10 Jan 2026 11:25:09
Amorim sympathy is peak on here right now.
Time to move on lads.
Agree8
Disagree0
11 Jan 2026 13:38:03
Utd Road you're one of those on here that have been banging on the drum to play a back 4 constantly. I've sympathy for Amorim to have to deal with this questioning of his formation when that's what he came here as. He deserves sympathy because he didn't get the backing to succeed that he should have.
When he had close to a full squad he demonstrated repeatedly the improvement he had promised.
If you get to harp on about formations for 14 months I'll move on when I'm good and ready.
11 Jan 2026 17:16:48
Yea time to move on and forget and forgive the board the glazers Wilcox berrada and Jim. That’s the problem with supporters like you, it’s just let’s move on start again. I’ve lost count now of how many times we have moved on.
It shouldn’t be treated as normal.
We are going to go back to last season form with a 442 with this squad we will be wide open. It may be exciting but we will lose more than we win.
11 Jan 2026 19:37:33
My one consolation is I stopped helping lay these goons wages a while back.
But Ineos have made a right title mess of things so far.
12 Jan 2026 00:31:22
Twenty someone said the other day we would win a lot of games playing 4 at the back
So we should be smashing it now.
The club deserve all they get from now till may
Hopefully they finished as low as possible and the rat Jim and his fools would have oversaw the two worst finishes in prem history
Like don red said with a full fit team we saw progression and improvement but the club as always like Amorim said himself they can’t handle the Gary Neville’s and experts on social media.
12 Jan 2026 16:43:17
Exactly bolger.
That's twice now they have caved to public moronic media and fans emotions to keep eth after the cup win was just caving in to people who couldn't see past the nose on their own face. Little picture people who don't have the common sense to widen their lens just a fraction. Sometimes its because their ego won't let them.
There was a clear media bias and agenda against amorim led by sky and some of the print media. They caved to the hyperbole again.
They have confirmed the business is working to a strategic plan.
That strategic plan will have had no dependency on what shape the 1st team play at all i'm 100% sure of that. So its not a case at all of starting all over again but there will be obvious tweaks that will need to be addressed.
We can all stamp our feet and say we want a sheik but we don't have one so its about hoping for the best with what we do have.
A few major errors have been uncovered 1 or 2 of that management team can't afford any more cock ups before they show some significant progress.
Next managerial apt is the key one to get right.
19 Jan 2026 16:17:29
Twenty we were already losing more than we win.
06 Jan 2026 18:08:00
I'd take de zerbi at the end of the season on the condition that Mason Greenwood comes with him. The club doesn't have the balls to do that though.
Agree1
Disagree0
06 Jan 2026 22:59:53
Jimbob,
Have you heard the voice recording? If you have and you keep posting about that scumbag I do worry.
07 Jan 2026 08:19:05
I've seen the video and heard the footage, I just don't care enough about this anymore.
Much like the people running the club don't care about the club.
There needs to be empty stadiums until the end of the season, but that won't happen.
Crash the stock price, force them all out.
It will never happen, but that is the only way.
07 Jan 2026 23:40:24
No idea what that has to do with backing a rapist to play for the club but never mind.
08 Jan 2026 10:01:18
Puts the rest of your posts into perspective Jimbo, I'll give you that.
08 Jan 2026 17:11:38
Keep eating the prawn sandwiches guys.
08 Jan 2026 17:56:27
Weird stuff Jimbo. But I've read your other posts 😂.
08 Jan 2026 20:52:04
Jim Greenwood won't be coming back to united.
Im Just pleased to see him playing well and seemingly living a happy life with his partner and children. Hope it stays that way for him. I hope he doesn't come back to the epl and stays away for a long as possible.
Being out of the lenses of the British media is good for him i'd imagine.
There was really awful stuff surrounding the whole episode only 2 people know the truth and they seem to be living a happy life together surely that's the only thing that matters.
08 Jan 2026 22:06:32
Angel, I've also seen your champ. pot kettle.
09 Jan 2026 13:10:14
You've seen his Champ? Reckon you should be discussing this on a different website!
