***Official*** English Football Season 2019-20

[cpr]

https://www.football365.com/news/ince-tells-man-utd-to-sign-no-brainer-alternative-to-mandzukic

Now I've aired some pretty ropey opinions over the years, and always stuck to my guns. But when I find an opinion I hold being aired by Paul Ince then I know I've got to back down an apologize....

 

[Uppercut]

Such a difference between United fan perceptions of Ibra when he played for us and perceptions of him now. At the time people found his performances pretty underwhelming.

Honestly they're both ****ing **** ideas. The fact that Ole is looking for elderly big men to temporarily build the attack around for 5 months just shows he has no intention (never mind ability) of building a cohesive attacking unit long-term. News like this shifts my position from "Ole out but there's no rush" towards "Ole out ASAP".

 

[sledger]

Mandzukic is awesome, but yeah, categorically not who I would look to if my vision was to undertake a long term project of rebuilding the attack with speedy highly-technical players.

 

[cpr]

I don't mind it as a very much plan B approach for when our attacks being stifled out of a game. Rashford/Martial/Greenwood sorta offer much of the same, and those days where passing and running it through a well organized defence isn't working. Sometimes debasing the game with 'toss it up to the big man' can work, especially against a defence thats well drilled against plan A but may panic when the style of attack varies away from their training ground routines. There's a reason why the 'send the big guy/centre back/David James?! up front for the last 10 mins' cliche exists, For all we ground when we saw Fellaini come on, knowing the long ball was going to be constantly deployed, it was actually effective at times, he caused enough confusion and got enough head downs to create chances we'd been denied earlier in games (when of course he decided to stay onside and not lead with his elbows).

I liked the Zlatan idea more for what he'd bring off the pitch. You got a strong feeling he bonded well with the squad (esp Pogba), and they looked up to him. The young attackers all gave the impression they learned a fair bit from him. Also he had the strong character and desire to win to not take any half arsed **** performances - when Ashley Young is your club captain you know you're lacking outfield leaders in the squad.

I never really found his performances underwhelming in their own right, certainly not in the first season - that entire team was underwhelming, but he was usually one of the better ones.... There's only so much he can polish a turd after all. The feedback from the fans seemed to suggest they weren't massively disappointed in him. Post injury its hard to recall much tbf, but we were even worse as a team then too.

 

[duffer]

From the Independent:

A training ground source says members of #AFC squad ‘mercilessly take the piss out of’ Emery, with many of the club’s younger players now openly do impressions of him in a way that is a lot more cynical than light-hearted “good ebening”.

 

[Furball]

Mandzukic is awesome

That's a funny way of spelling mediocre.

 

[sledger]

I see you are in need of assessment once again. Most regrettable.

 

[Uppercut]

I don't mind it as a very much plan B approach for when our attacks being stifled out of a game. Rashford/Martial/Greenwood sorta offer much of the same, and those days where passing and running it through a well organized defence isn't working. Sometimes debasing the game with 'toss it up to the big man' can work, especially against a defence thats well drilled against plan A but may panic when the style of attack varies away from their training ground routines. There's a reason why the 'send the big guy/centre back/David James?! up front for the last 10 mins' cliche exists, For all we ground when we saw Fellaini come on, knowing the long ball was going to be constantly deployed, it was actually effective at times, he caused enough confusion and got enough head downs to create chances we'd been denied earlier in games (when of course he decided to stay onside and not lead with his elbows).

I mean I thought Fellaini was a really useful player if used correctly, our fans treated him very unfairly, and letting him go was a mistake. But we don't need a plan B, we need to massively, massively improve plan A, and signing a big striker would undermine that process (if such a process existed, which it doesn't, so Ole out).

I liked the Zlatan idea more for what he'd bring off the pitch. You got a strong feeling he bonded well with the squad (esp Pogba), and they looked up to him. The young attackers all gave the impression they learned a fair bit from him. Also he had the strong character and desire to win to not take any half arsed **** performances - when Ashley Young is your club captain you know you're lacking outfield leaders in the squad.

So the "good in the dressing room" stuff, I'm not sure whether it's pure bollocks or just unobservable. I'm sceptical that signing a mediocre footballer with an excellent personality will make much different to a club's performance anyway, but I'm certain that we can't tell which players have excellent dressing room personalities from our sofas.

 

[cpr]

We can tell a bit from Social Media though, the players who are seen interacting with each other, training ground footage, comments in interviews etc. Of course its picking through propaganda, but there's enough there to get a general feel that Zlatan had a positive impact in the dressing room, in the same way there's enough to understand Sanchez didn't click at united.
Calling him a mediocre footballer is a bit of a miss IMO, he's obviously not as good as he was 10 years ago, but he showed more than enough when he was with us to show that even with a couple of years drop off he can still hold his own and make a decent impact for half an hour at the end of a Prem game.

Yes I agree plan A needs to massively improve, but to say we don't need a plan B is absolute fantasy. Unless you're absolute world class, you need a plan B. Utd always had one under Fergie. Upront Sherringham/Ole were different players to Yorke/Cole, and Rooney/Berbatov/Tevez weren't all the same. Behind them we'd play Nani for the creativity, but switch out for Park when his industriousness was more valuable and time on the ball would be limited. Sure lumping it up to the big man isn't a pretty tactic, but its worth having in the bank if a defence is playing exceptional at shutting down passing space and blocking off the runs - and it's not like Zlatan or Mario are donkeys with the ball at the feet.
The truth is, were not City/Liverpool, and can't stick to our game because it'll always win out - we've seen so much this season lesser teams can nullify it quite well if we aren't at our sharpest. We are not going to massively, massively improve that plan A in the winter window, so getting something different for cheap can't be a bad thing for the interim. It's not like we'll be blowing our budget on it and sacrificing signings in other positions, and I doubt were struggling for spaces in our PL squad given the number of youngsters we are using. It just seems, well, prudent, to throw something different into the mix

 

[Uppercut]

We can tell a bit from Social Media though, the players who are seen interacting with each other, training ground footage, comments in interviews etc. Of course its picking through propaganda, but there's enough there to get a general feel that Zlatan had a positive impact in the dressing room, in the same way there's enough to understand Sanchez didn't click at united.
Calling him a mediocre footballer is a bit of a miss IMO, he's obviously not as good as he was 10 years ago, but he showed more than enough when he was with us to show that even with a couple of years drop off he can still hold his own and make a decent impact for half an hour at the end of a Prem game.

