The Skipper

Ivanovic and Cahill are a nightmare atm.

Yeah. Let's ignore Courtois' massive saves before his slight error.

Unbelievable how our two best right hand side defenders are on the bench.

LOL.

Ivanovic is such a liability defensively sometimes.

Cahill getting spun once again... Dear me.

He's still out on the flanks tbh, just had a bit more freedom in his role.

Coincidence how Hazard is enjoying himself more now Luis is playing? I think not.

Don't go! Just do what I did - be less active.

I cannot believe you're comparing Kezman, Sheva and Torres to possibly the greatest player that has ever lived. Then you continue to say we don't need Messi because of Bamford. Wow.

Tbf, Mourinho has never talked up a youngster as much as RLC.

City had a very easy run in at the time, we didn't. Now they don't, it's very different.

Sorry I disagree with this a lot. Basically you are trying to insinuate that because Schneiderlin is more athletic (or faster) than Matic (mind you Matic obviously isn't in athletic) that he automatically becomes the better DM, and I think that's just not the right way to look at it at all. Sure, Matic hasn't been in blistering form recently so it's easy to forget that he does read the game very well and that the timing of his challenges are fantastic. How many times has Matic broken up dangerous play for us resulting in fantastic counter attacking opportunities? Earlier in the season people were saying that he was the best player in the league and they weren't too wrong - he was playing that well. It's very easy for you to come out and say something like this now he's been average for a few games on the trot but honestly, the only thing Schneiderlin trumps Matic in is probably speed, apart from that, Matic is hands down better in every single category, and I've watched a lot of Schneiderlin. Schneiderlin is definitely one of the better DMs in the league but no one in the PL can touch an on form Matic - when he's defensively fantastic and makes interceptions galore whilst still contributing massively to our offensive game by starting off the moves immaculately. People were calling Matic one of the best, if not the best DM in the world when he was really playing well and on form, and honestly there's nothing wrong with that because he was playing at an extremely high level. I didn't see you commenting on it then - so again I say... It's very easy for you to come out and say it when he's recently been average.

Xavi + Xabi Alonso fused. The ultimate Spanish midfielder.

Absolute nonsense. United are the 2nd richest club in the world (by revenue) and City are owned by the Abu Dhabi group, who are a lot richer than Wolfsburg's owners.

£43m for Pogba would be excellent. Count me in.

... Very constructive Leif.

It was still the right thing to do because it was clear our manager wasn't going to ever play him frequently enough.

Schneiderlin is a better DM than Matic? My word. Why do you even think so? Can you back that up?

Messi doesn't really play centrally anymore at Barcelona though. He's gone back to the right side of the attack (sometimes he swaps with Suarez but he isn't exclusively in the centre anymore).

I hope you now agree that City's run in isn't easier than ours.

Schneiderlin.

To further elaborate on my earlier point: We definitely made some changes tactically in the second half. In the first we were very deep, a lot more compact, and weren't committing men forward, especially after our goal (we had a decent 5 minute spell before that). In the second it definitely changed. Mourinho got more players to commit forward and we played with a much higher line and started pressing a lot more and played more physically - so I would say we caused Soton to retreat to their initial game plan; they definitely came to the Bridge looking to sit and counter but because we offered them so much freedom in the first half, Koeman allowed his players to revert to the more traditional way Soton play - which is trying to dictate the tempo. As soon as Mourinho realised that we shouldn't be as compact or patient and that we should play with a much higher tempo and line, we automatically took control of the game as we should've from the start. Remember, Southampton haven't played for 12 days iirc - that's a lot of preparation time. They weren't physically exhausted or anything - Koeman's tactics are just very, very flexible. It's the reason why they're joint best defensively with us in the PL this year. They can change their transitions in a moment, a very well coached team. As soon as Koeman realised that we were piling on the pressure he got his team to retreat into a low block and hoped that the pace of Mane and Long would catch us out, but credit to Azpi, JT (who I thought was great in the 2nd half, underrated performance. Made a lot of key interceptions) and Ramires (who came on and performed the Matic role excellently), who didn't give those two a sniff. Courtois was also a lot more proactive off his line because we pushed up higher, I'm sure this was an instruction from Jose (naturally, of course). Credit must go to Mourinho for actually trying to revert back to our more cavalier approach from earlier in the season, we haven't seen that from the team in ages. His subs indicated that we were going for the win as well. I really liked his Ramires -> Matic sub - haven't seen a risky sub like that from Mourinho in ages. Of course credit to the players who responded magnificently as well and tried to win the game.

Courtois Azpi - Zouma - JT - Luis Matic - Fabregas Cuadrado - Willian - Hazard Costa Please and thank you.

Thank you for collating my thoughts.