Mason Mount's Misfortune

NLunited said:
It makes no sense. There must be a reason he‘s not playing that we are not aware of. He‘s not even coming off the bench.

Neither is Mejbri which is also concerning.
Click to expand...
Surely in Mount's case it's because he's been utter garbage and a waste of a player. He offers nothing other than that he can run around. I mean Fred could do that and we'd have saved £55million.

McT has become flavour of the month for his two goals the other day but reality is I don't think ETH knows his best midfield especially with Bruno being dire and Mount being as bad if not worse since joining (appreciating he's been injured).

Eriksen has to start to give us an element of control in games for 60 minutes or as long as he lasts. Beyond that I've lost confidence in everyone and I think ETH has too.
 
Is there a single core quality to attacking midfield play that Maddison isn’t infinitely better than Mount at?…..
 
I dont believe for one second that he's already fallen out with the manager or that the manager chose him in the summer and has already given up on him in less than 10 matches. I think we'll find out he had an injury or personal issues

That doesnt mean I think he'll come good on his transfer. Just that I'd be surprised if the manager is so weak willed that he put his name on the line with a player and gave up so easily. Whether he turns out good or bad for us I think he'll play plenty of games for us over the next 2 years and may well outlast the manager
 
Ekeke said:
I dont believe for one second that he's already fallen out with the manager or that the manager chose him in the summer and has already given up on him in less than 10 matches. I think we'll find out he had an injury or personal issues

That doesnt mean I think he'll come good on his transfer. Just that I'd be surprised if the manager is so weak willed that he put his name on the line with a player and gave up so easily. Whether he turns out good or bad for us I think he'll play plenty of games for us over the next 2 years and may well outlast the manager
Click to expand...

my suspicion is something along the following:
  • ETH decided he wanted to play this high press double 8 formation at all costs
  • His key criteria for signing was someone with elite pressing stats and last 3rd turnovers
  • Mount looked very attractive on a spreadsheet
  • Brings him into the team and the defensive foundations haven’t been solid enough to allow for a proper functioning 4141
  • And Mount himself has underwhelmed in his technical abilities on the ball (which was pretty predictable)
The frustrating thing is, on balance surely it’s much easier to coach an elite technician with good athleticism to be proficient at pressing, than coach a decent presser to be technically gifted. If he just wanted an elite presser for turnovers he should have just kept Fred.

The dangers of “Moneyball” type signings in football. For me, Mount never passed the eye test, and although I’d love him to prove me wrong, I doubt he ever will.
 
Last edited:
Astonishing that people can be writing off Mount after a handful of games yet the same people wanting to shoehorn McTomminey into to the side after about 200 games of being abysmal.
 
I do think he’s a good player but signing him seems pointless at the moment. Surely ETH had a plan for him
 
sammyhol said:
my suspicion is something along the following:
  • ETH decided he wanted to play this high press double 8 formation at all costs
  • His key criteria for signing was someone with elite pressing stats and last 3rd turnovers
  • Mount looked very attractive on a spreadsheet
  • Brings him into the team and the defensive foundations haven’t been solid enough to allow for a proper functioning 4141
  • And Mount himself has underwhelmed in his technical abilities on the ball (which was pretty predictable)
The frustrating thing is, on balance surely it’s much easier to coach an elite technician with good athleticism to be proficient at pressing, than coach a decent presser to be technically gifted. If he just wanted an elite presser for turnovers he should have just kept Fred.

The dangers of “Moneyball” type signings in football. For me, Mount never passed the eye test, and although I’d love him to prove me wrong, I doubt he ever will.
Click to expand...
Is it really moneyball?

That phrase to me implies something with a little more smarts and nuance than signing a high profile, completely exposed (in terms of skillset and potential) English player directly from a rival for a sizeable fee. I'd say that's just a fairly unimaginative approach if anything. You could give a guy in the pub 60 million to spend and they could come up with that idea quite comfortably with no particular additional analysis as it's such a known player.

Also Mounts numbers have not been anything to write home about since his form plummeted for club and country over the last year or so. So that's not really tallying up with a hugely data driven decision. I think it was a lot more about sentiment than facts. For whatever reason they couldn't resist the opportunity to sign him with his contractual situation.
 
