Out - Fellaini, Herrera, Lukaku & Sanchez; In - Daniel James

McTominay and Pereira are the replacements for Herrera and Fellaini whilst James is the replacement for Sanchez so it’s only Lukaku we haven’t replaced yet although I can see Llorente being brought in simply because he’s a free transfer so can be signed outside of the transfer window.

Chong, Gomes, Greenwood and Garner have also been added in the first team squad too and as an actually squad we’re better for those four and the trio of McTominay, Pereira and James being given the first team games than Fellaini, Sanchez and Lukaku are (I’d have kept Herrera though) as none of them fit how we want to play or how we should play.

Yes we lack experience and we’re in a fight to get a Champions League spot and yes Ole probably isn’t the manager to take us back to where we want to be BUT at least Ole has a style, an identity and knows the club inside out and genuinely loves the club, it’s a shame we didn’t have Ole as Director Of Football with Pocchettino as head coach/manager as I think that as a duo would work perfectly for what we need long term.
 
We need to clear the deadwood first and get a healthy wage bill before we can go again, pretty simple.

Ole is throwing out the trash and moulding the squad in his image. Give it time.

Just because we haven’t got immediate replacements doesn’t mean we won’t have in the future.
 
davidmichael said:
McTominay and Pereira are the replacements for Herrera and Fellaini whilst James is the replacement for Sanchez so it’s only Lukaku we haven’t replaced yet although I can see Llorente being brought in simply because he’s a free transfer so can be signed outside of the transfer window.

Chong, Gomes, Greenwood and Garner have also been added in the first team squad too and as an actually squad we’re better for those four and the trio of McTominay, Pereira and James being given the first team games than Fellaini, Sanchez and Lukaku are (I’d have kept Herrera though) as none of them fit how we want to play or how we should play.

Yes we lack experience and we’re in a fight to get a Champions League spot and yes Ole probably isn’t the manager to take us back to where we want to be BUT at least Ole has a style, an identity and knows the club inside out and genuinely loves the club, it’s a shame we didn’t have Ole as Director Of Football with Pocchettino as head coach/manager as I think that as a duo would work perfectly for what we need long term.
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Martial has been upgraded to a regular starter (from being a bench player) and Greenwood has been upgraded from to the bench (from being a reserve team player).

Martial is the direct replacement for Lukaku and Greenwood is the direct replacement for Martial.
 
A) We are more skint than people think

B) The Glazers are looking for a way out so didn't invest too heavily

C) Our targets all turned us down

D) All of the above

Choose one.
I pray to God it's B but you just know that it's not.

Dance on the guy's grave in a heartbeat given the chance. That family is a cancer on our club. There's no way back from this unless they sell. They haven't got a clue what to do now Fergie is gone.
 
The caf constantly bleats on about “clearing out the deadwood”, and when we finally do, everyone complains.

No the plan is not to sell four players each window and bring in one prospect, but we’re finally, at long last, getting rid of these overpaid average players. We need to clear these players out before rebuilding, this is going to take time but this is a good start. I’d rather have players like Daniel James, who knows what it means to wear the shirt, than ridiculously overpaid, overweight, overrated primadonnas such as Lukaku and Sanchez.
 
settembrini said:
We do have a mixture of experience and youth unless somehow Mata, Matic, Lingard, Fred, Pogba, Martial and Rashford don't count as experienced players? Rashford is the greenest of that list and he's 'only' got 173 appearances for United plus 32 England caps.

Alongside them we have McTominay, James and Pereira. All have at least 50 senior appearances, all have been capped by their country.

That's 10 players for the 6 midfield/forward positions in the team before we get to the actually inexperienced players (Greenwood, Gomes, Chong, Garner). Greenwood is so far the only one to even make the bench this season and if the squad was kept as bloated as it had been in previous seasons then we wouldn't have that either.

