How will Man Utd cope without half their non-poo players? | OneFootball

Manchester United dominate the narrative after Monday’s 4-4 draw, with the next few weeks key in sorting out that bizarre table.

Premier League clubs measured against expectations

At the beginning of the season, I made some suggestions about what fans viewed as minimum expectations for their clubs this season, and possible repercussions of failure (outside reasonable tolerance).

Maybe it would be a fun time to revisit that, with the season at such an interesting point? Probably not, but nevertheless…

“City – #1 – how can their fans and indeed their manager and owner bear the thought of lower expectations than top?” Well my theoretical money remains on them, after getting through a tough early period. I don’t like it, but it’s what my gut says.

“Liverpool – #2 – while they should expect to be competitive again, I think they’d be happy with second and keeping it tight at the top. Reality might prove different, of course. But Champions to 3rd or below seems unconscionable. Who knows though; a Dutch manager after an overachieving first season then stumbles? It’s happened before…” Yikes! With where they are now, you could roundly argue that this stands as probably the aspiration. But landing that title should give him some flex. If they can achieve 3rd, I’d say he deserves another year. I think 4th is very much on the cards though.

“Arsenal – #2 – yes, also second. While reality again may be different, they’ve now added their biggest missing part and *surely* they can’t be happy with a backwards step. Could Arteta and his process survive 3rd? Can they actually take a step forward? I know what I think.” Yep, I still think they’ll end up as bridesmaids. Arteta will probably stay, and the fans will have to suffer the bottlers moniker.

“Chelsea – #4 – complete guesswork of course but I would think they’d be happy with fourth. Would the owners? As ever who knows. But I don’t think they are ready for a title challenge yet, and sitting comfortable outside the top three but above the rest is a nice place to aim.” Tricky one this. I think the manager absolutely needs to get 4th, but I fancy it’s going to be close between them and Villa and indeed Liverpool. Villa feel a bit thin, so injuries may be the deciding factor.

“Newcastle – #6 – going to be a big season for them. More pressure, risk of losing vital players especially if they fail. If they’re sensible, they should be happy with 6th, considering rivals.” Oh dear. I fear trouble ahead for this project, at least with this manager.

“Villa – #6 – similar to Newcastle, they need to maintain their upward journey, and retain players on the back of that. Otherwise the clutching claws below will be dragging them back.” Love to see a bit of over-achieving, and I really hope Emery sticks it. I think they’ll probably fall away a bit towards the end, but top 6 is definitely realistic. So is top 3. If City and Arsenal get a stumble on, they could do something very exciting. Wow, this Sunday got interesting!

“United – #6 – I think, while no one seriously expects anything above 6th after last year’s calamity, anything below that should probably see a new manager. Expectations may have been lowered but let’s not forget this side finished 3rd just a couple of years ago. Amorim has to do better than Ten Hag’s worst or INEOS have a lot of pie on their face. Also, no Europe to worry about.” Honestly, who knows any more. Could be 6th, could be 4th, could be 14th. Anything and everything is up for grabs. Which is nice, I guess? Match on Sunday really will give some interesting answers.

“Spurs – #7 – if we’re being realistic, considering the changes there and how last season panned out, plus the other teams involved being more developed, 7th is a reasonable ambition.” Yeah, no, 7th isn’t going to happen. Possible, but not probable. I don’t have a good sense for Spurs fans vibes, but the F365 mood rankings had them at 9th and that feels about right, but I think they’ll keep the manager anyway. Or a certain Palace manager might be there instead.

“Palace” I didn’t include Palace, but I did suggest there would be one wildcard and, as FA Cup winners, it stands to reason that it’s them. If they don’t get asset stripped at Christmas, I suspect they’ll be in the top 6 mix by the end of the season. And then they’ll be needing a new manager. Badwolf

It’s all about to get very interesting…

I watched the United/Bournemouth game as it was the only one on. I was more interested as I had a couple of players in my fantasy football team and wondered how things might be panning out going into the tough holiday period. While the pundits declared it the game of the season, it showed why the teams not in Europe aren’t making as much headway as they’d hoped. Sure, lots of goals, pretty open game, it showed a certain lack of control, chaos and lack of defensive focus. Mind you, some great goals and some incredible misses, the score could have been much higher.

