Manchester United Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread - See Mod Warning in OP, 09/11

beno619

Larry Wildman wrote:

Re Mata, Mourinho didn't fancy him and he can't really get a look in for the Spanish national side. And the proof of the pudding is in the eating...He has been poor for United.

Mourinho didn't fancy Matic a couple of years ago. DDG couldn't get into the national side...

KH25

BloodBath wrote: »

The first was for dissent, not the foul.

I didn't realise that, cheers. No issues with the red so!

Johner

A deserved point in the end for United although still a sickening way to lose 2 points from a Chelsea point of view. As with most I was really impressed with Fellaini, he was popping up in nice positions between our midfield and defence. I think Di Maria struggled a bit with the physicality of Ivanovic but he had the last laugh any way! Top 4 won't be a problem imo, the signs are there that United are starting to gel, it's not perfect yet but this season should be more than enough for top 4 and comfortably. I still think Vlaar would be a good signing in January and then maybe go after Hummels in the summer.

Giggsy11

beno619 wrote: »

Mourinho didn't fancy Matic a couple of years ago. DDG couldn't get into the national side...

It was not Jose, Ancelotti was the manager when Matic was sold and Scolari might be the manager when he was signed.

Johner

Gowlasauras Rex wrote: »

Second yellow was a yellow, first was a yellow. Could have been booked for other tackles during the match.
Rightly sent off, not that it mattered when it was the last kick of the game.

Don't think the second was a yellow to be honest, might have deserved it for persistent fouling but an accidental trip with legs crossing shouldn't be a yellow.

beno619

Giggsy11 wrote:

He makes lot of rash and cynical fouls and gets away with it. Yesterday if Rafael made the foul like he did on Januzaj near the box people would have called Rafael an idiot, rash, liability and all the names under sun.

In a nutshell.

its annoying enough when it comes from clueless commentators or ABU’s even more infuriated when it comes from United fans.

beno619

Giggsy11 wrote:

It was not Jose, Ancelotti was the manager when Matic was sold and Scolari might be the manager when he was signed.

Mourinho signed him and never played him.

BloodBath

Johner wrote: »

Don't think the second was a yellow to be honest, might have deserved it for persistent fouling but an accidental trip with legs crossing shouldn't be a yellow.

Who said it was an accident? Top players like Ivanovic know how to skirt around the rules and how to foul to make it look accidental.

Regardless it's a yellow.

The Moldy Gowl

Johner wrote: »

Don't think the second was a yellow to be honest, might have deserved it for persistent fouling but an accidental trip with legs crossing shouldn't be a yellow.

Maybe the yellow could have been influenced for the persistent fouling. Could have looked like he did it on purpose. Either way it's not an issue if he had stayed on or not. 2 defenders watched the goal go in.

Johner

BloodBath wrote: »

Who said it was an accident? Top players like Ivanovic know how to skirt around the rules and how to foul to make it look accidental.

Regardless it's a yellow.

I think it looked an accident, maybe it wasn't but from what it looked like I thought it was a harsh yellow, that's just my opinion.

Johner

Gowlasauras Rex wrote: »

Maybe the yellow could have been influenced for the persistent fouling. Could have looked like he did it on purpose. Either way it's not an issue if he had stayed on or not. 2 defenders watched the goal go in.

Yeah from a Chelsea point of view it should been defended better regardless.

BloodBath

Of course, everyone has an opinion but nobody but Ivanovic knows if it was accidental or not.

Regardless if you run directly behind a player you risk clipping his heels and fouling him.

Clumsy or intentional it's a yellow card.

Larry Wildman

beno619 wrote: »

Mourinho didn't fancy Matic a couple of years ago. DDG couldn't get into the national side...

What's your point?

Mata wasn't fancied by Mourinho, isn't fancied by del Bosque and has been poor for United. That's three strikes.

Isolated incidents of otherwise excellent players (e.g. Matic and De Gea) not being fancied aren't relevant.

homerjay2005

KH25 wrote: »

And he was wrongly sent off too. Second challenge was a yellow by all means but not the first. The victim of a very poor referee. Ivanovic had a great game otherwise.

both incidents happened about 15 metres away from me. the first card was NOT for the foul, it was for mouthing off and he walked away with the ball - the ref was blowing his whistle at him to give the ball back and he didnt, so he booked him.

the second yellow was a stonewall yellow and already on a card, he should have know better.

MagicIRL

Do we have a RB cover for Rafael? I think it's safe to assume he'll miss games when he notches up more and more yellow cards. I thought Smalling did a good job at CB yesterday. It's one of the first times I was watching United and felt somewhat safe when the ball came to him.