09 Jan 2026 14:43:25
Ports, Irish champ is similar to colcannon.
09 Jan 2026 22:25:37
Katie Taylor is an Irish champ.
10 Jan 2026 19:08:43
Nice port, nice. You made me laugh on here for the first time in a while, well played! 👍.
01 Jan 2026 21:28:08
There is a lot of chat here about Amorim not showing improvement in the squad. It's an opinion forum of course but too often people are pushing their own preferences rather than evaluating Amorim fairly. Though many of the same also reject xG, that is entirely wrong as it is a better predictor of future performance and fairer reflection of current one (though if results constantly go either for or against it momentum can take over) .
So let's view xG points finishes over past few seasons
2021/22 8th (actual 6th)
2022/23 6th (actual 3rd)
2023/24 15th (actual 8th)
2024/25 12th (actual 15th)
Currently 5th (actual 6th)
We most definitely have improved. Our underlying metrics show that we didn't actually regress last year despite what some on here are spinning.
Our squad is awful. We have bought well last year and this year but probably only have maybe 15 players good enough for upper half side (with maybe 7 or 8 good enough for a CL side) . Against Wolves we were missing 6 of our good players. It should not surprise anyone that we were poor. Many of those players are the same that have shown over 2 seasons they are lower half PL level. And that's generous as Bruno has bailed most of them out.
Agree8
Disagree0
02 Jan 2026 10:09:00
Question. ) If XG is the probability of an average player scoring from that position, isn't it possible that over performing your XG is a sign of a good team and under performing your xg a sign of a bad team?
02 Jan 2026 11:09:20
I say it again. Xg is entirely subjective. The fact that it rarely if ever tallies with actual reality is evidence enough. It would never be entertained in the business world as it is fraught with inaccuracy.
02 Jan 2026 11:11:27
Sort of. As you say xG represents what an average player would do in that position given the same scenario. Sometimes good teams with poor attackers can create good opportunities but those players not take them. Over performance or underperformance of xG is more a reflection on the execution of that scenario so it's more a retrospective tool to evaluate players.
Nonetheless you can use xG (especially with penalties removed) as a good predictor of future performance. If a teams xG is consistently high that of course indicates they are a good attacking side. And that is a better predictor of future performance than goals.
02 Jan 2026 11:13:36
So high xG is a sign of a good team, low xG is a sign of a bad team. Good teams tend to have players that execute better than bad team, so they'll often outperform their xG. But it isn't predictive. It's more a correlation vs causation argument.
02 Jan 2026 11:31:15
Keefy T you are entirely, and woefully wrong. Businesses also try to use metrics like this all the time as better ways to evaluate their performance. It is not entirely subjective. That is the point.
And it does tally with reality. Goals are a more volatile number than xG (since xG is continuous and goals are not) . You get more information from xG because they capture chance creation etc more.
If they didn't add information do you really think that clubs that use this extensively. Brighton, Brentford, etc are all founded by people who advocate for this massively, but hey fella you seem to know better than Tony Bloom and Matthew Benham so you crack on.
02 Jan 2026 11:48:06
And how about xg against, i. e. the likelihood of us conceding? I'm guessing that's really bad. It doesn't matter how many goals you score if you are also conceding heavily.
02 Jan 2026 11:52:13
2025
12 won
14 lost
11 draws
38% Win rate
What about those stats?
02 Jan 2026 11:58:04
2023/24 we were 15th in xG against i. e. only 5 teams worse
2024/25 13th
Currently 9th
So we're not great but another metric that demonstrates improvement. And also demonstrates what RA inherited was shockingly bad.
02 Jan 2026 12:10:11
What's the point of that angelred? Obviously our results aren't good enough. If you want to be shorttermist that's fine. I'm not saying use only xG and ignore results am I?! Why create a false dichotomy. I'm asking for a fuller and more rounded evaluation. Other that Bruno the metrics show the squad that RA took over was a lower half PL side, possibly one that would have been in relegation trouble without him.
That squares up much more than the 8th place finish in 2023/24 to me. Your point would say we were much better that season than we actually were. Because people in the club also followed that nonsense we didn't start the rebuild for another year.
