelsea, the same number of Champions Leagues as them and 10 less than Madrid, embarrassed by Liverpool.

Chelsea showed the way, ex player doing ok was not enough, were decisive, got in a top manager and he absolutely vindicated their decision. Our board dither with emotional ties, it's sad, pathetic and ultimately will cost us years of obscurity for the trophies that matter.

Woodward make the decision.

1.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 09:35:40
Oliver Holt does a piece in the Daily fail today saying now is the time a club not treading water would thank Ole and send him on his away with gratitude , having steadied the ship and taken the team as far as he can -The final in midweek showed the lack of winners and hunger in the team and in the dug out.

The club then looks for a winner to take us to the next level and install hunger and a winning mentality, weed out those not on board.

Glazers will never do it though, top 4 is good enough for them, spend just enough to keep it respectable and maybe nick a cup.

I have to say Mr Holt sums it up perfectly right there.

2.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 11:11:30
It's really telling isn't it that Tuchel signed a 1.5 year contract with chelsea and wasn't given any contract extension even after finishing in top 4 and getting them to fa cup and CL finals, only after winning the cl is there a talk of extension while we handed one to ole just because var gave us a lucky decision in a CL R16.

3.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 11:23:21
Red Man - You strike me as an educated man. You are a knowledgeable and well respected poster but why direct your vitriol towards the manager when it’s the Club that keeps him in a job! It’s the Club that appointed him, the Club that will offer him a new contract and the Club which outline the ambition.

A top 4 finish is considered success at Manchester United, Ole is more than meeting expectations he’s going no where!

I’m tired of reading the anti Ole sentiment. Of course if we have any real ambition to win the league or champions league we need a better manager and better players but it’s incumbent on the Club to make the right decisions and demonstrate the necessary ambition.

Ole has delivered two consecutive top 4 finishes which no manager has achieved since SAF retired. Ole is excelling. Why would you sack a manager that has restored some stability to the Club and delivered the extra revenue of champions league football two seasons running when this is the principal target?

Manchester United are run as a business, the principal aim is to make money not deliver trophies. Unfortunately the Club can make lots money without winning trophies.

I’m made peace with the situation. We all spend hours reading these pages, debating managers, tactics, players etc discussing how the Club can improve and deliver us the success we all crave but the truth is the Club has different expectations than ours! We are no longer a Club obsessed with wining so whilst these pages offer us some comfort and cathartic release until our ambition is mirrored by the Club the wait will go on. It already stands at 8 years and counting!

4.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 11:53:10
The difference is the owners.

Ole hasn't been backed and has come up short. You can try to apportion blame but the rot is at the top.

5.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 11:56:16
dlib do you think when fergie retired that's the day the glazers decided they don't want to win anymore?

6.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 11:59:21
DLIB

Thank you first of all

I called upon Woodward to make a decision and said the board are emotional and dithering. I talk after games about the tactical and in game mis management but the decision is the boards, that is my aim right now. Ole is the result of the boards incompetence.

Ole is only excelling in keeping an emotional tie to 1999, a generation ago and a level of money coming in from CL to enable dividends to be paid. Emotions were very prevalent after 68, the emotion of winning an EC under Busby after everything that happened. I was around, born into it. We didn’t learn anything from wallowing in emotion, we went 26 years and the first 20 were a tide of emotion, harking backwards, chanting about long faded glory.

I said before SAF retired we needed a retirement plan, to learn from Busbys retirement and we didn’t. Now we are not learning from the emotional ride in the 70’s. We have as a result appointed the new Dave Sexton.

I won’t just accept the situation, I watched as we fans accepted it after Sir Matt and it was painful. I am obviously not as young as I was back then, I almost certainly don’t have another 26 years to wait and watch the mess unfold again.

Now I am with Ken, I wouldn’t buy merchandise or give them one penny so they can give it the Glazers in dividends. However, I also think I have a finite point with this, where as I get older I likely will have to focus on something else. For now I challenge the apathy, the incompetence, the wasted misdirected emotion about an ex player. I will not accept Ole until he wins the league or EC and I just can’t see that happening, so these are wasted years, just like when Sexton came. We knew that was a 24 carat error but had to wait years to put it right. Now we are there again and we are seeing similar football too. The reason people study history is to learn from the past, yet United don’t.