Janko plays RB for the U21s, doesn't he? I wouldn't be surprised to see him get a game or two this season if Rafael got injured. If Valencia plays there I'll cry.

homerjay2005

would ye go for a sneaky low bid for Vidic in January?

i know its not going to happen, but its something that came up in prematch discussions yesterday.

wouldnt be a bad short term solution, especially if Moyes got the Inter job

KH25

homerjay2005 wrote: »

both incidents happened about 15 metres away from me. the first card was NOT for the foul, it was for mouthing off and he walked away with the ball - the ref was blowing his whistle at him to give the ball back and he didnt, so he booked him.

the second yellow was a stonewall yellow and already on a card, he should have know better.

As I said already I didn't realise it was for dissent. Sky made an awful mess of that whole section. Nobody seemed to know who the booking was for at first or even what it was for in the end.

beno619

Larry Wildman wrote:

What's your point?

A certain manager not finding a player suitable for the system isn't conclusive evidence that a certain player is poor/average/great.

Being voted Chelsea's player of the year in the season they won the European cup is pretty strong evidence for a certain argument though.

Larry Wildman

beno619 wrote: »

A certain manager not finding a player suitable for the system isn't conclusive evidence that a certain player is poor/average/great.

Being voted Chelsea's player of the year in the season they won the European cup is pretty strong evidence for a certain argument though.

Yes, not being fancied by someone in isolation isn't conclusive.

However, soon it'll be Mourinho, del Bosque and Van Gaal who'll have cast this guy aside.

Are they all wrong? The guy just doesn't do enough.

Timmyctc

Larry Wildman wrote: »

Yes, not being fancied by someone in isolation isn't conclusive.

However, soon it'll be Mourinho, del Bosque and Van Gaal who'll have cast this guy aside.

Are they all wrong? The guy just doesn't do enough.

Mata has played 6 times for us this season. Scored two goals and by all accounts played quite well thus far. How in King Eric's name has van Gaal cast him aside or even looked like doing that? Your post, as always, lacks basic logic sir.

On Fell.

According to the statistics, Fellaini covered 12.17km during the course of the game, almost a kilometre more than United's Daley Blind, the man next in the list.

That's more like it from a man in the middle of the park.

EDIT:

They also add this part. But I don't quite know what the arbitrary "Sprint" is.

More significantly, Fellaini also completed 70 sprints, a remarkable number for a holding midfield player and more than two Manchester United full-backs encouraged by their coach to overlap.

homerjay2005

beno619 wrote: »

Being voted Chelsea's player of the year in the season they won the European cup is pretty strong evidence for a certain argument though.

theres many many examples of players who were top class and had excellent achievements, but they either lost form or changed clubs and were never seen again.

using Matas Chelsea career as a defence mechanism against people who say his form is not good enough for United, doesnt really sit well.

as a person, i absolutely love Mata, he is a really likeable guy so i find it hard to be harsh on him but right now, i dont want him in the side if everybody is fit and i hope next Sunday, thats where we are.

duffman13

homerjay2005 wrote: »

would ye go for a sneaky low bid for Vidic in January?

i know its not going to happen, but its something that came up in prematch discussions yesterday.

wouldnt be a bad short term solution, especially if Moyes got the Inter job

Have you seen much of Inter? I seen a couple of games and they were atrocious at the back, not necessarily Vidics fault but he's not standing out either.

Larry Wildman

Timmyctc wrote: »

Mata has played 6 times for us this season. Scored two goals and by all accounts played quite well thus far. How in King Eric's name has van Gaal cast him aside or even looked like doing that? Your post, as always, lacks basic logic sir.

On Fell.



That's more like it from a man in the middle of the park.

Mata will be cast aside by Van Gaal by the end of the season...you can see his United career evaporating week by week.

Deiseboy01

BloodBath wrote: »

I've been saying Mata isn't good enough for quite a while now. I haven't seen anything from him in a United jersey to suggest he's good enough. The last 3 managers seem to agree as well since he's not first choice for any of them.

Saying that I though he performed better than usual yesterday. He got himself into some good positions and actually made some effort defensively. I even seen him make a block near our box. How often do you see that?

He delivered a sweet pass to Di Maria as well creating a good goal scoring opportunity and he could have had a goal if Van Persie had squared the ball to him on one of his shots. He was wide open in the middle of the box.

He's still a great player to have as back up but will he be happy being second choice? He would get more game time with more competitions next year but I have a feeling he would be suited to Spain or somewhere where his defensive liabilities won't be as much of a problem.