{Ed001's Note - but you are not using a more rounded evaluation. You have not included any context to the xG. For starters, offensive xG has to analysis who the chances are falling to as well to have any use at all. If you are creating lots of chances, but all falling to a player who couldn't score in a brothel with a fistful of 50s, then it doesn't matter how high a number you get.}
02 Jan 2026 13:18:09
Top analysts use passing chains to give more context for instance into who is contributing best to attacks. I get that not everyone will know or want to know the cutting edge approaches to these metrics but talking about them being useless, lacking context and subjective is so wide of the mark.
02 Jan 2026 13:13:36
Just wrong Ed001. You use it to evaluate players primarily. If a player is underperforming their xG you try figure out why. If the team is underperforming their xG because of the players the chances fall to you use that information to make adjustments. Your point is nonsensical. No good analyst would use xG without context. It's a non sequitur.
{Ed001's Note - but you are talking about it without context. Telling other people they are wrong when you are using it so blatantly wrong is just ridiculous. It is not my point that is nonsensical, it is the way you have posted that is the problem. You completely ignored context, now you are trying to make out it is me that is nonsensical. I won't bother again, don't worry. Pointless talking to someone that will just keep jumping to a completely different viewpoint and pretend it was what they said all along.}
02 Jan 2026 13:56:43
Ed001 what are you on about? I put forward another way of viewing our performances. That in and of itself gives a fuller picture. You jumped in to say I didn't give a more rounded evaluation. Unless you're expecting me to write a 30 page evaluation then your point was nonsensical.
Quite what you're trying to achieve by getting het up I don't know. Perhaps read the thread again. And maybe go for a walk and cool down.
{Ed001's Note - I am not the one getting het up, have you not read your posts. You are getting very angry over anyone questioning you.}
02 Jan 2026 14:01:22
Your point was that an xG analysis without context of which player the chances fall to is useless definitely is wrong. I stand by that. It still gives additional information beyond just the scoreline.
{Ed001's Note - ok mate, you are right, is that what you want to hear? So needy.}
02 Jan 2026 14:14:05
Ok fella. I didn't get angry. I pointed out that taking such a strong opinion as to dismiss additional ways to evaluate performance is nonsense. That's it. Anyway take your higher ground if you like. Hopefully others are more open minded.
{Ed001's Note - yes, I hope they are more open minded than you. You did a very good impression of a tantrum.}
02 Jan 2026 14:36:03
Listen Tris I appreciate you and all you do here. You misinterpreted tone and made a point I disagree with. Don't blow it up to mean any more than that.
02 Jan 2026 15:29:18
You've picked out 1 stat to demonstrate improvement, angel was showing another perspective, as was I. I think everyone can see some progress, but not as much as others would like to make out, and picking one single stat in isolation is pretty pointless.
02 Jan 2026 15:33:17
I come in peace. DonRed i quite agree in most of what you say. But its not exactly like that, constantly underperforming your expected goals is a sign of a bad team. But it doesn't work like that the other way.
No player has the ability to overperform his expected goals constantly, its about form (or luck? ) in a short period in which they overperform only for them to then underperform them and at the end the result is almost tie. For example Cristiano Ronaldo in his time at La Liga had the same goals (bar penalties) as his non penalty expected goals suggested, at the same time Lewantofski (i am sorry for spelling) did the same at Bundesliga. Here we speak theoritically about the 2 best goalscorers in the last 15 years and even them didn't overperformed.
There are exceptions, Son was the one because of the ability to score with his "bad" leg and Messi the other because of the ability to score outside the box-chances who has low expectations but he converted them. They are the two players constantly overperforming their xg worth mentioning, the other i think is Kane but he overperfomed by less margin.
Top teams have a big expected goals difference in common, 2 plus for expected goals and 1 or less for expected goals against, and then overperfoming or underperforming, doesn't matter, you will be there (near the top) . Have a happy new year everyone.
02 Jan 2026 16:16:31
Xgn8s an interesting if unproves metric. Taking a wider view, last season 10 teams conceded fewer goals than us. This season, so far, 13 teams have conceded fewer. We are scoring more, but are worse at the back, conceding more per game than last year.