If you want United to have a giant squad of senior players like recent seasons that's fine, I can understand why you would be upset with the current squad. But it's pretty silly to claim you are 'all for giving youth a chance' when our manager is trying to create a situation where our best young players can actually make the bench and it's upset you.
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If you do enough mental gymnastics then you can justify anything. There are our attacking options for 4 competitions -
  • Rashford (21 y/o)

  • Martial (23 y/o)

  • James (21 y/o, debut season, 1st season in top flight)

  • Lingard (26 y/o, no goal contribution since December)

  • Greenwood (17 y/o, 1st season in 1st team, was playing u18s last season)

  • Mata (31 y/o)

  • Chong (19 y/o, still plays reserve games)

  • Gomes (18 y/o, still plays reserve games)

Rashford and Martial have played a lot of matches between them but at the end of day they're still young players who will still make mistakes. They are still developing and will have their ups and downs throughout the season, problem for us is we've no options but to throw kids in if that were to occur.

Jury is still out on the trio of McTominay, James and Pereira being good enough to make at the club.

There's no point in throwing youth in spades if you're not creating the ideal environment for them to succeed, they will be thrown into the deep end to rescue and win matches for us when in an ideal world they should be learning their trade. Remind me how well this experiment of young players making the bench went in 2015 under van Gaal? These are the players who played for us that season, mainly because van Gaal gutted the squad to such an extent, he had no option but to play the kids
  • Nick Powell (Now at Stoke City, after 3 unsuccessful loan spells at Hull, Wigan and Leicester)

  • Guillermo Varela (Now at FC Copenhagen)

  • Paddy McNair (Now at Middlesbrough)

  • Donald Love (Now at Shrewsbury Town)

  • Cameron Borthwick-Jackson (Now at Scunthorpe United)

  • Will Keane (Now at Ipswich Town)

  • James Wilson (Now at Aberdeen)

  • Adnan Januzaj (Now at Real Socediad)
  • Tyler Blackett (Now at Reading)
With exception of Januzaj, none of them are playing in 1st Division of their respective league. Only player to come good through that experiment was Marcus Rashford. I understand fans want to be romantic and want youth players to succeed, but there's a very very tiny percentage of players who make the step up from youth football to top level. The parallels I see with van Gaals' last season and Oles' current are staggering, both got rid of experienced players from the squad and pinned their hopes on existing squad players to step up along with youth. Ole is doing the same thing with Rashford and Martial like van Gaal did with Rooney and Depay, we all know how that season went for the club.
 
If you look at it like that, it looks awful, but rightly or wrongly - and I guess time will tell whether they're good enough or not, Ole has put a lot of trust in the youth.

Out:

Fellaini, Herrera, Lukaku, Sanchez

In:

McTominay, Gomes, Garner, James, Greenwood

Hopefully they can step up, otherwise we could be in trouble.
 
People are in here saying McTom & Perriera are replacements for Herrera & Fellaini when we already needed an extra midfielder with all 4 here.

The recruitment has been non-existent & anyone lapping up the, “give youth a chance” nonsense are deluded.

Reasonable fans expected a squad capable of getting back into the Top4 [yes, standards have fallen] but how can OgS be expected to compete with this squad.

If OgS gets Top4 this season I want him knighted, he’s not playing a fair game.
 
I'm happy we're giving youth a chance, but doing it with so many players at the same time won't do them or the team any good.

Young players always benefit from having top experienced players around them, specially at big clubs where there's this added pressure to perform. Now all of a sudden having a good season will depend entirely on how they perform.

Ole had a big challenge ahead of him, and now that challenge is almost impossible in my humble opinion. I expect to see some great performances this season, but there's no way this squad is capable of top 4 finish. We basically need a season where none of our key players gets injured, and where all the young players need to deliver. when in fact, we can't even get our best players to deliver consistently. Ole won't make it till may, but it's really not on him this time.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
If you look at it like that, it looks awful, but rightly or wrongly - and I guess time will tell whether they're good enough or not, Ole has put a lot of trust in the youth.

