Jase

Looks like Pulisic's injury is nothing serious, if you're not the conspiracy theorist kind.

Oh...

But Vidic was hardly a known quality when he joined United, was he? Anyway 👇🏻 https://www.dailystar.co.uk/sport/football/former-old-trafford-captain-nemanja-18684384 https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1279039-man-uniteds-decline-how-united-have-regressed-tactically-since-queiroz

Where did I say we don’t need better defenders? All I’m basically saying is the defensive coaching side of things is also important and you don’t have to be a defensive manager to be able to coach. Fergie had his assistant Queiroz to do that at United. Also even if our defence was creaking in Conte’s second season, it never got as messy as we have been in this season.

That was under Sarri. This is under Lampard, who would play the young players. So why not have the new contract with the wages based on performances if it's all about game time? Again, what if by giving them a big contract so early that they lose that hunger and desire?

What does this have to do with other manager? Still doesn't change the fact that we have been a collective defensive mess all season, making the same mistakes over and over again. Leicester and Sheffield United this season for example don't exactly have world class players across/in their defence but they have the second best defence in the league. Why? You can only blame the players for so long. They are a problem, but so is the defensive coaching. I remember when Fergie used to have Carlos Queiroz do the defensive coaching side of things at United.

It's easy to say that and I'm not naming anyone, just saying in general. Still playing with fire with such an approach. What if the player suddenly lose their motivation after getting such a big contract having not done anything yet? Would rather promise them an increase in salary based on performances, return in goals and assists etc.

Yes but what I'm trying to say is when we used the back 3 at Wolves and Spurs, it was used to counter them specifically. Lampard said so on both occasions, it looked like he had worked with the players on the system because the players looked comfortable and knew what they were doing in those 2 games. But when it was used against Valencia, Southampton and Arsenal, the formation looked haphazard at best and the players looked clueless, not knowing what to do or how to play it (Lille away was the only occasion it kinda worked). It felt as though Lampard simply went with that formation because it worked in the previous game and just tried to paper over the defensive organization cracks. Regarding the defenders not being good enough at defending, I don't necessarily disagree but good defensive coaching goes a long way to help players defend better, as individual and as a unit.

Yeah but the problem is, every other young player would probably want a similar contract to CHO now, especially when he got it based on potential rather than having performed consistently, which they may well use to argue their case.

That's not the wing position, is it?

Not expecting high octane football but just some sort of reaction to our dominance, like a change in formation or something just to give us a food for thought. His subs was like-for-like in terms of position. Aubameyang was non-existent going forward, Lacazette was invisible, could have gone with 2 up top for instance.

Nothing new with keeper and defender screaming at one another during a match. This was after the game... The bigger question is...DOES KEPA SAVE ANYTHING?! It feels like the only meaningful save he's made in the league this season was against Ben Foster at Watford.

The club have really dug a hole for themselves by caving in for CHO...

What a waste that would be. Just because Werner can play there, it doesn't mean it's his best position.

With you, it's definitely the latter.

As well as they defended, it's also strange that Arteta changed nothing to stop us from dominating the game. Granted we never looked like scoring until Leno's blunder but he was sure playing with fire because one goal from us would change the game and it sure did. Arsenal had just 3 shots after they scored and none were on target.

Good to know you're still alive! Hope you had a great B-day.

It was the same thing earlier this season. Started with the 3-4-3 at Wolves and we won 5-2, then he started the same system in the next game and we duly lost to Valencia with a very flat performance. I just don't get why Lampard persisted with the back 3 when on both occasions, we played it to specifically counter opposing teams.

Oh. Didn't realize archived threads are still visible to everyone.

Should I just combine the Youth and Senior players' individual thread in one place? I noticed that there are a lot dead threads in here.