We have a lot of options going forward, although Sesko needs to come to the party, but are not solid enough at the back. We don't need to score more goals, we need to concede fewer.
Our win rate this year is 42%, last year it was 33% (whole season), so that shows progress.
02 Jan 2026 16:21:40
That was my point AJH. But every time xG is mentioned somebody rocks in to criticise it as if the point is to use it in isolation. That was the tenet of the criticism here too.
Heaven there is a good lot of evidence that good teams outperform xG. Individuals don't do so consistently but good teams have more good players so at a team level it does tend to apply.
02 Jan 2026 17:05:54
I think it's worth extrapolating on the xG for teams. Because it is designed more to evaluate players, events like penalties tend to skew xG higher. But expected goals which are very similar to xG but are more like a rolling average of goals scored are what are actually used to gauge team strengths. This is what is used to give the odds on a team winning a game for instance.
Of course there are corrections for strength of the opposition, if it's a home game and so on. This number is far less variable than goals, and xG tends towards this faster than goals - again because it varies far less. It is not the be all and end all. Because of how volatile goals are (due to how few there are) football is a far more interesting game.
02 Jan 2026 19:04:03
Do Red I agree generally with you. Too teams don't always overperform the expected goals, I think Arsenal this year doesn't and Liverpool last year didn't. City very often does so I guess it's the quality of chances that each team creates. City under Pep usually create high quality chances, we otherwise shoot a lot from difficult angles-Rashford was guilty and Bruno I think always is.
Let's use an example to understand the above. Every chance worldwide averages 0,10 expected goals. A team can make 10 shoots with 0,10 xg each so has 1 expected goal. Another team doesn't always shoots but passes the ball a lot in order to find a big chance (a big chance averages 030 to 0,40), so with 3 big chances has almost 1 expected too.
For the first team it's perfectly fine to score zero goals from 10 difficult shoots (low propability shoots), so this reminds us who constantly underperform our expected goals. The second team is perfectly fine to score 1 to 3 goals (teams usually score 1 goal per 3 big chances but because we speak about big chances a lot of times they score 2 from 3 or even 3 from 3) and overperform the xg. The second team could be City who usually overperform them.
To summarize good teams tend to create better quality chances that leads to overperform the xg.
02 Jan 2026 19:25:17
Can't we just all keep it simple and agree that xg is a load of over analysed bollocks that's contributing to sucking the fun out of football.
02 Jan 2026 20:18:44
A load of waffle.
02 Jan 2026 21:03:33
But it's not bollocks. It's no coincidence that the team that wins the Premier has the biggest expected goals difference 9 times out of 10. Metrics such as xg are very useful, but you must know to put some perspective.
02 Jan 2026 21:48:06
If only I was totally and woefully wrong. I am an MBB and can tell you that stats based on factual inputs are considered robust enough to make decisions on, not subjective inputs. The reason is subjective data can fall foul of personal opinion and manipulation.
You have teams with an xg of 0.3 who win games against teams with an xg of 2.5. That itself shows that it cannot be trusted as a reliable, robust and factual metric. Your list above even shows that. None align.
Yeah sure you can use it to show what “should” happen all things considered but you cannot use it to say we will win the league next year for example. All you can say is that we could win it if we perform to that expectation.
But that round thing in the oppositions netty thing, more often than they put it in our netty thing is the ONLY stat that is robust enough as a stat.
02 Jan 2026 23:14:23
Keefy what is it that makes you say the data used to calculate xG is not based on factual inputs. That is just a strange critique. And of course actual goals and xG don't align. Your post already tells me it is not at all likely that you work directly with data but I'll respond anyway since you've made some argument from authority to try push a point.
xG on a previous game allows for a retrospective analysis. It can be used to predict future games because it gives a better evaluation of prior games than goals scored alone.
Example though you gave (I'll pretend it's expected goals) . For 0.3 the prob to score at least one goal is 26%, while the 2.5 team has an 8% chance. This assumes Poisson which you should understand if you actually work with data. So that's a roughly 2% chance of it happening. That this corresponds to a one I'm fifty event does seem right to me. Honestly that is a seriously bad understanding of stochastic measurements.