Out:

Fellaini, Herrera, Lukaku, Sanchez

In:

McTominay, Gomes, Garner, James, Greenwood

Hopefully they can step up, otherwise we could be in trouble.
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This is exactly my problem, we're placing too much pressure and expectations on the kids to step up. None of them have even had loans to lower league sides either, and now we're expecting them to step up for Man Utd at senior level. The scrutiny and pressure surrounding the club is so high that many experienced pros break, how can we have the slighted idea on how these kids will cope under that pressure?

This sort of management cannot be excused at any level, nevermind the state we find ourselves in. People are pointing to McTominay and Pereira being replacement for Fellaini and Herrera, it's almost as if they have forgotten we were in dire need of injection of quality when all 4 of them were together at the club. Now we are just down to 2 and people expect them to magically improve as footballers. Same applies with regards to Martial being 'replacement' for Lukaku who is 20 goal a season forward and Greenwood being a Martial 'replacement' who is 10-15 goal a season player himself. This is without even pointing to the obvious fact of squad being in dire need of more goals. :wenger:
 
Yes we should have brought 1 or 2 more in but you're listing the 'outs' like they were all first XI players and we've been decimated.

Other than Herrera, I'm not arsed they're gone and while "youth" hasn't instantly found its way into the first XI, they're more in the match day squad so closer... at least they've got a chance now of showing if good enough or not.
 
El Zoido said:
The caf constantly bleats on about “clearing out the deadwood”, and when we finally do, everyone complains.

No the plan is not to sell four players each window and bring in one prospect, but we’re finally, at long last, getting rid of these overpaid average players. We need to clear these players out before rebuilding, this is going to take time but this is a good start. I’d rather have players like Daniel James, who knows what it means to wear the shirt, than ridiculously overpaid, overweight, overrated primadonnas such as Lukaku and Sanchez.
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If the CAF was a person he'd be a real fecking aszhole. But it's a collection of people, and there's always someone who is not happy or likes to complain. We have almost no use for Sanchez so goodbye. We probably should have obtained another striker and midfielder though. We've already got three injuries it appears: Bailly (of course), Shaw (again), and Martial (hoping short term). And we are all of 2 games into the season!
 
El Zoido said:
The caf constantly bleats on about “clearing out the deadwood”, and when we finally do, everyone complains.

No the plan is not to sell four players each window and bring in one prospect, but we’re finally, at long last, getting rid of these overpaid average players. We need to clear these players out before rebuilding, this is going to take time but this is a good start. I’d rather have players like Daniel James, who knows what it means to wear the shirt, than ridiculously overpaid, overweight, overrated primadonnas such as Lukaku and Sanchez.
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We've recently extended Jones, Rojo and Young's contracts. Two of them are injury prone central defenders whom nobody seems to want to buy, Young is perceived as a liability and lacking quality, simple as. It's all about balance, we've we've lost two midfielders and a donkey, we're about to lose another attacking option, shit as it is, in Sanchez. We haven't gotten rid of any of our defenders. Bailly, Jones, Rojo, Lindelof, Maguire, Smalling, Tuanzebe, perhaps TFM, even fecking Darmian is still here, poor guy. We've got 7 central defenders (8 if you count Timbo) for two positions, then look at our attacking and midfield options, try not to count the kids with 0 experience for a second. Rashford and Martial as strikers; Mata, JLingzboiiiii, perhaps Pereira for #10; James for the wing. And that's it from the 'senior' players (mind you that James is what, 21? same for Rashford, Martial slightly older, good luck expecting any sort of continuity and consistency from them). Then you've got Chong, Gomes and Greenwood from the young lads. That's 9 players for 4 positions.

It's like saying 'hey, I've recently bought another two pairs of shoes, now I've got 10 pairs of those' and you're walking around without trousers. Getting rid of deadwood is fine and all but when you consider the above, the numbers and the contracts that we've recently extended with your Joneses, you really, really have to reach deep into your delusion to convince yourself that there's some sort of integrity and strategy behind it all.
 
It's mental. We're undercooked in 3 or 4 positions in the team, and I don't think there's much hope of us doing anything about it in January either.
 
El Zoido said:
The caf constantly bleats on about “clearing out the deadwood”, and when we finally do, everyone complains.