Abraxas said:
Is it really moneyball?

That phrase to me implies something with a little more smarts and nuance than signing a high profile, completely exposed (in terms of skillset and potential) English player directly from a rival for a sizeable fee. I'd say that's just a fairly unimaginative approach if anything. You could give a guy in the pub 60 million to spend and they could come up with that idea quite comfortably with no particular additional analysis as it's such a known player.

Also Mounts numbers have not been anything to write home about since his form plummeted for club and country over the last year or so. So that's not really tallying up with a hugely data driven decision. I think it was a lot more about sentiment than facts. For whatever reason they couldn't resist the opportunity to sign him with his contractual situation.
Click to expand...

The moneyball point was more in regards to his supposed specific skill set of last 1/3 pressing and turnover… a la the “getting on base” principle in baseball. I have no idea whether that was the rationale behind the purchase… but it was my suspicion..:

actually it was more of a hope tbh. Because if the decision was in fact made by ETH and the coaching staff, and the criteria was more on the form and eye test of “who is a current elite 8/10?”, Mount should have been nowhere near the conversation.

But the way ETH talks about players and tactics, and with signings like Antony, it seems clear to me that he likes specialists who do a specified function, rather than free spirited natural footballers.

whereas someone like Pep takes gifted footballers, and drills them to the point where they can perform a specified function whilst still having the natural ability to consistently perform to an elite level.
 
We put way too many of our eggs in this basket. Simply way too much. I think it was to build around our counterattackers but the formation change sounded like a gimmick destined to fail but also the players who would have been beneficiaries of this plan are nothing special themselves and probably aren't worth building around.
 
Greck said:
We put way too many of our eggs in this basket. Simply way too much. I think it was to build around our counterattackers but the formation change sounded like a gimmick destined to fail but also the players who would have been beneficiaries of this plan are nothing special themselves and probably aren't worth building around.
Click to expand...

yeh I kinda agree with a lot of this…

however, as I’ve said in other threads, I’d go a step further to say this 4141 formation and style actually goes against the biggest strengths of our best (albeit flawed) players.

- Casemiro - good progressive passer and ball recovery specialist, but clearly not got the legs or positional discipline to play as a sole CDM

- rashford - forced far too wide away from the channels where he is effective, and has to get too involved in build up where he struggles. Creates additional defensive duties for him too

- bruno - creates congestion in the 10 spot where he thrives on space, and requires him to get more involved in deeper, possession retention based moves which he is weak at

- Shaw (when fit) - brings him central, removing his probing ball carrying runs out of defence which have been massively important for us, and lessens effective overlapping of rashford.

it’s just so weird that he continues to try it, when all our best football this season has been when he has reluctantly shifted to a 4231 when chasing games, usually by bringing eriksen on.

Eriksen was the actual type of player we should have tried to find a younger, fitter, like for like replacement of!
 
He was a weird signing in the same way DVB was. Made no sense to us laymen so we have to assume the 'experts' have some kind of clever plan behind it right?

Then here we are a little while later, Mount apparently with no obvious spot in our starting 11 as many would have predicted.

Who knows how it'll turn out, but we can without a doubt say that this was not the best way to spend £60m..

It can't go as badly as Donny did, right ?!
 
sammyhol said:
Is there a single core quality to attacking midfield play that Maddison isn’t infinitely better than Mount at?…..
Click to expand...
Maddison didn’t win the balon d’or, … sorry, I meant Chelsea’s player of the season, not once, but you know, twice!
 
sammyhol said:
yeh I kinda agree with a lot of this…

however, as I’ve said in other threads, I’d go a step further to say this 4141 formation and style actually goes against the biggest strengths of our best (albeit flawed) players.

- Casemiro - good progressive passer and ball recovery specialist, but clearly not got the legs or positional discipline to play as a sole CDM

- rashford - forced far too wide away from the channels where he is effective, and has to get too involved in build up where he struggles. Creates additional defensive duties for him too

- bruno - creates congestion in the 10 spot where he thrives on space, and requires him to get more involved in deeper, possession retention based moves which he is weak at

- Shaw (when fit) - brings him central, removing his probing ball carrying runs out of defence which have been massively important for us, and lessens effective overlapping of rashford.

it’s just so weird that he continues to try it, when all our best football this season has been when he has reluctantly shifted to a 4231 when chasing games, usually by bringing eriksen on.