Where does this idea come from that a lack of defensive ability is not an issue in Spain? Applies equally in every league. In Spain you've the likes of Barca, Athletico, Bilbao etc. Playing a highly focused game all about being defensively minded, regaining the ball immediately once its been lost. High intensity pressing. Mata would struggle equally in most top sides Europe wide in that regard.

glued

homerjay2005 wrote: »

would ye go for a sneaky low bid for Vidic in January?

i know its not going to happen, but its something that came up in prematch discussions yesterday.

wouldnt be a bad short term solution, especially if Moyes got the Inter job

We should be looking to bring someone in. I'm not at all convinced by Rojo but you'd hope we'd get one starting center back from Evans, Rojo, Smalling, Jones, Blackett and McNair. I don't think we'll get someone in during the Winter window and hopefully by next summer we have 3 decent center backs. Sell the least promising of the rest of the bunch and bring in a world class center back. We're probably carrying too many defenders at the minute and the problem is that they're all injury prone too.

Either way it's time to sink or swim for a lot of these guys.

Larry Wildman

Guys like Xavi and Iniesta work hard.

Fabregas works hard.

Mata does not work hard.

Yes he's likeable but if that was the only basis for playing for United, we'd have Ant & Dec playing up front.

MagicIRL

The key difference over these two games (West Brom & Chelsea) is that Fellaini is playing as an attacking midfielder with a quality DM behind him.

Under Moyes, Fellaini was shoe-horned in to the Defensive Midfield role which he just couldn't do. This became pretty evident and Moyes then deployed him (if I remember correctly) as a #10 or even as a striker once or twice to try and get something out of him. Neither of these worked while at United, despite Fellaini having some success as the target man at Everton.

Now we're seeing him playing that box-to-box role and he's looked impressive in both his games in said position this season. It's going to offer a lot of options in midfield. Having Blind (Carrick) and Herrera/Fellaini available for that box to box role will serve us well, especially with the height and strength Fellaini brings to the team.

Dust off the wigs, lads!

Deiseboy01

homerjay2005 wrote: »

ive said this a couple of times before, but if i could sign one defender for United, it would be this man. he can play accross the back 4, solid as f*ck and has a threat in the final 3rd also.

Yesterday just confirmed it for me. he is a super player.

Totally agree, one of the most underrated players in the league and his consistency is amazing. Brilliant signing and iirc not a massive price tag? Which manager signed hin?

glued

Larry Wildman wrote: »

Guys like Xavi and Iniesta work hard.

Fabregas works hard.

Mata does not work hard.

Yes he's likeable but if that was the only basis for playing for United, we'd have Ant & Dec playing up front.

Mata does work hard. You've just bitten off and chewed the typical Sky Sports-Mourinho fed rhetoric.

kryogen

KH25 wrote: »

And he was wrongly sent off too. Second challenge was a yellow by all means but not the first. The victim of a very poor referee. Ivanovic had a great game otherwise.

He lived close to the edge for most of the game, but a serious player

KH25

kryogen wrote: »

He lived close to the edge for most of the game, but a serious player

A lot of the best live on the edge though. Occupational hazard as a defender really.

CantonasCollar

Giggsy11 wrote: »

Mata was played in his best position.

Rafael is not a liability. He was very good yesterday, he was booked around 6th min mark but didn't commit a foul (I think) for the whole 80 odd mins playing against Hazard.

Maybe liability was the wrong word. More and more I find that he does something avoidable to tarnish what has otherwise been a good performance. He is the best we have a RB, expectations are just so high after having GNev there for so many years.

Just going to have to disagree about Mata.

newballsplease

Havent posted here in a while or havent read the thread in a while but wanted to say, i was never a fan of Fellaini as a Utd player. I wanted him gone with Moyes.

But if he can perform like he did yesterday on a continous basis he can be a great player for Utd. Thought he was excellent yesterday.

DM_7

Rojo should improve when he gets used to the league. He has struggled when the ball is played long as he is not sure what to do, at this stage he has not played with any of the other centre backs enough to have confidence to go and meet the ball.

Once he plays more in England and gets to know the opposition players as well as his team mates he should be much better and more decisive.

Losing Vidic, Evra and Ferdinand in one summer was always going to have an impact on a cohesive defence. From just knowing the league and the players all knowing what to expect to things like guidance before a match on how to play against opponents.

Smalling on Rio for example:

“I was talking to Rio on Friday and he was giving me little pointers. He has played with and against Carlos Tevez for many years and seen him in training every day for a couple of years so he was giving me little bits of advice on how to play him.

“He was making the point that Carlos likes to feel the defenders at his back. So you let him have his touch before you move in and go for him. It was great advice because he is a tricky player. It was a really good challenge for me.