No the plan is not to sell four players each window and bring in one prospect, but we’re finally, at long last, getting rid of these overpaid average players. We need to clear these players out before rebuilding, this is going to take time but this is a good start. I’d rather have players like Daniel James, who knows what it means to wear the shirt, than ridiculously overpaid, overweight, overrated primadonnas such as Lukaku and Sanchez.
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Exactly.

There's no point in only replacing squad personnel, because the negative squad culture is going to continue to stick around until it's rooted out completely.

The key is to clear out the players who lack commitment and desire.

The United dressing room is full of bad apples spoiling the barrel. Whilst the situation is not as bad as the drinking culture of the 80s, Ole needs to follow the Fergie model and cast aside the players who are causing the underlying issues; even if that means selling some of our most talented players.

We need to rebuild the squad the bottom up.

There are some famous stories from the 90s and 00s, when the United players would go away and train with England. Apparently, during the training drills, you could always tell the difference between the United players and the Arsenal/Chelsea/Liverpool players. While everyone else was treating piggy in the middle or boxes or rondos as a casual warm up, the United lads were fighting tooth and nail to win every single round. It was our competitive spirit, never say die attitude and desperation to win which made us great. And it was Fergie's genius which made that spirit an integral part of the United Way.

For me, the clearing of the deadwood is about clearing out the players who don't appreciate what it means to be a winner at all costs and who don't feel that United is a club worth giving that level of effort for. I mean, it's fair enough if a player thinks that Real or Barca are the pinnacle. But if that means they don't think that United are the pinnacle as well, they really shouldn't be at the club. A world class player who gives 90% of their potential is not really world class anymore.
 
davidmichael said:
McTominay and Pereira are the replacements for Herrera and Fellaini whilst James is the replacement for Sanchez so it’s only Lukaku we haven’t replaced yet although I can see Llorente being brought in simply because he’s a free transfer so can be signed outside of the transfer window.
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Great replacement options, I see.
 
Who plays if both Rashford and Martial are our? Which is a very likely scenario some point this season with us being in 4 competitions.

James Greenwood mata ?

Rashford & Martial both need 20 goal seasons for us to have a chance of finishing in top 4 or winning Europa.
 
Disastrous window. Signing Llorente would make it even more disastrous.
 
Who decided this? Woodward or old or both? Whoever it is, is mindless. Yeh sure the idea is to get rid of deadwood but then replace it...
 
Sanchez is at best our 3rd choice left winger and striker as it stands. It would take injuries to two of Rashford, Martial and James for him to potentially start.

If all 3 were out you could still see us going with a front line of Lingard, Greenwood and Mata before using him. What teams keep a £350k+ a week player for that role?

Liverpool have Origi and Shaqiri as their back ups before they are on to Brewster.

The quality of the first choice front 3 in the first place is the issue, not the depth.
 
Dante said:
Martial has been upgraded to a regular starter (from being a bench player) and Greenwood has been upgraded from to the bench (from being a reserve team player).

Martial is the direct replacement for Lukaku and Greenwood is the direct replacement for Martial.
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We already struggled to score goals last season - do you really expect Martial and Greenwood to replace the 20+ goals Lukaku scored?
 
I've yet to see a team improve by selling players, no matter how crap they've been.
Usually you have to replace them with better players.

If news comes out this week that Martial is out injured we will look a laughing stock. The Europa Cup hasn't even started, strap in it's going to be a bumpy ride.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
We already struggled to score goals last season - do you really expect Martial and Greenwood to replace the 20+ goals Lukaku scored?
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Between them, Lukaku and Martial got 22 goals in the league last season (3754 minutes).

Can Martial and Greenwood match that?

Well, the pair already has 2 in 3 games (309 minutes), so they're well on the way.
 
Dante said:
Between them, Lukaku and Martial got 22 goals in the league last season.

Can Martial and Greenwood match that?

Well, Martial already has 2 in 3 games, so they're well on the way.
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Hopefully Martial can keep it up and score all those goals this season. As for Greenwood, I think it's too much pressure on him and he's not quite ready yet - if he manages even five goals this season I'll be thrilled.
 