That should be the lifeblood of what your company does!
As for using it to predict next year's performance. Yes we could, but only if the squad didn't change, and other squads also didn't. I spoke about expected goals not being the same as xG but that xG can converge to it quickly. This is very similar to ergodic theory results. Again you should understand that if your claim is true.
"All you can say is that we could win it if we perform to that expectation. " That is true of any retrospective statistic but extrapolating to say it can't be used to predict future performance is just bizarre and again reveals a really poor grasp of predictive modelling. Goals themselves can be used for that but are less reliable than xG or expected goals.
02 Jan 2026 23:18:58
Exactly Keefy. All you can say is that "we could win it if we perform to that expectation" as you say and that's the point. Sometimes improvement doesn't apply on pitch but metrics can see the improvement.
Now we have the example of Aston Villa. Villa scored 4 more goals than her expected and conceded almost 9 less than the expected against. Metrics show us that they are lucky to be third and our eyes says the same (i have seen 4-5 matches of them that won without being the better team) . Expected goals show you that usually if a team overperform or underperform there will be a correction and at the end of the year you will probably take the position you deserve.
I use the words "usually" and "probably" because its not sure you will take what you deserve, the season is not long enough to always make up for a bad run or a long time with injury crisis or simply bad luck and a long period of underperforming the metrics.
I can tell you that. If a year had 100 (the more the better for these metrics) i would comfortably say that we would finish at top 6.
02 Jan 2026 23:23:05
*8% chance that they won't score. That makes it around a 2% chance that the 0.3 xG team wins against the 2.5 xG team.
03 Jan 2026 05:03:17
I understand exactly what you are saying DonRed.
I am not here to argue statistics or data analysis with you. I don’t have the time or frankly the inclination. Clearly you are fully conversant and fully understand the intricacies of dealing with random data over a fixed period of time. Stochastic is probably more befitting of what XG is trying to achieve given the randomness of all aspects of the game.
Heaven says it well. It needs perspective and no self respecting person would hang their hat on it. WelI I wouldn’t use it to bet on the outcomes of a game, but then who said I was self respecting 😂
But ultimately, and this merely an opinion, I still think XG is generally garbage.
If we played the same team week in week out with the same players, same referee on the same pitch and at the same time then of course the randomness is reduced and the data becomes more robust.
As you said you cannot realistically use it to predict next years games unless the squad remains the same and similarly it is somewhat flawed in trying to predict next weeks games unless the, just less so.
03 Jan 2026 13:42:06
In no way you can predict next year's results, the circumstances are different. But with metrics you can see where the progression is, and you can see where a team can finish in ideal circumstances if the year was big enough to prevent anomaly and big enough to allow correction (in bad runs, injury crisis etc) .
With players you can analyze better their performances and I think that's how Liverpool used to do business. Liverpool used to buy players between the age of 24-26 so they can have 3 full year of data of each player in order to minimize fail.
That was the age of Virgil Salah Mane Alison. Speaking about Salah, who people underestimate at the time, in a specific metric that shaw us not only expected goals or expected assist, but the overall contribution, Salah was second in the whole Europe behind only Messi. We didn't know that, Liverpool did so they buyed him. We only could see his lack of goals, Liverpool knew that goals will come because metrics says. That's the strength of metrics.
28 Dec 2025 13:38:23
According to The Times, Ericksen has made some interesting comments around some of the things RA has said.
If you remember, RA called the team the 'worst team maybe in the history of Man United', which apparently did little for morale.
'That didn't help, ' Eriksen told the Times. 'Yeah, that didn't help at all. I mean, that was not… I don't think that helped the players at all. Some stuff you can say inside and it's not too clever to say outside, to put extra pressure and put an extra label on the players who were already trying to do their best'
He also highlighted the pressure of playing for United expectations are so high, due to continual comparisons with the past.