If it proves the club have no ambition maybe that is the moment I take my leave, enjoy my other interests as some of my elderly friends have, utterly frustrated in the club, but not yet and until then I have a burning ambition to win another EC. I just wish the club had.

7.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 12:56:56
Red Man - What further evidence do you need to prove the Club have no ambition?! Having read these pages, other fan forums, talked to other Utd fans, read countless media articles and listened to all the radio debates I don’t think there are many people, the majority of Utd supporters included that genuinely believe Ole has the necessary experience or credentials to win the biggest trophy’s however some argue that in a summer when he had to close a 30 point gap he was given a veteran striker, a midfielder he didn’t want, a back up full back and a couple of kids. Some argue he’s actually did as well as could be expected with the tools at his disposal.

I’ve read the comments about Tuchel and the great job he’s done but people forget Chelsea spent over £200m last summer and their record signing scored in the final. I’m absolutely convinced Tuchel would not have won the champions league without this investment and certainly not if Chelsea had signed Cavani, VdB, Telles, Diallo and Pellestri last summer. How would Chelsea’s season have unfolded if despite chasing Havertz all summer they ended up with Pellestri and Diallo instead? Of course we’ll never know but to dismiss the summer transfer window and heap all the praise on Tuchel doesn’t tell the full story in my opinion. Lampard obviously couldn’t get the best out of a very talented squad but he was given everything he needed to succeed. That’s certainly not the case at Old Trafford and Tuchel would not have won the champions league had he replaced Ole when we were top of our group after two games.

It’s not overly emotional, sentimental fans that keep Ole in a job but the football club that actually think he’s doing a good job and more than meeting their expectations!

Ken - Come on mate, SAF was a genius, probably the best football manager of all time or certainly in the debate. SAF kept on winning despite the Glazers and not because of them. There is a huge difference and surely you can make the distinction.

A new manager may give us fresh impetus and new ideas but the ambition of the Club is severely lacking to achieve any long lasting success.

What we are actually waiting for is a new SAF or the next Sir Matt Busby. The next brilliant man at the very peak of their talents that can install the correct mentality and drive the Club forward almost singlehandedly, achieving success despite of the owners and not because of them. One day that man might walk through the dilapidated corridors of Old Trafford and re awaken a sleeping giant. I’m not saying we can’t win under the Glazers but any success with be despite them rather than because of them and that’s the task facing any manager than takes up the challenge.

8.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 13:38:58
DLIB, since Pep took over City we've spent just €60 million less than them. I think our net spent is like €550 million.

I remember a thread in roughly 2017/ 2018 of how many Liverpool players would get into our team. Obviously bias plays a big part but most posters said very view would. I think Shappy only had 1 or 2 players from Liverpool in our combined teams.

Fast forward a year or two and the difference a top coach makes. Klopp made some of that team into the best in the world in their positions. A team with an identity, a plan and passion.

It's always deflect deflect deflect. We spend money. We spend shed loads of money. The idea that "Ole didn't want this player or that player". Salah wasn't Klopps first choice, either was Alison. I'm sure there's a few others in their too but he made it work.

This idea that we should only focus our attention on the Glazers is a stupid one. Of course they are the root of our problems but why can't a manager succeed in this environment? We spend money. We pay wages. We can attract top talent.

As I said the other day, I don't think we can dominate English football but there is no reason we can't be competing at the top end. A top manager could have us playing better than the sum of our parts. The idea that any manager is doomed is not one I can agree on.

Lesser teams with lesser squads of players have triumphed. Watch any great sporting achievement. There's always a top coach behind it. Changing the mindset of the players. We have a manager who threw in the towel in a title race halfway through the season. We have a manager who said trophies are only for your ego. He smiles after every 0-0. His football career mirrors his managerial one. He's happy to be a part of the Man Utd machine.

We can get into the nitty gritty of how we spend our money, but the fact is that we do have the tools to compete for top honours. We just don't have a manager in Charge who matches that ambition. The owners may be happy with top 4 but when that seeps down into the manager than it's game over.