Eriksen was the actual type of player we should have tried to find a younger, fitter, like for like replacement of!
Click to expand...
Casemiro - is all those + he is a very sloppy passer who gives the ball away far too often

Rashford - comes across as half-hearted and lazy, wants all the glory and forgets it's a team game

Bruno - tries too hard and gets over-excited, assumes everything good is his repomsibility resulting in stupid mistakes

Shaw - his positional awareness isn't always the greatest, but he's generally fine

Eriksen - every team is looking for someone like him, not too many around, we need to manage hime carefully and use him in games that will suit him
 
I was very skeptical about this signing and I still think we could have used the money for other areas but it still is really early days and who knows, maybe Bruno might decide to leave for another club at the end of this season. To me though it just has never looked right to have them both in the same team (in the centre of the pitch) which was clearly the plan.
 
sammyhol said:
my suspicion is something along the following:
  • ETH decided he wanted to play this high press double 8 formation at all costs
  • His key criteria for signing was someone with elite pressing stats and last 3rd turnovers
  • Mount looked very attractive on a spreadsheet
  • Brings him into the team and the defensive foundations haven’t been solid enough to allow for a proper functioning 4141
  • And Mount himself has underwhelmed in his technical abilities on the ball (which was pretty predictable)
The frustrating thing is, on balance surely it’s much easier to coach an elite technician with good athleticism to be proficient at pressing, than coach a decent presser to be technically gifted. If he just wanted an elite presser for turnovers he should have just kept Fred.

The dangers of “Moneyball” type signings in football. For me, Mount never passed the eye test, and although I’d love him to prove me wrong, I doubt he ever will.
Click to expand...
Another factor with the high press and two 8s, is back four. I think when Varane and Martinez are back ETH can try going back to that and we might see Mount get more starts.
 
Our obsession in stockpiling no 10s is disturbing. We've done it with Mata, VDB and now Mount.
 
KD6-3.7 said:
But then not even using them properly so you can add Kagawa to that list as well.
Click to expand...

Yeah because flash news, you can only play 1 no 10 at a time. ETH got lucky that Eriksen could be dropped in a deeper role. However that was a miracle that, to my knowledge, happened only twice in the last 40 years of Manchester United (ie Scholes and Eriksen). I never understood why we buy players only to refuse playing them in their preferred role. If we need a DLP then we buy a DLP.
 
sammyhol said:
yeh I kinda agree with a lot of this…

however, as I’ve said in other threads, I’d go a step further to say this 4141 formation and style actually goes against the biggest strengths of our best (albeit flawed) players.

- Casemiro - good progressive passer and ball recovery specialist, but clearly not got the legs or positional discipline to play as a sole CDM

- rashford - forced far too wide away from the channels where he is effective, and has to get too involved in build up where he struggles. Creates additional defensive duties for him too

- bruno - creates congestion in the 10 spot where he thrives on space, and requires him to get more involved in deeper, possession retention based moves which he is weak at

- Shaw (when fit) - brings him central, removing his probing ball carrying runs out of defence which have been massively important for us, and lessens effective overlapping of rashford.

it’s just so weird that he continues to try it, when all our best football this season has been when he has reluctantly shifted to a 4231 when chasing games, usually by bringing eriksen on.

Eriksen was the actual type of player we should have tried to find a younger, fitter, like for like replacement of!
Click to expand...
I think our biggest undoing is that the front 6 in this formation don't keep the ball well at all bar Antony and he has been out due to his issues. It could be tactical, we set out to create 'transitions' through the high press and actually succeeded but we weren't clinical enough to turn those turnovers into goals see the Brighton and Spurs matches.

Then the defense didn't push up as expected so there were vast spaces between midfield and defense so in instances where Case pushed up to support the attack he had vast spaces to defend a feat very few could accomplish even at their peak, maybe only Kante.

To succeed at this we'd actually need to rip out the core of this squad - Bruno, Rashford, Casemiro and maybe replace Varane with a quicker more robust CB. This is more difficult to do than simply buying a ball circulating 8, dropping Mount and pushing Bruno up in a 4-3-2-1.