He was complimentary about the club and his time there but it makes a change to get and opinion from a player instead of a bland soundbite. RA is perhaps too honest for his own good sometimes, I think he still overshares which will be niggling some players. Hopefully he will learn what to say publicly.
Agree1
Disagree0
28 Dec 2025 16:41:17
His press conference can be very negative and detrimental on the players confidence. More so last season, than this one.
Sometimes you need to lie and make things sound better than they actually are.
28 Dec 2025 17:09:48
I might be in the minority ajh but the comments for me are yet another ex player having a dig and blaming the pressure of playing for man utd on them just not being good enough.
28 Dec 2025 17:45:43
I'm not sure we can look at Eriksen that way John, he's a complete professional who has been successful at the highest level, and he was complimentary about the club. He was asked a question and gave an honest answer.
28 Dec 2025 18:42:56
Were was he so successful? That's been the problem united players have not been able to handle the truth he got rid of the ones that couldn't and rightly so still a couple of entitled ones left they will go soon enough . We all wanted rid of the high earners not doing enough.
Ericksen was one of them. Nice guy good profit but under performing and under achieving. Good riddance to bad rubbish. He knows nothing of being a success at united. That's real pressure imo.
28 Dec 2025 19:05:32
You can't handle the truth!
Jeez, I get people want to defend the Manager but I think Eriksen gave a considered answer. If anyone thinks publicly describing the team as the worst United team ever was a sensible thing to do, them I'm lost for words.
We're making progress, RA is showing some flexibility and creativity, he's learning and adapting, pointing out he was careless with his comments is not treasonous.
28 Dec 2025 19:35:09
I don't consider them one bit careless. Bang on and accurate. How many of them in today best 11?
28 Dec 2025 19:37:47
I'm not saying ericksen is not being truthful about how he felt about it. In saying that those offended by it should be gone. If they could not recognise where they were then and be accountable for it then good riddance.
28 Dec 2025 19:56:50
Well we"ll have to disagree. You think it was the worst United team ever, I disagree. 🤷♂️.
28 Dec 2025 21:42:38
I think he is a lot more calculated than you give him credit for. He was in the process of sorting the weak mentality in the squad from the rest he got his answers and took his actions. Not finished yet.
Challenging players through the media can be tricky.
Fergie Jose and pep have been the masters imo.
Do you think its any coincidence that he challenged the academy players 2 weeks before he knew he would need them in the squad and possibly team?
31 Dec 2025 10:39:57
That is Eriksen's opinion, and like all opinions it is routed from ones own perspective.
He didn't like what the manager said publicly, and maybe he was one of those who struggled with the pressure that the managers comments put on him.
Ultimately diamonds are formed by pressure, and we need diamonds at our club.
Other players have handled his comments well and have managed to improve under him.
We are dealing with people, and people are fickle. What works with one person doesn't with another.
The manager himself has come out and been honest when discussing himself with the media. Saying that he has learned a lot during his first year at the club, and with hindsight that he would probably have done things differently. He isn't holding the players up to a standard above himself, he demands the same from himself, and he appreciates that he and his players will make mistakes but that they must learn from them and grow.
I still have full faith in this manager, I haven't really seen anything from him that I would call an obvious error or mistake. When you look at the context of the situation his decisions are always well thought out and justified, even the ones that don't turn out as we would hope.
We have to appreciate just how far our club have fallen away, just how much needs to be done to get us back to where we want to be, and the reality of how long that will take.
Progress isn't linear, sometimes it's two steps forward and one step back. But that back step gives you a chance to look at the bigger picture, we're those two forward steps in the right direction or were we walking down a cul de sac.
The most successful people learn from their mistakes, but to do that they have to be given the freedom to make those mistakes in the first place, and the time to learn from them and move forward.
Ultimately there are probably dozens of things the manager in hindsight would have done differently. But there is actually no guarantees that if he'd done them differently that things would have turned out better. Different certainly, but not necessarily better. That's the problem with hindsight, it tricks you into a false belief that if you just did this or that then you'd have gotten the outcome you wanted. When all you really did was found one of the million ways to fail at your target, changing how you failed might mean finding a successful way to achieve it, or just another of the million ways to fail.