Dante said:
Between them, Lukaku and Martial got 22 goals in the league last season.

Can Martial and Greenwood match that?

Well, Martial already has 2 in 3 games, so they're well on the way.
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We finished 6th in the league last season.

To finish Top4 [a ridiculous target for our club but we are who we are] we would need to better that goal total handsomely.

Has Greenwood even scored a league goal yet?!

Lukaku can have piss poor season & still arse end his way into 12 league goals; the way people act as if it’s an inevitability for Greenwood is lunacy.
 
Kush said:
Wow, talk about having head in the sand.

Lukaku an 'overpaid, underperforming waster' got 42 goals for us in 2 season. That's an average of 21 goals, who'll score his goals? That's without accounting for goals Herrera and Fellaini would chip in from midfield, ~around 10 every season. Sanchez was a total waste, but with our squad so unbelievably thin we needed him to go through matches in Europa league. What's the point in saving 40% of his wages when that player isn't even guaranteed to leave next summer?



Experience that Lukaku offers is 20+ goals every season. You can't expect kids to be thrown into deep end and expect them to perform, you just need to see Greenwood performance vs Palace to get my point. With regards to Sanchez, he was an option despite being utterly useless in last 18 months. In case you forgot, we have 2 cups in England and Europa League to contend with besides PL.
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Exactly right. Can’t believe we’re letting Sanchez go. We’re so light in attack it’s ridiculous.

It’s such poor management of our club from Ole to the top
 
Kostur said:
We've recently extended Jones, Rojo and Young's contracts. Two of them are injury prone central defenders whom nobody seems to want to buy, Young is perceived as a liability and lacking quality, simple as. It's all about balance, we've we've lost two midfielders and a donkey, we're about to lose another attacking option, shit as it is, in Sanchez. We haven't gotten rid of any of our defenders. Bailly, Jones, Rojo, Lindelof, Maguire, Smalling, Tuanzebe, perhaps TFM, even fecking Darmian is still here, poor guy. We've got 7 central defenders (8 if you count Timbo) for two positions, then look at our attacking and midfield options, try not to count the kids with 0 experience for a second. Rashford and Martial as strikers; Mata, JLingzboiiiii, perhaps Pereira for #10; James for the wing. And that's it from the 'senior' players (mind you that James is what, 21? same for Rashford, Martial slightly older, good luck expecting any sort of continuity and consistency from them). Then you've got Chong, Gomes and Greenwood from the young lads. That's 9 players for 4 positions.

It's like saying 'hey, I've recently bought another two pairs of shoes, now I've got 10 pairs of those' and you're walking around without trousers. Getting rid of deadwood is fine and all but when you consider the above, the numbers and the contracts that we've recently extended with your Joneses, you really, really have to reach deep into your delusion to convince yourself that there's some sort of integrity and strategy behind it all.
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We’ve been trying to move defenders on. Smalling, Rojo, and Darmian, all would be sold if the right offer was on the table. Possibly Bailly too, had he not got injured. Young is decent cover and nearing retirement age anyway, no problem with him staying. Jones is the only odd one for me, but perhaps he’s happy with a squad role & Ole sees a use for him.

It might be a rough year but I think we need this. It can’t all be fixed in one summer. Clear a lot off the wage bill and don’t panic buy, but bring in the correct targets in future windows. I’m happy with how we handled the Dybala situation because I’m sure that in previous years we would have offered him silly money he couldn’t refuse. Not anymore, and that’s great.

It’s not going to happen overnight but I genuinely feel like we’re moving in the right direction and building a proper team. I hope we can keep ticking over this season and not have a total collapse because if we can keep what we have and add to it, we’ll be in a good place.
 
Paying Sanchez to play for Inter Milan whilst having so little first team options is boarderline treasonous, I wonder what Neville will have to say about this one.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
We finished 6th in the league last season.

To finish Top4 [a ridiculous target for our club but we are who we are] we would need to better that goal total handsomely.