I think we were probably worse when Zlatan was at the club than we are now. We certainly weren't much better. You can say there were other reasons for that, and you'd be absolutely right, which supports my argument that Big Character Dressing Room Personality Goodness isn't even in the top 100 determinants of team performance. It should never be used as a reason to sign a player if you can't justify it purely on footballing grounds.

OTOH, being a total bell-end in the dressing room should definitely sometimes be used as a reason not to sign someone. But that's a different scenario.

Ftr I didn't mean to imply that Zlatan is mediocre. Even if he's not good enough for United that would still be a pretty off-the-mark description.

 

[Furball]

So the "good in the dressing room" stuff, I'm not sure whether it's pure bollocks or just unobservable. I'm sceptical that signing a mediocre footballer with an excellent personality will make much different to a club's performance anyway, but I'm certain that we can't tell which players have excellent dressing room personalities from our sofas.

At Rangers I reckon Jermaine Defoe has been a hugely positive influence on Alfredo Morelos, to the point where I'd be happy for the club to extend Defoe's contract until the end of next season even if he didn't play for us again.

 

[sledger]

How can you possibly know that though?

I mean I'm not even saying you are wrong necessarily. But this is total conjecture.

 

[cpr]

I think we were probably worse when Zlatan was at the club than we are now. We certainly weren't much better. You can say there were other reasons for that, and you'd be absolutely right, which supports my argument that Big Character Dressing Room Personality Goodness isn't even in the top 100 determinants of team performance. It should never be used as a reason to sign a player if you can't justify it purely on footballing grounds.

OTOH, being a total bell-end in the dressing room should definitely sometimes be used as a reason not to sign someone. But that's a different scenario.

Ftr I didn't mean to imply that Zlatan is mediocre. Even if he's not good enough for United that would still be a pretty off-the-mark description.

Fair, but I genuinely believe Zlatan can be justified on footballing grounds, in that he's still got enough ability to score goals, albeit from an impact sub position if the game calls for something else. Considering there'd be zero fee, just hefty but affordable wages, the impact on other transfer moves is 0. A small increase on the pitch, plus a small increase in positive dressing room atmosphere, plus a very experienced player taking on a mentoring role to younger lads on the training ground, it all adds up to a fair positive impact for what, to us, it so little cost.

Theres potential negatives in the move, such as Zlatan demanding to be a regular starter etc. But if those are negated (or dont exist) then I'm struggling to see why its a bad idea so long as we aren't putting all our eggs in that basket (Hello Woodward, ah ****)

 

[cpr]

Anyway can we stop making me agree with Paul Ince please. I need a shower.

 

[Uppercut]

I suppose I’m just taking a ‘no more sticking plasters’ stand. You could say that a sticking plaster is better than letting the wound fester out in the open, but I don’t think so because the short term isn’t very important given where we are. We need to get our young attacking players working as a good attacking unit, even if that takes years, and 6 months of a Big Man won’t help with that.

 

[cpr]

I get that, which is why I'm trying to look at the off pitch positives - There was quite a bit of media bits about how the attackers loved learning from Zlatan on the training ground. Admittedly none of the ****ers applied it on the pitch, but I can see having him about would be of use to our front 3 in training. It's not like he's just a big man lumped in for target practice, he's a vastly experienced striker who's played everywhere and generally succeeded in scoring quite freely with head and feet. Being able to watch the effort and determination a world class player puts into practice, even when he's been there and done it all, would be worth having round to show the rest of the front line the effort needed to stay at the top. Whatever tips he can impart, be it technical or the mental aspect, will help us long term. The vibe I got from everything around his first stint was that he was a more than decent mentor, and whilst it would be a sticking plaster on the pitch, I reckon he'd be a decent shot of the good stuff at training that'll last long after he's gone. I've read a few articles on when we brought Larsson in for that 3 month spell, and the positives everyone took from having him in training (I don't actually remember him being overly brilliant on the pitch...), and if Zlatan can have that effect, then it's worth the punt.


Lets be honest, Mason Greenwoods gonna learn **** all about goalscoring from Mike Phelan

 

[andruid]

maybe Ole should try coaching them some of his goal scoring tactics. If its not too much to ask...

 

[cpr]

Because 'sitting on your arse for 80 mins' is not a viable tactic really.

 

[sledger]

Haha, "ok lads, what you need to do is not be good enough for me to start you, but be able to come on for the last few minutes of a match and score a late goal every time. Ok, got it? Great."

 

[Furball]

How can you possibly know that though?

I mean I'm not even saying you are wrong necessarily. But this is total conjecture.

Morelos' attitude and general demeanour on the park this season are much improved, and for someone who in the past has played like he absolutely hates other strikers, it's notable how often Morelos will run over to the bench to celebrate goals with Defoe. You can tell with the way they are with each other there's a great partnership despite them barely playing on the park together.