We have to pray that Kobie or Hannibal is ready to share that 8 role with Eriksen in the interim otherwise ETH is fecked and we along with him because we have spent the best part of 1/2 a billion on him and another manager will want to get rid of 3/4 of players he brought in.
 
devilish said:
Yeah because flash news, you can only play 1 no 10 at a time. ETH got lucky that Eriksen could be dropped in a deeper role. However that was a miracle that, to my knowledge, happened only twice in the last 40 years of Manchester United (ie Scholes and Eriksen). I never understood why we buy players only to refuse playing them in their preferred role. If we need a DLP then we buy a DLP.
Click to expand...
Eriksen had already been playing deeper for Brentford and quite often Denmark before we signed him. It's not something that ETH changed and got lucky with, it's the position Eriksen has mostly played in ever since his medical issue.
 
MadDogg said:
Eriksen had already been playing deeper for Brentford and quite often Denmark before we signed him. It's not something that ETH changed and got lucky with, it's the position Eriksen has mostly played in ever since his medical issue.
Click to expand...

Sure but there's a difference between Brentford and Manchester United
 
sammyhol said:
Is there a single core quality to attacking midfield play that Maddison isn’t infinitely better than Mount at?…..
Click to expand...

No. And there isn’t a core defensive quality that Maddison isn’t better at, either.

We, as usual, have paid 50% more for a significantly worse player.

And the troubling thing is that it’s not like we overrated recent form. We’ve had a habit of buying players who are out of form, but overpaying for them regardless.
 
Cantona’s Kung Fu Kick said:
Astonishing that people can be writing off Mount after a handful of games yet the same people wanting to shoehorn McTomminey into to the side after about 200 games of being abysmal.
Click to expand...

I don’t think it’s based on a handful of games. He’s always been a bit of a “nothing” player. People will talk about his POTY with Chelsea, but he’d have never won that if he wasn’t from their academy. He’s also a nothing player with England, to the point where he’s suspected of being the manager’s son whenever he is picked.
 
Spaghetti said:
I don’t think it’s based on a handful of games. He’s always been a bit of a “nothing” player. People will talk about his POTY with Chelsea, but he’d have never won that if he wasn’t from their academy. He’s also a nothing player with England, to the point where he’s suspected of being the manager’s son whenever he is picked.
Click to expand...

You know he scored 11 goals and had 10 assists in 2300 PL minutes two seasons ago, right? And that he scored in the CL quarter finals against Porto, semi final against Real Madrid and made an absolutely brilliant assist against City in the final that ensured their CL victory?

He has delivered many times in big games, and is a very efficient player, but unfortunately for us, we're not playing him to his strengths and I have no idea what Ten Hag was thinking with him. He'd look very good in Liverpool under Klopp like the rest of their midfielders.
 
Cantona’s Kung Fu Kick said:
Astonishing that people can be writing off Mount after a handful of games yet the same people wanting to shoehorn McTomminey into to the side after about 200 games of being abysmal.
Click to expand...
Curious - How so you know it's the same people? Can you prove that in any way?
 
zaafi said:
You know he scored 11 goals and had 10 assists in 2300 PL minutes two seasons ago, right? And that he scored in the CL quarter finals against Porto, semi final against Real Madrid and made an absolutely brilliant assist against City in the final that ensured their CL victory?

He has delivered many times in big games, and is a very efficient player, but unfortunately for us, we're not playing him to his strengths and I have no idea what Ten Hag was thinking with him. He'd look very good in Liverpool under Klopp like the rest of their midfielders.
Click to expand...

If we are just judging him on goals (which we shouldn’t) then he scored 3 goals last season. And averages 6 a season in the PL.

What I mean by nothing player, is that he has no stand out quality and no stand out position. He’s not fast, aggressive, doesn’t score a lot of goals, doesn’t create a lot of chances, set pieces are average, not great defensively. He’s nearly 25 and nobody really knows where he plays or what he’s supposed to do.
 