Has Greenwood even scored a league goal yet?!

Lukaku can have piss poor season & still arse end his way into 12 league goals; the way people act as if it’s an inevitability for Greenwood is lunacy.
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Who said that?

Martial is a CF this year, having played on the left last season. He could easily get 20+ goals at the current rate. Greenwood is good for at least 2.

We finished 6th because of our defence. We conceded 54 compared to 3rd place Chelsea at 39 and 4th place Tottenham at 39. Our attack was comparable with 65 scored to Chelsea's 63 and Tottenham's 67.

And this season, our attack is already much better than the last few seasons. I don't think it's much too expect us to improve that number. Our defence is also much improved (a wonder goal and two hoofs aside, we've barely given away any clear cut chances).

We're dominating possession like under LvG, but taking more shots on goal than under Jose. A couple of penalties and VAR calls the other way, and we'd be on 9 points out of 9 with nobody able to say we were lucky to be there.
 
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When you put it like that it does seem pretty brutal. Fellaini is no big loss, Sanchez either. Martial is getting his chance to step up and meet the expectations of his gigantic fee, hopefully he can replace Lukaku but it's a gamble. But Herrera is the real problem. Pereira may be able to step up, but that leaves no true cover. Mata can't play against a top pressing team anymore.
 
"Ole's at the wheel. He smiles! Positiviteh. High press. Young & British. Lindelöf - Maguire both ball playing center backs. Glazers've spent enough money. We outspent our opponents. It's OK. Don't panic."

05onfire1_xp-jumbo-v2.jpg
 
Dante said:
Who said that?

Martial is a CF this year, having played on the left last season. He could easily get 20+ goals at the current rate. Greenwood is good for 2 to 5.
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Either you’re expecting Martial to score 22 goals+ or you’re [somewhat] pinning your hopes on a talented yet unproven attacking talent.

You’ve just said Greenwood is good for 2 to 5 as if it is inevitable, what are you basing this on? I ‘think’ he’ll end up with more btw but that’s a ‘gut feeling’.

As I said we’ve lost a striker that donkey kicks his way into double figures & are acting like it’s ok to try out an untested youth product & a guy who in his one season as a no.9 didn’t get to 20 goals.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
Either you’re expecting Martial to score 22 goals+ or you’re [somewhat] pinning your hopes on a talented yet unproven attacking talent.

You’ve just said Greenwood is good for 2 to 5 as if it is inevitable, what are you basing this on? I ‘think’ he’ll end up with more btw but that’s a ‘gut feeling’.

As I said we’ve lost a striker that donkey kicks his way into double figures & are acting like it’s ok to try out an untested youth product & a guy who in his one season as a no.9 didn’t get to 20 goals.
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Martial can can get 20 as a striker. Greenwood will get at least 2 as a sub. It's not that hard.

I go to reserve games. I'll be at OT on Friday. I know how good Greenwood is.
 
AFC NimbleThumb said:
Either you’re expecting Martial to score 22 goals+ or you’re [somewhat] pinning your hopes on a talented yet unproven attacking talent.

You’ve just said Greenwood is good for 2 to 5 as if it is inevitable, what are you basing this on? I ‘think’ he’ll end up with more btw but that’s a ‘gut feeling’.

As I said we’ve lost a striker that donkey kicks his way into double figures & are acting like it’s ok to try out an untested youth product & a guy who in his one season as a no.9 didn’t get to 20 goals.
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These are young and extremely promising players and need their chance eventually. United is a club who should never be shy about giving them these chances. We're inevitably in a transition season where even with a perfect summer, we arent challenging for the title. It's as good a time as any to give the young players a chance as we are in with a good shot to get 4th as is, and the potential is a massive step up in all of them to the extent that no signing would improve us.

Everyone complaining about Rashford and Martial not being proven... well theyve never had the chance to have that main role. 1 season of it could be all it takes for them, and their at the right age and right stage in their developments for it.
 
Dante said:
Who said that?

Martial is a CF this year, having played on the left last season. He could easily get 20+ goals at the current rate. Greenwood is good for at least 2.