For Manchester United, Bournemouth, Brighton, Everton, Fulham and even Brentford, this was an opportunity to consolidate their status and push harder for a European place. With many weeks featuring only one game week, the extra rest, likely lower injury rates as a result, and the time to plan and practice tactics against upcoming opponents, it should be a huge advantage. Compared to the 9 teams playing, who are by and large doing reasonably well to at least coping.

Yet it doesn’t appear to be that way. United in 6th, are the highest in the table, but have the same number of points as (a disappointing) Liverpool and (spectacular) Sunderland.

In a few recent games in which the team that had just played in Europe faced a team that had not, it was surprising how well the former team seemed to handle the extra workload. While the latter team had players who appeared to be struggling with the pace near the end. Are the teams that play in Europe generally fitter? Does the extra workload build to fitter players? Sure, the squads tend to be bigger, and there may typically be more rotation, but other than Chelsea, we haven’t seen that much yet.

So now all teams will be playing twice a week on a regular basis AND possibly losing some squad members to Afcon. Sunderland has the biggest risk, but Fulham, Everton, and even United will be losing key players.

Definitely an interesting season so far and it will be fascinating to see how the table changes over the coming weeks. Paul McDevitt

Man Utd and rather more toilet talk than anybody needs

To run with that analogy a little more.

The turd supply is very much still there, the products of which continue to steam away from time to time, occasionally letting through a goddamn awful stench, but what’s helped United this season is they’ve bought some lovely nice pot pourri that has occasionally helped to mask the foulness (Mbuemo and Cunha) along with Amad and the dependable Bruno, who have occasionally chipped in by sprinkling some glitter on to the underlying brown jobbie factory as well.

The problem for United over the next 4 weeks is that 50% of the pot pourri supply and 50% of the glitter isn’t going to be there, at a time where fixtures come thick and fast and so it’s probably even more important than normal that you keep on top of that putrid smell to prevent it hitting the back of your throat.

Mazraoui not being there to help out at the back is not going to help with the efforts to maintain a veneer of hygiene either.

All in all – it points to a very interesting month ahead, where we will find out just how important those players were at masking the crud-like smell, or whether United have at long last began to learn some much needed bowel control. Andy H, Swansea

Man Utd players came to life v Bournemouth

The suggestion that young inexperienced manager Amorim, unfamiliar with a big club or a big league, will view young Mainoo’s last cameo performance through the prism of his couple of mistakes rather than the obvious positives is both very likely and also astoundingly ironic for a manager that’s been the worst performing manager since WW2.

Yes, the ball bounced up and hit Mainoo’s arm. Is that a droppable offence? He also made the “mistake” of going in for a tackle (as a non-DM player being asked to play a DM role), and it not going perfectly. Can you imagine? Thank god, Casemiro never does that (or picks up a millionth red card) and gives away a free kick that leads to a goal.

And as per AdidasMUFC’s mail, if the manager can show he’s learned something – anything – and sticks with his adaptions but also recognises that young players make mistakes and that (as explained by the excellent Adam Clery YT channel) Bournemouth were razor sharp with their finishing, then things really could change for the better.

The way Cunha, Bruno, Mbeumo, Amad and even Sesko in his brief appearance came to life with this freedom was like a beautiful sunrise after over a year of almost daily very very grey skies and heavy rain. It’s the kind of set up that players like Lacey could come in to and stick the landing.

Will he? We’ll find out fairly soon, but after a year of seeing zero lessons being learned, I have serious doubts. Please let me be proven wrong. Badwolf

Peg chat

In his 1st point he talks up the redeployment and performance of Amad as a positive, and calls it a ‘square peg in a square hole’, as in a good fit.

