OneMoSalah

Obviously their facts? I mean am I disputing that they didn’t happen? I think you’ve got the severity of the injuries the wrong way round also. Reece and Ben both suffered big knee/ACL injuries in the last few seasons whilst Kante really was just the victim of little reoccurring niggling injuries although this season he did miss an awful lot of football. And his hamstring couldn’t of been that bad that when he came back some of his performances looked alright? Or his games for France? I think people are just writing his him off for his age. Which is moronic aa their have been bucketloads of players in their 30s in the past 5, 6 or 7 years that have continuously proved this notion wrong. It doesn’t help that we seem to only be interested in buying 18-21 year olds either as well as people seem to think buying really young necessarily means better also. It it well noted Reece has had a lot of injuries in his career already. Multiple that have been reoccurring, particularly with his knees and ankles. And Chilly had his ACL and reoccurring hamstring issues this season? Hardly “little tweaks that just need time” are they?

Needs to focus on getting himself fit and sustaining a good run of no injuries over the next few seasons. Has all the tools to be an absolute stalwart here but has to get that part sorted. Particularly when people have shown how important playing is regardless of how good you are with the whole Kante situation.

Criminal decision by the club. Absolutely criminal. But what a career and at least he’s gone to somewhere where we wont necessarily regret it as he isn’t playing for a direct rival/competitor.

Maybe on the books it looks good but football isn’t played on a spreadsheet. Also not to mention we wouldn’t give half as much a shit about this side of it if Boehly, Eghbali & co had been a bit less excitable in certain transfers in the summer (Cucurella & Koulibaly) and January (Mudryk as well as actually maybe looking at selling some of the players who had no future here). But on the pitch, what we lose/have lost in those players - its not easy to replace. Caicedo could easily be another Cucurella and for the £100m plus fee that Brighton will want - I wouldn’t be surprised. Lavia could be another Carney but at almost triple the price if you trust some of the reports. We need some sort of proven quality with similar characteristics and leadership skills to replace these kind of players. Its as if we haven’t learned any lessons and are just going to continue throwing stuff against a wall and hope it sticks. Like there needs to be some sort of happy medium in our transfer strategy, it can’t just look good on a spreadsheet or we might as well become Benfica, Leipzig or Ajax. Also this injury thing re Kante. I am sick of hearing it. We just had what 2 seasons where how many players were constantly out injured? We just gave Reece a 7 year deal at the beginning of the season despite the fact he’s been in and out the team the last 2 seasons with injuries. Chilwell signed an extension despite the same fact he’s been in and out a lot in past 2 seasons. We wanted to give Mount an extension despite the fact he struggled with injuries this year? If these were in the same position would you advocate the same approach? Kante’s return and some of his performances were actually positives in what was a dismal season.

Lets be honest theres no such thing as loyalty in football these days. Plus he’s going from a club who finished 12th to 2nd, where there isn’t as much uncertainty around it. Again as mentioned, I am not surprised we have seen an exodus of players and staff this last 12 months, something is definitely happening at the club that whilst in the long run may work out for the good (or may not) has concerned me. No doubt players and staff in and around with more exposure to whats going on and involvement will likely have concerns. Just because they haven’t said they wanted to leave the club or shown that or necessarily went about anything like that, doesn’t mean everything is all good. Thiago Silva done an interview to French media after our CL exit that raised a lot of questions about the going ons in the club. Players like Jorginho, who turned down Man City to come here, Kovacic, who left Real Madrid to come here, Mason Mount, who came through the academy here, Ngolo Kante, Antonio Rudiger, have all left/are leaving for various reasons. Losing this calibre of players in a short period never looks good.

Losing Kante for nothing and agreeing a 30m fee (only guaranteed 25m as 5m is add ons related to performances) with City to sell them Kovacic is bad enough, never mind that it looks like our plans to replace them is to spend probably £130m minimum on Lavia and Caicedo…. I am sorry but our transfer strategy is fucking wank. Poch alone isn’t going to be able to give all the required experience and leadership to this group, we need some actual proper boys in there who have got a bit about themselves.

Going to be £100m upwards I’d imagine, any club spending a fee of £40-50m for Lavia is just going to further ensure that Brighton go well he’s worth more than double that. Not to mention they probably rank him up there alongside Declan Rice in terms of value (WHU talking about wanting £110-120m including player/adds on apparently).

We aren’t getting Caicedo for £70m. What a crock of shite. We would of got him in January if they valued him at that….

Interested to see how he does, hopefully he plays as a 10 as he won’t cut it as an offensive outright 9 here. We need a number 9 regardless. Coming from the Bundesliga that skepticism will always be there for me as we’ve seen with Werner and Havertz, scoring goals in Germany doesn’t necessarily mean its a given that it will translate to the PL. And if I am really honest, by no means does Nkunku look a better player than what Havertz did at Bayer Leverkusen but he is much more mature so he has that going for him. His numbers are good the last 2 seasons goals wise and from 2019-2022 he has good numbers for assists so its promising but again he has to bring that to this team. I think Poch will use him like he used Dele Alli at Spurs, in that role running beyond the CFs.