We finished 6th because of our defence. We conceded 54 compared to 3rd place Chelsea at 39 and 4th place Tottenham at 39. Our attack was comparable with 65 scored to Chelsea's 63 and Tottenham's 67.

And this season, our attack is already much better than the last few seasons. I don't think it's much too expect us to improve that number. Our defence is also much improved (a wonder goal and two hoofs aside, we've barely given away any clear cut chances).

We're dominating possession like under LvG, but taking more shots on goal than under Jose. A couple of penalties and VAR calls the other way, and we'd be on 9 points out of 9 with nobody able to say we were lucky to be there.
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Dante said:
Between them, Lukaku and Martial got 22 goals in the league last season (3754 minutes).

Can Martial and Greenwood match that?

Well, the pair already has 2 in 3 games (309 minutes), so they're well on the way.
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:lol:

Ashley Barnes has 4 goals in 250 minutes, Teemu Pukki has 5 in 263 minutes. You cannot use such a small sample size and extrapolate it through the entire season which has plenty of up and downs. Otherwise both Barnes and Pukki would be contending for Ballon d'Or next season.

Fact of the matter is, highest tally of Martial in PL is 11 goals. Yes, he's playing centrally but does that mean his productivity will magically go up by 200%? Especially when we as a team create so little? Same with Rashford who breached double figure mark for the first time last season with 10 goals. Snap out of cuckoo land. Martial and Rashford suddenly won't start scoring 40 goals between them in one PL season. Even Raheem Sterling who has become so prolific and plays for a City side who scorer for fun, hasn't breached 20+ goal mark once in PL.

I don't even know how to address the goal scoring tally column, everyone knows we are short on goals in the squad. In fact, Ole specifically name checked adding a goal scorer in the summer to rectify that. Not only we didn't do that but we went on and sold our most prolific striker, who in his worst ever PL season scored 12 goals (a higher tally than any forward in our current squad). Pogba only scored 1 more goal than Lukaku, and 7 of them were penalties.

Even in a hypothetical scenario Rashford sustains the 10 goal tally despite playing wide and starts taking penalties, we are looking at 17-20 goals. But then, that means Pogba goals in midfield are less. So, we are back to square one.

In a side already struggling for goals, we've sold our main goalscorer and one former goalscorer with kids in Greenwood and Chong. At the same time we are pinning our hopes on Rashford and Martial to become 20+ goalscorers, Pogba to keep up the productivity without taking penalties, and kids to step up seamlessly. While that might work out well in FM/FIFA, chances of same happening on pitch are pretty remote.

Funny how you left out Arsenal? Is it because they scored 73 goals last season and added a prolific winger on top of that?
 
bosnian_red said:
These are young and extremely promising players and need their chance eventually. United is a club who should never be shy about giving them these chances. We're inevitably in a transition season where even with a perfect summer, we arent challenging for the title. It's as good a time as any to give the young players a chance as we are in with a good shot to get 4th as is, and the potential is a massive step up in all of them to the extent that no signing would improve us.

Everyone complaining about Rashford and Martial not being proven... well theyve never had the chance to have that main role. 1 season of it could be all it takes for them, and their at the right age and right stage in their developments for it.
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Good point.

I’m not adverse to Rashford & Martial taking 2 of the 4 attacking positions; I’m actually in favour of this but signing a Right Winger & an Attacking Midfielder wouldn’t stand in the way of this.

I don’t see selling Lukaku & ridding the club of Sanchez as good moves in isolation, when no upgrades/alternatives have been purchased.

Martial has an injury which now leaves us ridiculously light up front; Greenwood has made the bench but Gomes & Chong are still behinw people like Mata so the “youth, courage” troupe rings hollow to me.

I’m all for giving youth a chance but I’m left asking, are there no other young players in world football we could have recruited this summer. We always seem to buy high, this summer was the perfect opportunity to buy ‘the next Maguire’, ‘the next Kante’ etc. imo & instead we’ve got a young first 11 backed by old subs & a number of youth players that are not truly in contention.
 
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