Spaghetti said:
I don’t think it’s based on a handful of games. He’s always been a bit of a “nothing” player. People will talk about his POTY with Chelsea, but he’d have never won that if he wasn’t from their academy. He’s also a nothing player with England, to the point where he’s suspected of being the manager’s son whenever he is picked.
Click to expand...
he should be done for England now Bellingham and Maddison have emerged, and Gallagher is basically the same player for England anyway in terms of being a player to bring off the bench to run around aimlessly
 
GlasgowCeltic said:
he should be done for England now Bellingham and Maddison have emerged, and Gallagher is basically the same player for England anyway in terms of being a player to bring off the bench to run around aimlessly
Click to expand...
I don't think he will prove himself to be a capable no.8 but there is a spot just ahead of Rice and behind Bellingham up for grabs. I don't think he has or will demonstrate the defensive (or tempo setting) capabilities for Southgate to play him there but if he can successfully play alongside Casemiro and with Bruno as the most advanced midfielder it will at least present an opportunity to get back in the starting line up.

I don't think it will happen but if ETH's 'ideal' midfield works then he can get back in.
 
Spaghetti said:
If we are just judging him on goals (which we shouldn’t) then he scored 3 goals last season. And averages 6 a season in the PL.

What I mean by nothing player, is that he has no stand out quality and no stand out position. He’s not fast, aggressive, doesn’t score a lot of goals, doesn’t create a lot of chances, set pieces are average, not great defensively. He’s nearly 25 and nobody really knows where he plays or what he’s supposed to do.
Click to expand...

I get your point, and it reminds me of the time Alphonso Davies said in an interview that when he saw Thomas Müller playing, he couldn't understand how he could be a professional football player for Bayern München. He doesn't have strikingly obvious qualities like dribbling, strength, passing maestro or pace, but it's the combination of being decent in every aspect in addition to his football intelligence and usage of space that makes him excellent. I'm not saying Mount is as good as Müller, but I think they are a bit similar in how they are perceived by fans, and the fact that Mount doesn't have a quality he is world class in, he is perceived as a nothing player who doesn't really contribute anything to the team or a game, even if it's very wrong.

I think he is very good at just keeping the game ticking, trying to keep the momentum and intensity up (unfortunately, he can't do it by himself - we are very badly coached in terms of high intensity pressing as a team). He is a decent enough passer who is very good at linking up with players. The problem here is that our players aren't used to play like that. We have relied on individual brilliance and moments for a very long time, so instead of building up an attack, making runs in midfield to provide space and opening passing lanes, they are passengers who jog around waiting for each other to create something, but that's just not going to work consistently in the PL if our ambitions is to win the PL.

I don't really think he is the answer to our problems, as they go far deeper than a player, but we should absolutely give him more time and let him play, especially with the form Bruno is in. You simply cannot let players who perform bad continue to play every game with no consequences. Either way, he is a good and useful player, but just not what we really needed.
 
zaafi said:
I get your point, and it reminds me of the time Alphonso Davies said in an interview that when he saw Thomas Müller playing, he couldn't understand how he could be a professional football player for Bayern München. He doesn't have strikingly obvious qualities like dribbling, strength, passing maestro or pace, but it's the combination of being decent in every aspect in addition to his football intelligence and usage of space that makes him excellent. I'm not saying Mount is as good as Müller, but I think they are a bit similar in how they are perceived by fans, and the fact that Mount doesn't have a quality he is world class in, he is perceived as a nothing player who doesn't really contribute anything to the team or a game, even if it's very wrong.

I think he is very good at just keeping the game ticking, trying to keep the momentum and intensity up (unfortunately, he can't do it by himself - we are very badly coached in terms of high intensity pressing as a team). He is a decent enough passer who is very good at linking up with players. The problem here is that our players aren't used to play like that. We have relied on individual brilliance and moments for a very long time, so instead of building up an attack, making runs in midfield to provide space and opening passing lanes, they are passengers who jog around waiting for each other to create something, but that's just not going to work consistently in the PL if our ambitions is to win the PL.

I don't really think he is the answer to our problems, as they go far deeper than a player, but we should absolutely give him more time and let him play, especially with the form Bruno is in. You simply cannot let players who perform bad continue to play every game with no consequences. Either way, he is a good and useful player, but just not what we really needed.
Click to expand...
Woah Woah. Mount is no Müller. That’s an apples & oranges comparison.

We don’t require plodders who ‘keep the game ticking’. This team requires a massive injection in quality.

Mount is the totally wrong player at the totally wrong time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.