“To have that knowledge to tap into is incredible. You get so much feedback with players you are playing with, players who are injured like Rio and the many coaches we have. It really puts me at ease and allows you to enjoy the occasion.

beno619

homerjay2005 wrote:

using Matas Chelsea career as a defence mechanism against people who say his form is not good enough for United, doesnt really sit well.

Oh I agree one hundred percent.

The argument being put forward by some posters is Mata isn't good enough for the club which is plain outrageous.

I would agree that his time at the club has been below par.

beno619

glued wrote:

Mata does work hard. You've just bitten off and chewed the typical Sky Sports-Mourinho fed rhetoric.

Did some great defensive with yesterday IMO.

newballsplease

homerjay2005 wrote: »

would ye go for a sneaky low bid for Vidic in January?

i know its not going to happen, but its something that came up in prematch discussions yesterday.

wouldnt be a bad short term solution, especially if Moyes got the Inter job

How stupid would that make the club look in fairness?!

Non runner

beno619

Anyway the elephant in the room is still RVP.

Though he was below par yesterday and his goal probably gives him another week or two before people really get on his back.

Giggsy11

beno619 wrote: »

Mourinho signed him and never played him.

He was signed in 2009 (as per wiki) Jose was sacked in 2008.

Fuhrer

beno619 wrote: »

Anyway the elephant in the room is still RVP.

Though he was below par yesterday and his goal probably gives him another week or two before people really get on his back.

Yesterday was the best hes played in a long time, even discounting the goal his hold up play, and runs were great for the most part.

His finishing could be better though.

kryogen

Mata worked very hard yesterday. Particularly first half

Mars Bar

Van Gaal is a bit mad!

Wilson explains shirt number change

James Wilson has revealed why he moved shirt numbers ahead of the 2014/15 Barclays Premier League season.

The Manchester United striker, who came off the bench to help the Reds earn a 1-1 draw with Chelsea on Sunday, switched from 47 to 49 in the summer after scoring twice in the previous shirt on his debut against Hull City in the final home fixture of last term.

"I asked why it had changed as it wasn't my decision and, because I'm a striker, the gaffer wanted me to have a nine in my number," the teenager told ManUtd.com. "So he has moved me up to 49. I could have been 99 in theory, but 49 was the closest one."

Louis van Gaal clearly feels the centre-forward will benefit from the psychological effect and continues to involve him in his first-team plans as he also entered the fray as a substitute in the win over Everton earlier in the month.

kryogen

beno619 wrote: »

Anyway the elephant in the room is still RVP.

Though he was below par yesterday and his goal probably gives him another week or two before people really get on his back.

I'm not certain what people want of him? He makes good runs, takes up good positions, links play well, he has been guilty of being a bit indecisive this season but he is still playing pretty well. He is not setting the league alight like he did when he joined, maybe thats the problem?

He is a great point man, he does a good job for the team and he still has a knack for that important goal as evidenced yesterday.

People have been getting on his back since before the season began

DM_7

beno619 wrote: »

Anyway the elephant in the room is still RVP.

Though he was below par yesterday and his goal probably gives him another week or two before people really get on his back.

I thought he did well and looked more mobile, sharper than recent games

Held the ball up well and made some great runs Genuinely think he would have scored earlier against another keeper with less positional awareness.

ElChe32

Mars Bar wrote: »

Van Gaal is a bit mad!

That is brilliant.

kryogen

Sometimes I do wish players like Cleverely were still around so we could have an (almost) universal target for the negative comments

DARK-KNIGHT

kryogen wrote: »

Sometimes I do wish players like Cleverely were still around so we could have an (almost) universal target for the negative comments

Gone but never forgotten...

Cantona's Collars

kryogen wrote: »

Sometimes I do wish players like Cleverely were still around so we could have an (almost) universal target for the negative comments

We still have Young.

Good article here on the rebirth of Fellaini:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2809395/Marouane-Fellaini-infamously-cost-27-5m-endured-year-misery-does-finally-look-like-Manchester-United-player.html

Due to his influence,Fabergas only had 11 passes in the whole of the first half.He also completed 70 sprints,I reckon he didn't even manage that in the whole of last season.

jaykay74

Larry Wildman wrote: »

Yes he's likeable but if that was the only basis for playing for United, we'd have Ant & Dec playing up front.

That doesn't make any sense. Ant is a keeper.

beno619

kryogen wrote:

I'm not certain what people want of him? He makes good runs, takes up good positions, links play well, he has been guilty of being a bit indecisive this season but he is still playing pretty well. He is not setting the league alight like he did when he joined, maybe thats the problem?

Yesterday was his beat performance of the season. Still he's playing far below his level again I think hell be cut slack because he got the goal in the end.

I don't believe he's contributing enough though he probably did more than Drogba yesterday.