9.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 13:52:23
DLIB

I don’t think the club have ever been particularly ambitious, it seemed to take the arrival of a leader in SAF to set them off, now it’s all lost again. The ambition was to win the EC in 60’s but the focus was because it was for those lost at Munich. Once won in 68 we lost all ambition until SAF arrived.

As to supporting Ole, have they not handed him £280m plus?

Simple fact is that if the Sexton level garbage we see from Ole is the extent of their ambition, then the fall will be sooner than expected, we will not have global superstar status much longer. The football has been that bad that the marginal supporters, the ones Woodward included in his noodle sponsor sales presentations have started turning off. Short sales are allegedly falling, that will ultimately hit them in the purse.

The answer is in front of them, the ambition, the aim should be to win 3 CL in a row. But that would need someone with the drive of SAF. For me Simeone and Conte would demand and drive forward, but if you accept the dross as is, the Fulham of the late 70’s, then how can you pretend to stand above the owners who provide it?

Stop accepting mediocrity as the only option.

10.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 14:29:17
Mumbles - I respect your opinion but you’ve also got the look at when this money was spent and how? You’ve also got to understand that City have a better squad and we’re playing catch up!

You’ve got to understand that there has been no investment in the infrastructure, stadium and training facilities whilst City have spent billions! I’m sure you already fully understand this but hopefully you get my point.

The money has predominantly been spent trying to keep us in the top 4 and not trying to win the league. Big investment has always occurred when we’ve finished outside the top 4 and not to close the gap on those above us in the seasons we’ve finished in the top 4 and needed to kick on.

I just can’t understand how an organisation can ever be successful when it’s not actually that concerned with winning and its priorities seemingly lie elsewhere.

I actually think we’re probably all saying the same thing. Most of us believe Ole isn’t good enough to win the top honours and most agree the Glazers aren’t particularly good for the Club. I suppose the real debate centres around could any manager really deliver success under the current incumbent.

11.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 15:42:40
Red Man - I tend to agree with that mate. If you look at the history of our Club it has been driven by two great men.

For the record I’m not an Ole fanatic. I’d have sacked him as soon as we got knocked out of the Champions League. The decisions he made in those final two games were amateurish to put it politely. On the other hand I can also sympathise with a manager that wasn’t given the tools to really succeed in what was in my opinion a shambolic transfer window last summer.

What Utd need is the next great manager that will bring their own energy, motivation and drive to a Club sorely lacking leadership and direction at the very top!

12.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 16:17:11
We're on the same side of the fence DLIB. I agree the facilities are well in need of an upgrade but the stadium being in bad condition doesn't change a thing on the pitch. Likewise the training ground isn't stopping us attracting talent.

On paper City dwarf us in everything right now. There's no point in comparing us with them because no one gets close to what they're doing off the pitch, but on it it's 11v11.

The reason I used Liverpool as an example was because it wasn't long ago we would have been in a better overall posistion than them. We have a bigger stadia, we have make more money off the pitch, our squad was better than there's. There turning point was hiring a world class coach. It turned decent players with potential into world class players.

I agree with you entirely on when we spend the money. We're reactive not proactive. But if we got a coach that could get another 10%-15% from our team we're challenging. No one has a Devine right to win any trophies but I would like a manager who is hungry for the fight and the huge task ahead.

13.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 16:23:03
DLIB

Simeone or Conte would add some real fire. We are drifting to irrelevance under Ole.

14.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 19:36:19
Whilst I’m no fan of how our club is run, looking at Chelsea as best practice is simply ridiculous. And not a club I’d ant to be a part of if we just sack A manager every 12-18
Months. What is the point.

15.) 30 May 2021
30 May 2021 22:06:12
Eric79

Winning trophies is the point and they are doing it far better than us without the emotional rubbish.

16.) 31 May 2021
31 May 2021 00:35:19
The difference is that RA isn’t too proud to admit that he made a mistake, nor is he bound by any sense of duty. If a manager doesn’t work, he brings in one who does and then repeats the cycle when results start to fade.

EW reminds me a lot of an investment banker who believes that a loss hasn’t been made until he actually sells the stock and so holds onto it, hoping that it will miraculously bounce back some day. He needs to learn to take the loss and reinvest in someone who actually has a clue what they’re doing.