Partey cant be depended on fitness wise all season though - which is the same argument here for us letting Kante walk out on a free. Plus there isn’t a huge gap between him and Rice, in fact I would say there really isn’t much of a gap if at all. Partey maybe better technically but isn’t much else where he stands out as a better player, Rice more mobile and physically not much in it. I genuinely see Rice taking Xhaka’s place though not Parteys.

Tbf there were several people on here where saying City’s treble was tainted due to financial breaches and whatnot a few weeks ago and are now in absolute shock that other fan bases have the audacity to accuse us of having dodgy Saudi links because of PIF and Clearlake, although I’m pretty sure it was common knowledge prior to the takeover….. Have to be careful of how these dealings go, I do get the feeling that perhaps down the line this connection could be one that is further investigated by some of the footballing authorities. Not sure what they find but ultimately, think folk should focus on what happens on the pitch a bit more than off it, particularly in regards to these links for us and City last season. Or Newcastle. Or Man United.

Big ask maybe. In all fairness though, has anybody actually ever seen this kid play in mens football yet? I think he played in MLS but again, never seen him play once myself. Have seen a few MLS games when I was in Houston back in April & May though and the standard is absolutely atrocious.

Genuinely not concerned by him going, he had a very good first season yes and made some huge saves in that time in the CL games also but its not like he is going to a top club. That speaks volumes for me - if he was that good then he wouldn’t be going to play in Saudi, but he is, so yeah. Different to Kante though - should have kept him as he could still offer something here.

What did people expect though? We need to sell players. We cannot demand excessive sums and clubs know that. Been saying this for months now we will lose good quality players for lower prices. If any of these Saudi deals collapse for Koulibaly, Mendy and Ziyech though we are pretty fucked as it sounds like they are given us decent fees for players nobody else wants to pay for. There is also no way United will pay what we want for Mount and I am doubtful that Arsenal will pay €80m euros for Havertz as being reported, I don’t think any clubs that stupid (although we were).

Yep. I doubt he would of even continued playing for Villa if we didn’t sign him. Not under Emery anyway thats for sure. Don’t see him doing anything in particular that would make us regret selling him, not even convinced he would play at AC Milan just seems an odd link. Genuinely wonder what folk who believe he is going to go on and make us regret selling him see in him because even at Villa, he didn’t remotely catch my eye. Would of taken McGinn or Luiz ahead of him any day of the week - and even then I am skeptical of how those 2 would do at a bigger club.

Precisely. He only wants Inter so it will inevitably be a shit deal for us or another loan.

I think they have to be a bit more progressive at times next season although there was some games with sequences where you could see bits and pieces of how EtH’s Ajax played also but would say United were a bit more rigid than Ajax who were a bit more free. I don’t think he will be able to completely instil that way of playing from Ajax to United either as I would imagine with some of the players he has at United he can tailor things to utilise certain skills. Plus Ajax always play in that style, although theres always slightly variations. Overall though, from how I looked at it, it looked like EtH focused more on resetting the attitude and mentality as well as trying to get back to that sort of ‘this is Man United’ of the past. Where as under Jose, Ole and Ragnick you got the feeling they were soft and would roll over after any little struggle. You’d expect them to go on and buy a few good players this summer and keep building. They did have some big losses though which again, difficult to shake off despite what you’d expect has to he considered a very positive season for United but they seemed to be a bit more resolute and not cave in moments where they did before.

Mata and Fabregas “a bit single dimensional” as players? Good god. Just stop. Wow. Please. Yes if Mata and Fabregas (who is still already one of the best PL midfielders of all time - even more impressive for supposedly being ‘a bit one dimensional’) were more athletic they’d of been better. Or in modern day football maybe bit they were still top top players. All players have weaknesses. In particular I believed Mata when he was here could have become more if he stayed and done what he did for another couple of seasons as he was one of the most technically gifted and talented footballers I’ve ever seen in the flesh but not overly convinced Mourinho knew how to implement him into his system. But the issue was also apparent as we seen with KdB and I think that this high pressing Klopp/Pep style also phased his kind out. But Benitez also a defensive, disciplined manager seemed to find a way to use Mata as a 10 whilst Mourinho effectively refused to so I don’t think Mourinho can say he got that one completely right. But Mata’s career never ever hit the heights after leaving here. The point about Fabregas is even more mind blowing, he was a key part of winning 2 European Championships and a World Cup for arguably the best generation of Spanish players their ever will be as well as being part of one of the best club sides ever in that 4 year period with Pep. But sure he was a bit single dimensional…..