In his 7th point he says that ‘Mainoo is a calm, foot on the ball, short controlled passing type player’ and that ‘Amorim wants his team to play like schoolchildren let out of school early’, concluding ‘Square peg’. I am not sure what was meant by this! Was Mainoo also a square peg in a square hole, a square peg in a round hole or, given he only played for half hour or so, a square peg not really in a hole at all! A, LFC, Montreal

On xG, Mainoo and more…

Chucking my 2p in on a few topics here…

Surely 11x Edersons is the way to go? I’d back him to score more vs an outfield player in the opposition goal than vice versa. I would have said 11x Allisons but considering how hard it is to find one fit Allison these days, 11 would be pushing it.

xG: so if I understand this right, the expectation of what happens in a given position takes no account of personnel or context? That is, the xG of me having a crack at goal from a spot 25 yards out is the same as Peak Tony Yeboah? If so, we’re going to need a full Salt Bae XI before we should go anywhere near this statistic. Surely everyone in the premier league should be outperforming their xG given how good the players are?

Saying xG is not a prediction, but then saying Liverpool should be more like 8th after their early games… That does sound a bit prediction-adjacent? Dare I say the word ‘eXpected’ should be replaced if people are using this stat to expect things?

Mainoo: I’m genuinely baffled about him tbh. When he broke through and received heaps of praise, I just assumed that with him being a deep midfielder, the stuff he was good at was stuff I wouldn’t see on MotD, so just accepted it. But I remember him playing for England in a couple of friendlies – Belgium and Brazil I think? – and him going fully in both games, with opponents streaming through the middle of the pitch in his stead. I think the Brazil goal came after he decided to chop someone in half right by the dugout?

Obviously an England friendly in the rain is not a great way to judge anyone, but I get the impression he’s the sort of player Wenger would have parked on the right wing for 2 seasons to see what he was made of. Maybe one of those full backs who move into midfield when their team is in possession would be a good role?

More on Kate…

No Kate, the reason this country is in the state it’s in now is mainly a decade of Tory incompetence, greed, and flat out stupidity. That and far too many people believing everything the mainly Tory press tells them, including too many people too quick and happy to believe that immigrants are the issue for some reason… (that’ll be the fascism that former commodities trader, sorry, man of the people, Farage is busy metastatizing on worryingly fertile ground – seemingly noone can be arsed to actually check the figures).

The 1% hoarding all the wealth telling the great unwashed immigrants are the enemy didn’t need to speak that loudly first either. Funny that. Granted, the current government aren’t covering themselves in glory, but unless and until there is some sensible and equitable wealth redistribution, I’d argue any government would/will struggle. Can’t believe we lost to f**king Peterborough either. RHT/TS x

…Just wanted to send my condolences to all you poor f*** who must be forced to read this (football) website. Finlay x

A Christmas wish list

Part of this Christmas thing is the pleasure in giving (& eggnog apparently) and this list of moves wrapped up in red and green stripey paper would give me pleasure .

Top first, Isak to Arsenal, he’d look much better in an Arsenal top than a Liverpool one and it is a present so they cannot say they can’t afford him, he’d make them champions to boot.

This would mean Gyokeres moving down to his level so – promotion with Cov’ .

I’m a big fan of Andoni Iraola so getting the United job while getting rid of the Glazers would be a lovely red devils present.

And a stocking filler would be Bruno Fernandes to Arabia.

Sticking with coaches. Pochettino to Spurs, now Levy has gone he can make them good again. I suppose Frank could take the States job in a winter switch.

Alvaro Arbeloa to Real Madrid’s first team, not because of his coaching abilities just he’d be more Zinedinesque which is hilarious.

I think Guehi loves the reds so a nice present for their rather shakey defence. Van Dijk on the bench pointing a lot while looking displeased .

Salah to MLS, don’t care where though I’ve heard Charleston is quaint.

In a team that I strongly dislike (though less so now Jackson isn’t there), I adore Cole Palmer so a nice present for the magpies to save the likeable Eddie Howe.

Just a few more under the tree:

Slovenian centre forward sounds right for West Ham and Benny Sesko would look good in claret.

Jamal Musiala could’ve chosen England and we’re desperate for a number ten so a present of re-electing his national team would be lovely just before the World Cup.

The great Keano went to Old Trafford from Forest so Elliot Anderson should be their next captain and once Andoni is in, Mainoo to play alongside him. (everyone glancing enviously over as Man United always get spoilt with presents).

The only player I can see following Salah’s numbers is Lamine Yamal but I guess the biggest presents are just dreams.

Mailboxers, please add any I’ve missed. Happy Santa.