Tomo

United have already got a proper (and top class) attacking midfielder in Kagawa but Moyes decides to play a 40 year old ahead of him. With Moyes there Barkley will be just as starved for game time as he would be for us, if not more.

Exactly, i would like to think if we had someone so obviously talented as Pogba is, he would get a damnsite more than 7 appearances.

There was the incident with Pogba aswell, he was young, talented and potentially a solution to United's midfield problem, so what do they do? play him a mere 7 times over the whole 11-12 season (3 of them in the Carling Cup) and lose him to Juve. To think we get enough stick for average players like Sinclair, Bruma and Mancienne never playing enough, imagine if we made a fuck up on that proportion?

Dont kill me While your here then, what do you make of Felipe Santana? From what i saw he was good cover for Subotic and Hummels and offered pace which those two don't, but when i ask people about him i get a mixed response. Was it a mistake on their part to sell him and could he be a nuisance when we play Schalke?

Exactly, i don't see where United get this reputation from that there so great for young players, they haven't been for years.

Actually someone posted the stats on the 5 biggest backward passers in Europe last season (might have even been on this thread) Mikel wasn't on that list, Iniesta and Xavi were.

So he can play under a tactical dinosaur who benched him while playing Phil Neville?

That's what? 6 times you have posted this in 5 pages. We get it, you don't like Mikel.

That's true, if we had a team to the strength of Bayern, Real or Barca in the prem, it would be very, very hard to see us winning it but our rivals for the title aren't actually all that. United have to deal without Fergie for the first time in two and a half decades and Moyes's playing Giggs is going to hold them back. City despite all the weird hype aren't actually all that, they have an off form keeper, a Kompany injury away from being all over the place at the back and Yaya Toure is actually very inconsistent, we shouldn't be fooled by his displays against us.

Ofcourse he is going to say that in public, he is probably telling players every day in Cobham that we are going to win it at Anfield.

---------------------------Cech----------------------------- Ivanovic--------Cahill----------Terry----------Bertrand ------------------Mikel-----------MVG--------------------- De Bruyne-------------Oscar--------------------Hazard ---------------------------Eto'o----------------------------- Subs: Schwarzer, Azpi, Luiz, MVG, Willian, Mata, Schurrle. Basle are no mugs, you saw what they did against United two years back, we can't do to much rotation, the reason for picking Bertrand and not Azpilcueta is that it will be a risk picking two players who haven't played all season (apart from a few minutes at OT for Azpi) so it's boils down to who needs a rest more and imo it's Cole. Save Luiz for Fulham too.

@Rubber bullets, Regarding the Terry and Lampard bit, JT has been playing regularly this season because he deserves too, he hasn't done that much, if anything wrong. Lampard should be playing less however.

We have some young players, but we aren't actually that young a squad. The average age of the team's we have put out this season is 28.

Spot on. Cech's the reason Drogba goal was a equalizer and not a mere consolation. Cech's the reason Drogba was the hero and not the man who tossed away another Champions League final. Cech's the reason Drogba is truly known as the man for big occasion and not the one who fucks up in Europe when we need him. Cech's the reason we won the CL instead of being on the receiving end of probably the biggest thumping in the final for decades.

They were back in the first two years yeah, but as their reliance on Messi goes up, the less good they are to watch, imo. I don't have a problem with teams that want to play that way, if they like tika taka then that way should be respected, what annoy's me is when those teams look their noses down at teams that don't play the same way or similar. Like for example, the way Arsenal fans use to look their noses down at Stoke.

He didn't, we had one good performer that night and that was Cech.

Even worse when the opposition try taking the moral ground, like in 2009-2010, we battered Arsenal twice with great defense and brutal counter attacking football, they hardly create a chance of real note in 180 minutes, but were trying to claim the moral victory because they played more short passes and triangles

I think the supposed "attractive game" is over-rated. Arsenal back in 2009 and Barcelona for me aren't even pleasing on the eye to me, i think passing the ball around in traingles isn't that good to watch and personally i love watching teams who will force opponents into submission (Chelsea 2005-2010, Madrid). I hate this perception of good football, there's a lot more ways of good football than just tika taka.

Maybe my standards have gone down after suffering with Torres for so long, but i thought he had a pretty decent game, he missed a couple of chances, but a striker reguarly getting in position to miss those chances is something we have longed for ever since Drogba lost his form.

That's a fair point, but also if you keep performing to the same standard eventually you will get your reward, look what happened to Bayern after the 2012 CL final?

Since when was Manchester United away not a real test?

Yes finishing is a part of the game, that night we took our's and Munich didn't. But Munich (apart from the finishing) were good that night, they made us look like school boys, if Drogba skied that header they would have probably been lauded for such a dominant performance in the biggest stage of all.

You can't be serious?

At the end of the day we are on the same points and United and City (yes the same City who are apparently a super team who are going to dominate England and take Europe by it's neck, that one)

We won the Champions League final but lets not kid ourself's, it was the most one sided Champions League final for a long, long time (even more so that Porto vs Monaco). It should have been a humiliating defeat, but some sort of footballing god was on our side. Munich was probably our worst performance in the Roman era, our whole team apart from Cech had a mare, we will never be able to truly re pay Cech for that night, ever!!!!! The point im trying to make is we got away with a shite performance that night, but we didn't get away with it forever (Athletico and Juve the following season, going out at the group stage), the same as we won't lose forever if we keep performing like yesterday.