Perhaps. I think with VdB at United and even his spell Everton, he isn’t necessarily a typical number 10 or a typical number 8 - he’s a weird player to categorise. At Ajax he and Tadic both seemed to interchange and play in this weird withdrawn CF role, particularly in CL games. Not a bad player and not a bad skillset as typically to be expected coming from Holland and Ajax but maybe just not suited to a top top club. Or PL football in a more rigid system. Point regarding Dutch league is also valid but the likes of Ziyech, VdB, FdJ, de Ligt all got big moves after working with ten Haag. There are different levels of ability and talent there but I think he’s shown he can bring the best out of certain players and bring them on. Has shown this particularly with likes of Marcus Rashford, Bruno Fernandes and Luke Shaw already at United. Granted Fernandes maybe stat pads certain performances but there seemed to be a bit more of that impact he had when he first arrived there last season than the huge disappearing acts he would do at times in the season before last. Likes of Shaw & Rashford would of probably been chased out of OT with pitchforks before he came in. Thats why I get the feeling there is still enough there and enough about Mount that someone like ten Haag, Klopp or Poch could get him back on the right path but if he doesn’t want to he here, can’t force him to stay. Not expecting him to go on and become absolutely top top level but as we’ve seen under Tuchel in the CL run, on his day he can make a big impact.

Nail on head both times but you cant argue with stupidity. Seems to be a lot of it going around.

A bit Overrated? Good god. Would take Barella here in a heartbeat, not many players who are as good as he is at that sort of box to box role where he can run beyond the strikers. Depends on the system though, clubs that don’t play a 3 man MF, its harder to see him fitting in as he does at Inter and Italy. Wait and see Liverpool will get involved soon enough if its only £50m. The windows only been officially open one day.

True but its not to say that Poch cannot take Mount on another level or get him back to playing as he did under Tuchel either. Its one of those where either we try it or we don’t. Yes he hasn’t been good the last year and a bit or so but he’s had a lot of fitness issues and ultimately we have been piss piss poor. Performances he put in also weren’t up to scratch but he made progress with Tuchel then regressed undoubtedly, but so did a lot of players. I think if he goes to United and works wirh ten Haag, it could have success story written all over it, I really do. I mean look at how the likes of Tadic, van der Beek, Ziyech etc all thrived under him at Ajax particularly in European competitions and then struggled under other managers. We have to be careful also because who do we sign to replace these guys? We need to sell before we buy clearly in some instances but we have to be sure we are going to get a certain calibre of players in and get some of the players that are certainly not good enough out first (would say priority should be getting rid of Kai, Ruben, Connor, Christian, Hakim first).

Wait and see though, no doubt the player will end up saying he would prefer a move to Italy… Bayern’s strategy has never been to buy 30, 31 and 32 year olds either so cannot that happening. Did you watch United at all this season? Or are you going to tell me that stats dictate everything. He played as a 6/8 next to Casemiro most of the time in a deeper more withdrawn role with Fernandes much more free and higher (except not in the big games). Not as a 10 or wide 10 where he had played at Ajax, Spurs and Inter. His passing ability definitely helped United and ten Haag implement and improve their play through the midfield as he can dictate a game and play through the lines. Phillips was a good player at Leeds but should have went to Man United and played every week prior to moving to City. Or stayed at Leeds but how often do y the chance to go to City under Pep? Your point could also be argued about Grealish but he also proved a lot of people wrong this season passed and was one of their key players too. No Mount and Gallagher aren’t superstars but Mount was an extremely key cog in a CL winning side. Gallagher not anywhere near but again, I am defos concerned about Mount being a good player elsewhere.

Yeah we are going to price clubs out of Mount deal I think. If we get £50m, sell him. If not and Poch wants him to stay and we can work a deal, keep him. The clubs not in a position to make huge demands either as we definitely need to sell before we can buy by looks of it. This has only really stemmed from poor planning and recruitment strategies by Boehly, Eghbali and the footballing lads who took more responsibility on in January, clearly. Arsenal want Havertz too, wait and see they’ll offer £50-55m and we will reject it wanting best part of £75-80m for someone with 2 years left on his deal and who hasn’t delivered on what was a huge outlay. We’ve lost that hard to negotiate with, with this new approach and owners in comparison to what we had with Roman and Marina. No doubt we will loan out £100m Lukaku again and Koulibaly at this rate too - despite the insistence we would look to sell players of no use as opposed to loan. But again the position we are in squad size wise and FFP wise - we have it all to do.

Barella close to Newcastle. £50m. What a fucking signing that will be. Wow….. we should be all over this @Gundalf Eriksen not a great deal for United? Don’t be so daft. Was a key signing, Sabizter also solid enough to cover Eriksen who picked up a big injury without being spectacular. Phillips was never going to play ahead of Rodri also - anyone who thought otherwise hasn’t got a clue about football. Verdict still out on Jorginho at Arsenal but we would of been better keeping him as an option ahead of RLC and Gallagher.